Sapphiric God: Esoteric Speculation of the Body Divine in Biblical and PostBiblical Jewish Tradition: Part I

2008 Wesley Williams

Margaret Barkers work to reconstruct the mythic tradition of the Jerusalem Temple, while not convincing in all of its details, is nevertheless noteworthy.1 Particularly notable is Barkers suggestion that incarnation had a place in this tradition.2 Relying mainly on the allegorical exegesis of Philo of Alexandria (Spec. I.81; QE II.85) and Josephus (Ant. III 151-186), both of whom explained the four colored fabrics used in the manufacture of the temple veil and high priestly garments (Exod. 26:1, 31, 36; 28:6, 31, 33) as symbols of the four natural elements and noting that the high priest wore the Tetragrammaton engraved on his golden diadem (Exod. 28:36), Barker suggests that the veil and sacred vestments are the earliest expression of the idea of incarnation, the presence of God on earth in material form.3 A radical thesis, but Barker is not alone in positing a Jewish tradition of incarnation.4 In a fascinating article Crispin FletcherLouis similarly outlined the relevance of this Temple theology for the early Christian belief in the incarnation.5 The symbolism of the high priestly garments play an important role in both reconstructions.6 Exodus 28 prescribes for Aaron and his sons an elaborate costume whose outer vestments included a long dark blue robe (mel),7 the hem of which was lined with cloth pomegranates and flowers and gold bells; an
1 See especially Margaret Barker, Temple Theology: An Introduction (London: SPCK, 2004); The Great High Priest: The Temple Roots of Christian Liturgy (London and New York: T&T Clark, 2003); On Earth as it is in Heaven: Temple Symbolism in the New Testament (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1995); The Great Angel: A Study if Israels Second God (Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1992); The Gate of Heaven: The History and Symbolism of the Temple in Jerusalem (London: SPCK, 1991); The Older Testament: The Survival of Themes from the Ancient Royal Cult in Sectarian Judaism and Early Christian (London: SPCK, 1987). 2 Temple Theology, 30-31;On Earth, ix. 3 Gate of Heaven, 105; Temple Theology, 30, 58; Great High Priest, 136-140. 4 For various views on the place, or lack thereof, of incarnation in Jewish tradition see Alon Goshem-Gottstein, Judaisms and Incarnational Theologies: Mapping Out the Parameters of Dialogue, Journal of Ecumenical Studies 39 (2002): 219-247; J. Andrew Dearman, Theophany, Anthropomorphism, and the Imago Dei: Some Observations about the Incarnation in the Light of the Old Testament, in Stephen T. Davis, Daniel Kendall, SJ, Gerald OCollins, SJ (edd.), The Incarnation: An Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Incarnation of the Son of God (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002) 31-46; Alan Segal, The Incarnation: The Jewish Milieu, in ibid., 116-139;Elliot R. Wolfson, Judaism and Incarnation: The Imaginal Body of God, in Tikva Frymer-Kensky et al (edd.), Christianity in Jewish Terms (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 2000) 239-254; idem, Neusners The Incarnation of God, JQR 81 (1990): 219-222; Jacob Neusner, The Incarnation of God: The Character of Divinity in Formative Judaism (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988); idem, Is the God of Judaism Incarnate? Rel. Stud. 24 (1988): 213-238. 5 Gods Image, His Cosmic Temple and the High Priest: Towards an Historical and Theological Account of the Incarnation, in T. Desmond Alexander and Simon Cathercole (edd.), Heaven on Earth: The Temple in Biblical Theology (Carlisle: Paternoster, 2004) 81-99. 6 On symbolizing these garments in Jewish tradition see Michael D. Swartz, The Semiotics of the Priestly Vestments in Ancient Judaism, in Albert I. Baumgarten (ed.), Sacrifice in Religious Experience (Leiden: Brill, 2002) 57-80. 7 7 Since the demise of the tekhelet production industry ca. 500-750 CE, its dye source, method of manufacture and hue are unknown. The modern attempt to rediscover these secrets began with Rabbi Gershom Henoch Leiner (1839-91), the Hasidic Rebbe of Radzyn, Poland, who thought the source was a cuttlefish and its color blue-black (see his Sefrei HaTekhelet Radzyn [Bnei Brak, 1999]). Today, scientists such as Irving Ziderman and Baruch Sterman have proclaimed the miracle rediscovery of the biblical tekhelet and its source, though both have proffered differing hues for their authentic tekhelet. Sterman and Ptil Tekhelet, the Israel-based nonprofit organization he co-founded which manufactures and distributes this tekhelet, argues that the source of the dye is the Murex snail found in the Mediterranean off the coast of northern Israel and that the hue is a rather bright indigo blue. Ziderman, on the other hand, posits the same source (the Murex snail) but argues that the authentic hue is violet or blueish purple (purpura hyacinthine). See Irving Ziderman, A Modern Miracle The Rediscovery of Blue Dye for Tallit Tassels, Israel Yearbook 1988, 287-292; idem, Revival of Biblical Tekhelet Dyeing with Banded Dye-Murex (Ph. Trunculus): Chemical Anomalies, in Dyes in History and Archaeology 16/17 (2001): 87-90; idem, First Identification of Authentic Tklet, BASOR 265 (1987): 25-33; idem, 3600 Years of Purple-Shell Dyeing: Characterization of Hyacinthine Purple (tekhelet), in Howard L. Needles and S. Haig Zeronian (ed.), Historic Textile and Paper Materials. Conservation and Characterization (Washington, DC: American Chemical Society, 1986), 190; idem, Seashells and Ancient Purple Dyeing, BA June (1990): 98-101; Ari Greenspan, The Search for the Biblical Blue, Bible Review (February 2003): 32-39; Baruch Sterman, The Science of Tekhelet, in Rabbi Alfred Cohen (ed.), Tekhelet: The Renaissance of a Mitzvah, (New York: The Michael Scharf Publication Trust of Yeshiva University Press, 1996). For critiques of both Zidermans and Sterman et als tekhelet v. P.F. McGovern, R.H. Michel and M. Saltzman, Has Authentic Tklet Been Identified, BASOR 269 (1988): 81-84 and Zidermans response BASOR 269 (1988): 84-89. The most serious challenge to Sterman et al, and Ziderman indirectly, is from Mendel E. Singer, Understanding the Criteria for the Chilazon, Journal of Halacha and Contemporary Society (hereafter JHCS) 42 (2001): 5-29. See the debate that ensued between he and Sterman: JHCS 43 (2002): 112-124; 44 (2002): 97-110 and Rabbi Yechiel Yitzchok Perrs contribution to the debate, Letter to the Editor, 44 (2002): 125-128. Whatever the dye-source of tekhelet turns out to be (if ever that secret is rediscovered) it is clear that in rabbinic tradition the color was dark blue, even blue-black. Rabbi Isaac Herzog demonstrated this in his D. Litt thesis submitted to London University in 1913 on the subject tekhelet (now translated and published as Hebrew Porphyrology, in Ehud Spanier (ed.), The Royal Purple and the Biblical Blue, Argaman and Tekhelet [Jerusalem: Keter Publishing House Jerusalem Ltd, 1987]). As he shows, the classic Talmudic description of tekhelet as the color of the sky and sea must be understood against the background of its Palestinian-Mediterranean locale where the cloudless Palestinian sky in bright sunshine is dark blue closely bordering on black (ibid., 64, 67, 81, 89-90) and the Mediterranean along the Palestinian coast was likewise deep, dark blue appearing almost black to the eye (Ibid., 90). The early Palestinian midrash Sifr to Numbers 115 describes tekhelet as like the deep blue of the night. See also Num. R. 2.7 where sapphiric blue is described as black. Both Philo and Josephus, who lived during the Second Temple and therefore likely witnessed the curtains,

apron-like ephod (Heb. phd), made of gold, of blue, purple, and crimson yarns, and of fine twisted linen (Exod. 28:6) upon which was fastened a breastplate (hen) consisting of twelve precious stones; a turban with a golden frontlet or diadem (ss zhb) engraved with the Tetragrammaton8; and a sash. Once a year (Yom Kippur) the high priest doffs this ornate and multicolored garment and wears instead a simple white linen tunic (Lev. 16:4). Barker, following a long Jewish and Christian tradition, understands these garments somatically as metaphor for the body of the high priest and the God whom he represented (she says he was) in the Temple.9 In this reconstruction particular attention is given to the white linen tunic, which, we are told, signifies the heavenly body of light of God, the angels, and the resurrected.10 What kind of body then does the blue robe signify? A material body for sure, but if the white of the tunic symbolizes a light-body, what somatic significance might the dark blue have? Barker and other commentators on the somatic significance of these garments have failed to offer anything in this regard.11 Might it signify a dark blue body? What sense could this have? We offer here further evidence of an incarnational temple tradition in which the high priestly garments play a prominent role. We suggest that the blue of the mel possessed as much significance in this tradition of speculation on the Body Divine as did the white of the tunic. We also suggest that this priestly tradition is rooted in the mythic tradition of the ancient Near East.

veils, and priestly garments themselves, describe tekhelet as dark or blackish blue. Josephus, The Jewish War Book 5, 212-13; Philo v. Spec. I.85 and QE 2.123 where he describes the high priests robe as almost black, and black is the color of ink and is opaque. Rashi, in his commentary on Numbers (Bemidbar 15:41) said tekhelet resembled the blackened or darkened sky and in Maimonides commentary (Brachat 1:4) he compares its color to that of the gemstone tarshsh, thus deep, dark blue (see below). Thus, the contrast that R. Joseph B. Soloveitchik sets up between Rashis dark and punitive night time blue and Maimonides clear and unthreatening midday azure blue is unwarranted. See Rabbi Abraham R. Besdin, Man of Faith, 2:26ff. Herzog thus concluded that the tekhelet colour was regarded by the Tannaites as well as by Philo and Josephus as akin to black (Hebrew Porphyrology, 137, n. 292). Rabbi Leibel Reznick (The Hidden Blue, Jewish Action 52 (1991-92): 54), based on the same sources, reached the same conclusion: What color is the heavenly throne? Talmud Yerushalmi (Brachot 1:2)says that it is like sapphire, dark blueRambam (Hilchot Tzitzith 2:1) says that Techelet is the color of a clear, noonday sky. However, in his commentary to the Mishnah (Brachot 1:4), he says that Techelet is similar to the gemstone Tarshish. All the Targumim (Aramaic translators of the Torah)say Tarshish is aquamarine. Rashi (BaMidbar 15:41) says that Techelet is the color of the darkening evening sky. That would seem to be a black-blue. The common description of tekhelet as bright or sky blue (e.g. Hebert Block, The Missing Thread of Blue, JBQ 31 [2003]: 246-7) must therefore be qualified. 8 According to the normal reading of the MT (Ex. 28:36) the fastened to the mitre bears the words , usually rendered Holy to Yahweh. In 1924 James Edward Hogg (A Note on Two Points in Aarons Headdress, JTS 26 [1924-25]: 72-75) argued that the proper reading of Ex. 28:36 is simply and engrave on it (i.e. the ) the holy name YHWH. He later supported this reading with evidence from late Second Temple texts: The Inscription on Aarons Head-Dress. JTS 28 (1926-27): 287-88. 9 On the somatic reading of these garments in Jewish and Christian literature v. especially Gary Anderson, Genesis of Perfection: Adam and Eve in Jewish and Christian Imagination (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001) 117-134; idem, The Garments of Skin in Apocryphal Narrative and Biblical Commentary, in James L. Kugel (ed.), Studies in Ancient Midrash, (Cambridge: Harvard University Center for Jewish Studies, 2001) 110-125; Stephen N. Lambden, From fig leaves to fingernails: some notes on the garments of Adam and Eve in the Hebrew Bible and select early postbiblical Jewish Writings, in Morris and Sawyer, Walk in the Garden, 86-87 [art.=74-90]. On Philo see QG 1.53; Leg. All. 2:55-56; Somn. 1.43; Jung Hoon Kim, The Significance of Clothing Imagery in the Pauline Corpus (London and New York: T&T Clark International, 2004) 44-52; April D. De Conick and Jarl Fossum, Stripped before God: A New Interpretation of Logion 37 in the Gospel of Thomas, VC 45 (1991): 123-150, esp. 128-130; Wayne A. Meeks, The Image of the Androgyne: Some Uses of A Symbol in Earliest Christianity, HR 13 (1974): 187-88. 10 Margaret Baker, The Second Person, The Way 43 (January 2004): 123 [109-128]; Gate of Heaven, 113-114; On Earth, 65-66. 11 Barker says simply The veil and the vestment being made of identical fabric is key to understanding the role of the high priest and the temple context of the concept of Incarnation. The vested high priest in the Temple was the Glory of the Lord in matter. Temple Theology, 30. In her exposition on the symbolism of the temple cult (On Earth) Barker discuses in a chapter entitled The Robe (Chapter Five) the corporeal meaning of the white tunic, but says nothing of what this means in terms of the dark blue robe. In other writings, Barker describes the blue robe as the visible form of the high priest (Beyond the Veil of the Temple: The High Priestly Origins of the Apocalypses, SJT 51 [1998] 4; Great High Priest,190) and as a symbol of incarnation (Time and Eternity: the world of the Temple, The Month January 2001: 21), but does not specifically speculate on the color of the robe. See also Hugh Nibley, Sacred Vestments, in idem, Temple and Cosmos: Beyond This Ignorant Present, The Collected Works of Hugh Nibley: Volume 12 Ancient History, edited by Dan E. Norton (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company; Provo, Utah: FARMS, 1992) 91-138, esp. 114-123 and John A. Tvedtnes, Priestly Clothing in Biblical Times, in Parry, Temples of the Ancient world, 649-704, esp. 662-680; both authors, in exploring the symbolic (somatic) significance of the high priestly garments, discuss the white linen tunic but not the blue robe.

1. The Body Divine in Ancient Near Eastern Myth Ancient Israel stood in linguistic, cultural and religious continuity with her neighbors in the Levant.12 Morton Smith suggested in a classic article that Israel participated in the common theology of the ancient Near East.13 However ill-defined this concept of an ANE common theology, it is clear that the God of Israel and the gods of the ANE actually differed less than has been supposed.14 The gods of the ANE and Mediterranean were transcendently anthropomorphic, to use Ronald Hendels term.15 That is to say, the gods possessed a form of human shape but of divine substance and quality.16 One of the distinguishing characteristics of this body divine is its dangerously luminous and fiery nature, the pulu melamm (Sum. n-melam) or fiery epiphanic glory of the Akkadian deities come to mind.17 Characteristic of this transcendent anthropomorphism was also a sapphiric body. That is to say, the leading deities of the ANE also possessed bodies the color and substance of sapphire. In biblical tradition and in ancient and medieval texts generally the term sapphire denoted the semiprecious stone lapis lazuli.18 Considered the ultimate Divine substance, sapphire/lapis lazuli possessed great mythological significance in the ANE.19 In its natural state lapis lazuli is deep blue with

12 Mark S. Smith, The Early History of God: Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel, 2nd Edition (Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 2002) 19-31; Michael David Coogan, Canaanite Origins and Lineage: Reflections on the Religion of Ancient Israel, in Patrick D. Miller, Jr., Paul D. Hanson, and S. Dean McBride (edd.), Ancient Israelite religion: essays in honor of Frank Moore Cross (Philadelphia : Fortress Press, 1987) 115-124; John Day, Ugarit and the Bible: Do They Presuppose the Same Canaanite Mythology and Religion? in George J. Brooke, Adrian H.W. Curtis and John F. Healey (edd.), Ugarit and the Bible: proceedings of the International Symposium on Ugarit and the Bible, Manchester, September 1992 (Mnster: UgaritVerlag, 1994) 35-52. 13 The Common Theology of the Ancient Near East, JBL 71 (1952): 135-147. 14 Bernhard Lang, The Hebrew God: Portrait of an Ancient Deity (New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 2002); Nicholas Wyatt, Degrees of Divinity: Some mythical and ritual aspects of West Semitic kingship, UF 31 (1999): 853-87; Edward L Greenstein, The God of Israel and the Gods of Canaan: How Different were they? Proceedings of the Twelfth World Congress of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, July 29-August 5, 1997, Division A (Jerusalem: World Union of Jewish Studies, 1999) 47-58; J. J. M. Roberts, Divine Freedom and Cultic Manipulation in Israel and Mesopotamia, in idem, The Bible and the Ancient Near East: Collected Essays (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 2002) 72-85; E. Theodore Mullen, Jr. The Assembly of the Gods: The Divine Council in Canaanite and Early Hebrew Literature (Harvard Semitic Monographs 24; Chico: Scholars Press, 1980). 15 Ronald S.Hendel, Aniconism and Anthropomorphism in Ancient Israel, in Karel van der Toorn (ed.), The Image and the Book. Iconic Cults, Aniconism, and the Rise of Book Religion in Israel and the Ancient Near East (CBET 21; Leuven: Uitgewerig Peeters, 1997) 205-228. 16 On transcendent anthropomorphism in ancient Near Eastern and Classical tradition see Hendel, Aniconism and Anthropomorphism; Jean-Pierre Vernant, Dim Body, Dazzling Body, in Michel Feher, Ramona Naddaff and Nadia Tazi (edd.), Fragments for a History of the Human Body: Part One (New York: Zone, 1989): 19-47. On ANE anthropomorphism generally see Esther J. Hamori, When Gods Were Men: Biblical Theophany and Anthropomorphic Realism (Ph.D. diss. New York University, 2004) 191-235; Mark S. Smith, The Origins of Biblical Monotheism: Israels Polytheistic Background and the Ugaritic Texts (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001) 27-35. 17 E. Cassin, La Splendeur Divine (Paris and the Hague: Mouton, 1968); A. Leo Oppenheim, Akadian pul(u)(t)u and melamm, JAOS 63 (1943): 31-34. 18 Michel Pastoureau, Blue: The History of a Color (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001) 7, 21f; The Interpreters dictionary of the Bible: an illustrated encyclopedia identifying and explaining all proper names and significant terms and subjects in the Holy Scriptures, including the Apocrypha, with attention to archaeological discoveries and researches into life and faith of ancient times 5 vols. (George Arthur Buttrick et al [edd.]; New York: Abingdon Press, 1962-76) s.v. Sapphire, by W.E. Stapes; Dictionary of the Bible, ed. James Hastings (New York: MacMillian Publishing Company, 1988) 497, s.v. Jewels and Precious Stones, by J. Patrick and G.R. Berry. 19 F. Daumas, Lapis-lazuli et Rgnration, in Sydney Aufrre, LUnivers minral dans la pense gyptienne, 2 vols. (Le Caire: Institut Franais dArchologie Orientale du Caire, 1991) 2:463-488; John Irwin, The L Bhairo at Benares (Vras): Another Pre-Aokan Monument? ZDMG 133 (1983): 327-43 [art.=320-352]. This is not to suggest that sapphire/lapis lazuli does not appear in ancient literature in more mundane, non-mythological contexts. It certainly does. In the Amarna letters lapis lazuli is listed among the presents exchanged by oriental potentates (see Lissie von Rosen, Lapis Lazuli in Geological Contexts and in Ancient Written Sources [Partille: Paul strms frlag, 1988] 34). The royal associations are prevelant, but it is not possible to definatively determine whether the royal use of this and similar colors (e.g. royal purple) is meant to imitate the divine, or whether they are being used to accord royal characteristics to the divine. The predominantly blue robe of the Jewish high priest (Exod. 28 :31) has royal associations (see Thomas Podella, Das Lichtkleid JHWHs: Untersuchungen zur Gestalthaftigkeit Gottes im Alten Testament und seiner altorientalischen Umwelt [Tbingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 1996] 67-8), but at Qumran it was also associated with the divine kbd ( e.g. . in the 12th and 13th Songs of Sabbath Sacrifice 4Q405 20 ii-21-22; 23 ii; see Carol Newsom, Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice: A Critical Edition [Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1985] 315; idem, Shirot Olat Hashabbat, in E. Eshel et al (edd.), Qumran Cave 4: VI, Poetical and Liturgical Texts, Part 1 [DJD 11; Oxford: Clarendon, 1998] 352; Himmelfarb, Ascent to Heaven, 19-20. Crispin H.T. Fletcher-Louis, Heavenly ascent or incarnational presence: a revisionist reading of the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, SBL Seminar Papers Series 37 [1998] 367-399, esp. 385-99; idem, All the Glory of Adam, 346-50). In a number of Rabbinic texts the royal garments of the high priest are specifically said to be after the pattern of the holy garments, i.e. Gods own

fine golden spangles, recalling the sky bedecked with stars 20; thus the frequently encountered motif of a sapphiric heaven.21 This sapphiric heaven, as the sky-garment of the gods, was often associated with the divine body, garment being an ancient and widespread metaphor for body.22 The leading deities of the ANE therefore had sapphiric-blue bodies. In Egypt, The traditional colour of (the) gods limbs (was) the dark blue lapis lazuli.23 The ANE cult statue, i.e. the earthly body of the deity, 24 was ideally made of a wooden core platted with red gold or silver, overlaid with sapphires,25 all of which signified substances
royal purple garments (e.g. Exod. R. 38:8). Nevertheless, it is clear that in the mythological texts/contexts cited below the reference to sapphire/lapis lazuli has cosmogonic significance and is not merely (a) sign of regal fecundity and prosperity. 20 On Lapis Lazuli v. Lissie von Rosen, Lapis Lazuli in Geological Contexts and in Ancient Written Sources; idem, Lapis Lazuli in Archaeological Contexts (Jonsered: Paul strms frlag, 1990); Rutherford J. Gettens, Lapis Lazuli and Ultramarine in Ancient Times, Alumni de la Fondation universitaire 19 (1950): 342-357. 21 Exod. 24:10; Ez. 1:26 (LXX); Pliny the Elder described lapis lazuli as a fragment of the starry firmament (Natural Hidtory, Book 37). Nut, the ancient Egyptian sky goddess, glistens like lapis lazuli. See J. Assmann, Liturgische Lieder an den Sonnengott. Untersuchungen zur gyptischen Hymnik I (MS 19; Berlin, 1969) 314ff. text III 4. 22 On the sky-garment of the gods see especially Asko Parpola, The Sky-Garment. A study of the Harappan religion and its relation to the Mesopotamian and later Indian religion (SO 57; Helsinki, 1985); idem, The Harappan Priest-Kings Robe and the Vedic Trpya Garment: Their Interrelation and Symbolism (Astral and Procreative), South Asian Archeology 1983 1: 385-403; A. Leo Oppenheim, The Golden Garments of the Gods, Journal of Near Eastern Society of Columbia University 8 (1949): 172-193. This designation arises from the golden star-like ornaments or appliqu work sewn into the garment recalling the star-spangled night sky. On the somatic associations see the Egyptian Amun-Re who is beautiful youth of purest lapis lazuli (wn-nfr n-sbd-m#) whose body is heaven (ht. K nwt). See J. Assmann, Sonnenhymnen in thebanischen Grbern (Mainz: a.R., 1983) 5, #6:5; 124, # 43:14; A.I. Sadek, Popular Religion in Egypt During the New Kingdom (Hildsheim, 1987) 14. See also Grey Hubert Skipwith, The Lord of Heaven. (The Fire of God; the Mountain Summit; The Divine Chariot; and the Vision of Ezekiel.), JQR 19 (1906-7): 693-4 and illustrations in Othmar Keel, The Symbolism of the Biblical World. Ancient Near Eastern Iconography and the Book of Psalms (London: SPCK, 1978) 33-4. In Manichaean tradition, the Mother of Life spread out the heaven with the skin of the Sons of Darkness according to the testimony of Theodore bar Khonai, Liber Scholiorum XI, trns. H. Pognon in Inscriptions Mandates des coupes de Khouabir, II (Paris: Welter, 1899) 188. In the Greater Bundahin, 189, 8 the cosmic body is said to have skin like the sky. See also the anthropomorphic body of Zurvan, called Spihr, which is associated with both the blue firmament and a blue garment: see R.C. Zaehner, Zurvan, A Zoroastrian Dilemma (Oxford, 1955; rep. 1972), 11f, 122. In Jewish tradition see Zohar 111, 170a: The skin represents the firmament which extends everywhere and which covers everything, like a cloakas we see in the all-covering firmament stars and planets which form different figures that contain hidden things and profound, mysteries, so there are on the skin that covers our body certain figures and lines which are the planets and stars of our body. The stars covering the garment signified rays of celestial light emanating from the hair-pores of the divine skin (see below). Thus, in some depictions of this sky-garment, the garment itself is missing and the stars are painted on the very skin of the anthropos. See e.g. the golden statue found in Susa and published by R. de Mecquenem, Offrandes de fondation du temple de Chouchinak, (Paris, 1905) vol. II, Pl. XXIV 1a. See also Oppenheim, Golden Garments, 182 Fig. 2. The the garment-as-body metaphore in antiquity see Geo Widengren, The Great Vohu Manah and the Apostle of God: Studies in Iranian and Manichaean Religion (Uppsala: A.-B. Lundequistska Bokhandeln, 1945) 50-55, 76-83; J.M. Rist, A Common Metaphor, in idem, Plotinus: The Road to Reality (London: Cambridge University Press, 1967) 188198; Dennis Ronald MacDonald, There is no Male and Female: The Fate of a Dominical Saying in Paul and Gnosticism (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987), 23-25. On the garments of the gods motif see also Herbert Sauren, Die Kleidung Der Gtter, Visible Religion 2 (1984): 95-117; Oppenheim, Golden Garments; David Freedman, ubt Bti: A Robe of Splendor, JANES 4 (1972): 91-5; Alan Miller, The Garments of the Gods in Japanese Ritual, Journal of Ritual Studies 5 (Summer 1991): 33-55. 23 Lise Manniche, The Body Colours of Gods and Man in Inland Jewellery and Related Objects from the Tomb of Tutankhamun, AcOr 43 (1982): 5-12 (10). The dark blue skin of the anthropomorphic deities was jrtyw or sbd (lapis lazuli), which is a blue-black: See Caoline Ransom Williams, The Decoration of the Tomb of Per-Nb (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1932) 52f; J.R. Harris, Lexicographical Studies in Ancient Egyptian Minerals (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1961) 226. On the color of the gods skin as indicative of its status and role, with the sapphiric-bodied deity as king of the gods v. Gay Robins, Color Symbolism, in Donald B. Redford (ed.), The Ancient Gods Speak: A Guide to Egyptian Religion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002) 58-9; Dolisks, Red and Blue, (5-6). On the association of a deities skin color and character see also John Baines, Color Terminology and Color Classification: Ancient Egyptian Color Terminology and Polychromy, American Anthropologists 87 (1985): 284 [art.=282-97]; G.D. Hornblower, Blue and Green in Ancient Egypt, Ancient Egypt (June 1932): 50 [art.=47-53]. 24 On the ANE cult of divine images v. Neal H. Walls (ed.) Cult Image and Divine Representation in the Ancient Near East (American Schools of Oriental Research Books Series 10; Boston: American Schools of Oriental Research, 2005); Zainab Bahrani, The Graven Image: Representation in Babylonia and Assyria (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003); Michael B. Dick (ed.), Born in Heaven, Made on Earth: The Making of the Cult Image in the Ancient Near East (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1999); idem, The Relationship between the Cult Image and the Deity in Mesopotamia, in Ji Proseck (ed.), Intellectual Life of the ancient Near East: Papers Presented at the 43rd Rencontre assyriologique international, Prague, July 1-5, 1996 (Prague: Oriental Institute, 1998) 1116; T. Jacobsen, The Graven Image, in P.D. Miller Jr., P.D. Hanson and S.D. McBride (edd.), Ancient Israelite Religion: Essays in Honor of Frank Moore Cross (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987) 15-32, esp. 16-20. 25 When King Nabu-apla-iddina of Babylon (ca. 887-855 B.C.E.) restored the image (almu) of the god Shamash, it was made of red gold and clear lapis lazuli: L.W. King, Babylonian Boundary-Stones and Memorial-Tablets in the British Museum: With Atlas of Plates (London: British Museum, 1912) 120-127, #36 IV 20. See also the lament of Ninubur on the occasion of Inannas Descent to the Netherworld (II. 43-46). On Egyptian cult statues and lapis-lazuli see Daumas, Lapis-lazuli et Rgnration, 465-67. On the materials used for the construction of divine images v. Victor Hurowitz, What Goes In Is What Comes Out Materials for Creating Cult Statues in G. Beckman and T.J. Lewish (edd.), Text and Artifact Proceedings of the Colloquium of the Center for Judaic Studies, University of Pennsylvania, April 27-29, 1998, Brown Judaic Series, 2006 (in press). My thanks to professor Hurowitz for providing a manuscript copy of this work.

from the body of the deity: his (i.e. Res) bones are silver, his flesh is gold, his hair genuine lapis-lazuli. 26 But the hair too was a metaphor for rays of light emanating from the hair-pores covering the body and lapis lazuli was considered solidified celestial light.27 The whole body was therefore depicted blue.28 This is particularly the case with deities associated with fecundity or creation.29 Mediating between the gold flesh and lapis lazuli hair or surrounding splendor of the creator deity is divine black skin, signified by the hide of the black bovine (usually a bull), the paramount attribute animal of the ANE creator-deity.30 The black bovine was associated with the black primordial waters from which the creator-god emerged;31 it thus came to symbolize the material body that the creator-god will don, the black skin of the bovine signaling

Gay Robins, Cult Statues in Ancient Egypt, in Walls, Cult Image, 6; idem, Color Symbolism, in Donald B. Redford (ed.), The Ancient Gods Speak: A Guide to Egyptian Religion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002) 60; Claude Traunecker, The Gods of Egypt, translated from the French by David Lorton (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2001) 44; Dmiitri Meeks, Divine Bodies, in Dimitri Meeks and Christine Favard-Meeks, Daily Life of the Egyptian Gods, trans. G.M. Goshgarian (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1996) 57; Erik Hornung, Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt: The One and the Many, trans. John Baines (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1982) 134. 27 Ad de Vries, Dictionary of Symbols and Imagery (Amsterdam and London: North-Holland Publishing Company, 1974) 39 s.v. Beard; Marten Stol, The Moon as Seen by the Babylonians, in Diederik J.W. Meijer (ed.), Natural Phenomena: Their Meaning, Depiction and Description in the Ancient Near East (North-Holland, Amsterdam, 1992) 255. See e.g.the hymn to the god Ninurta: O Lord, your face is like the sun godthe lashes of your eyes are rays of the sun god. In T. Jacobsen, The Treasures of Darkness: A History of Mesopotamian Religion (New Haven, 1976) 235-236. On lapis lazuli as solidified celestial light see Robins, Color Symbolism, 60. On rays of light emanating from the divine hair pores see for example the Vedic text atapatha-Brhmaa (hereafter B) 10, 4, 4, 1-2: When Prajpati was creating living beings, Death, that evil, overpowered him. He practiced austerities for a thousand years, striving to leave evil behind him. 2. Whilst he was practicing austerities, lights went upwards from those hair-pits of his; and those lights are those stars; as many stars as there are, so many hair-pits there are. Trans. J. Eggeling, The atapathaBrhmana according to the text of the Mdhyandina school. I-V. Sacred Books of the East (Oxford, 1882-1900) IV, 361. See also Mahbhrata 5.129.11 which mentions rays of light, like the suns, [shining] from [Kas] very pores. Trans. James W. Lane, Visions of God: Narratives of Theophany in the Mahbhrata (Vienna 1989) 134. On ANE parallels see Parpola, Sky-Garment, 74. 28 See e.g. Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica (III, 115a, 7) who quotes from Porphyrys lost Concerning Images concerning the Egyptian deity Kneph: The Demiurge, whom the Egyptians call Cneph, is of human form, but with a skin of dark blue, holding a girdle and a scepter, and crowned with a royal wing on his head. Trans. E.H. Grifford, 1903. See also the blue-bodied Amun; Traunecker, Gods of Egypt, 44; G.A. Wainwright, Some Aspects of Amn, Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 20 (1934): 139-53; Monika Dolisks, Red and Blue Figures of Amun, Varia aegyptiaca 6 (1990):3-7 29 John Baines, Fecundity Figures: Egyptian Personification and the Iconology of a Genre (Wiltschire: Aris & Phillips and Chicago: Bolchazy-Carducci, 1985) 139-142. 30 See e.g. the black skin of the Egyptian deity Min, the creator god par excellence. Robert A. Armour, Gods and Myths of Ancient Egypt (Cairo and New York: The American University in Cairo Press, 1986, 2001) 157; Veronica Ions, Egyptian Mythology Middlesex: The Hamlyn Publishing Group Ltd., 1968) 110; DDD s.v. Min, 577 by K. van der Toorn; H.Gauthier, Les ftes du dieu Min (Le Caire, 1931; IFAO. Recherches dArchologie 2); Wainwright, Some Aspects of Amn, 140. On the mythological significance of the black bovine skin see especially Ren L. Vos, Varius Coloribus Apis: Some Remarks of the Colours of Apis and Other Sacred Animals, in Willy Clarysse, Antoon Schoors and Harco Willems (edd.), Egyptian Religion: The Last Thousand Years, Part 1. Studies Dedicated to the Memory of Jan Quaegebeur (Leuven: Uitgeverij Peeters en Departement Oosterse Studies, 1998) 70918. The bull represented potency, fecundity, and primordial materiality, all essential characteristics of the creator-deity. Vos, Varius Coloribus Apis, 715, notes that the bulls of Egypt materialize upon the earth the creative forces of the hidden demiurge. On the creator deity and the bull v. also Harold Bayley, The Lost Language of Symbolism: An Inquiry into the Origin of Certain Letters, Words, Names, Fairy-Tales, Folklore, and Mythologies 2 vols. (London: Williams and Norgate, 1912) I:323-4. On the symbolism of the bull see further Mircea Eliade, Patterns in Comparative Religion, trns. Rosemary Sheed (1958; Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska Press, 1996) 82-93; DDD s.v. Calf, by N. Wyatt, 180-182; Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics 13 vols. (James Hastings, John A. Selbie, and Louis H. Gray [edd.]; New York: Scribner, 1955) 2:887-889 s.v. Bull, by C.J. Caskell. On the attribute animal of ANE religion see Erik Hornung, Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt: the One and the Many (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1982)109-25; P. Amiet, Corpus des cylinders de Ras Shamra-Ougarit II: Sceaux-cylinres en hematite et pierres diverses (Ras Shamra-Ougarit IX; Paris: ditions Recherche sur les Civilisations, 1992) 68; Attribute Animal in idem, Art of the Ancient Near East, trans. J. Shepley and C. Choquet (New York: Abrams, 1980) 440 n. 787. 31 Asko Parpola, New correspondences between Harappan and Near Eastern glyptic art, South Asian Archaeology 1981, 181 suggests that the dark buffalo bathing in muddy water was conceived as the personification of the cosmic waters of chaos. In the g Veda the cosmic waters are cows (e.g. 4.3.11; 3.31.3; 4.1.11) and in Pacavia-Brmana 21.3.7 the spotted cow abal is addressed: Thou art the [primeval ocean]. On water and cows in Indic tradition see further Anne Feldhaus, Water and Womanhood. Religious Meanings of Rivers in Maharashtra (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995) 46-47. The black bull (k" km) of Egypt, Apis, personified the waters of the Nile which was regarded as a type of Nu, the dark, primeval watery mass out of which creation sprang (See mile Chassinat, La Mise a Mort Rituelle DApis, Recueil de travaux relatifs a la philology et a larcheologie egyptiennes et assyriennes 38 [1916] 33-60; E.A. Wallis Budge, The Egyptian Book of the Dead (The Papyrus of Ani). Egyptian Text Transliterated and Translated [New York: Dover Publications, Inc. 1967] cxxiii). See also the Babylonian Enki, called am-gig-abzu, black bull of the Aps (primordial waters). See W.F. Alight, The Mouth of the Rivers, AJSL 35 (1991): 161-195, esp. 167. The Babylonian Tiamat (primordial salt-waters) seems also to have been presented as a bovine in the Enma eli: see B. Landsberger and J.V. Kinnier Wilson, The Fifth Tablet of Enuma Elis, JNES 20 (1961): 175 [art.=154-179]. On the black bull and the black waters of creation see also Vos, Varius Coloribus Apis, 715, 718.

26

the black skin of the deity.32 We should probably imagine the light of the golden flesh passing through the hair-pores of the divine black skin producing the sapphiric surrounding splendor. The black bull, Ad de Vries informs us, mediated between fire (gold) and water (lapis lazuli), heaven and earth (inserts original).33 Now Biblical and Jewish myth owe a great deal to the mythology of the ANE.34 Like the gods of her ancient Near Eastern neighbors, the God of Israel was transcendently anthropomorphic; that is to say, he possessed a body so sublime it bordered on the non-body.35 It would therefore not surprise to discover that Israel participated in this Blue Body Divine tradition. We hope to give evidence here of the existence of an ancient, esoteric temple tradition concerning a sapphiric-bodied Yahweh. Evidence for such a tradition is found in a number of Second Temple texts. 2. P and Ancient Esoteric Priestly Tradition Gerhard von Rad in his Genesis commentary appropriately put any would-be interpreter of the first chapter on notice:
Whoever expounds Gen., ch. I, must understand one thing: this is Priestly doctrine-indeed, it contains the essence of Priestly knowledge in a most concentrated formNothing is here by chance; everything must be considered carefully, deliberately, and preciselyNowhere at all is the text only allusive, symbolic, or figuratively poetic. Actually, the exposition must painstakingly free this bundled and rather esoteric doctrine
See Dieter Kessler, Bull Gods, in Redford Ancient Gods Speak, 30. In one description of the Babylonian kal-ritual the slaying and skinning of the sacrificial bull, black as asphalt, is mythologized as the god Bls slaying and flaying of the god Anu, whose characteristic attribute animal was the black bull. See Werner Daum, Ursemitische Religion (Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1985) 204; E. Ebeling, Tod und Leben nach den Vorstellungen der Babylonier (Berlin-Leipzig, 1931) 29; C. Bezold, Babylonisch-assyrisches Glossar (Heidelberg: C. Winter, 1926) 210 s.v. sugugalu; Georgia de Santillana and Hertha von Dechend, Hamlets Mill: An essay on myth and the frame of time (Boston: Gambit, Inc., 1969) 124. On Anu see further Herman Wohlstein, The Sky-God An-Anu (Jericho, New York: Paul A. Stroock, 1976). This association between divine and bovine skin is explicitly articulated, for example, in the B 3, 1, 2, 13-17 with regard to the black trpya garment worn by the royal sacrificer (dkita) during the Vedic unction ceremony of royal consecration (Rjasya). During this ceremony the dkita ritually impersonates the creator-god and divine king Prajpati-Varua (See J. Gonda, Vedic Gods and the Sacrifice, Numen 30 [1983]: 1-34; Walter O. Kaelber, Tapas, Birth, and Spiritual Rebirth in the Veda, History of Religions 15 (1976): 343-386; Johannes Cornelis Heesternman, The Ancient Indian Royal Consecration: The rjasya described according to the Yajus texts and annotated [The Hague: Mouton & Co., 1957]). The trpya garment represented the gods own body (See Heesternman, Ancient Indian Royal Consecration on the somatic significance of the ritual garments). Specifically, the black antelope skins used in the ceremony represent the black skin of the divine king Varua, who personifies the primordial waters (on the black skinned Varua see B 11.6.1. On Varua and the black sacrificial garments see further Alfred Hillebrandt, Vedic Mythology, trans. from the German by Sreeramula Rajeswara Sarma, 2 vols. [Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 1999; reprint] 2: 41, 44-45. This divine skin/bovine skin identity is further illustrated by the chromatic assonance between the black skinned deity Yam, the primordial god-man, and his vhana (animal attribute/vehicle) the black buffalo. See P. van Bosch, Yama-The God on the Black Buffalo, in Commemorative Figures (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1982) 21-64; Parpola, Sky-Garment, 64-71. See also the black-skinned Osiris, called the big Black Bull, and his earthly representative, the black bull Apis. On the black-skinned Osiris as big, Black Bull see Vos, Varius Coloribus Apis, 716; idem, Apis, DDD 70. 33 Dictionary of Symbols and Imagery 69 s.v. Bull. As the bull of heaven the bovine has sapphiric associations as well. See e.g. the statuette from Uruk, Jemdet Nasr period (c. 3200-2900 B.C.E.) with trefoil inlays of lapis lazuli: H. Schmkel, Ur, Assur und Babylon: Drei Jahrtausende im Zweistromland (Stuttgart, 1955), plate 8, top. In the Epic of Gilgamesh (Old Babylonian Version, Tablet IV 170-3) the Bull of heaven has horns of lapis lazuli. Nanna-Sin, moon-god of Sumer and Babylon, is the frisky calf of heaven and the lapis lazuli bull. See Tallay Ornan, The Bull and its Two Masters: Moon and Storm Deities in Relation to the Bull in Ancient Near Eastern Art, Israel Exploration Journal 51 (2001) 3 [art.=1-26]; Stol, The Moon, 255. On Nanna-Sin v. further DDD, s.v. Sn 782-3 by M. Stol. See also the sapphiric bearded bull in Jeremy Black and Anthony Green, Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia: An Illustrated Dictionary (London: British Museum Press, 1992) 44 s.v. bison. 34 Howard Schwartz, Tree of Souls: The Mythology of Judaism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), lxiii; Michael Fishbane, Biblical Myth and Rabbinic Mythmaking (New York: Oxford, 2003). 35 Hendel, Aniconism and Anthropomorphism, 223, 225: Yahweh has a body, clearly anthropomorphic, but too holy for human eyesYahwehs body was believed to be incommensurate with mundane human existence: it has a different degree of being than human bodies It is a transcendent anthropomorphism not in form but in its effect, approachable only by the most holy, and absent in material form in the cultThe body of God was defined in Israelite culture as both like and unlike that of humans. On biblical anthropomorphism and an anthropomorphic deity see Johannes Hemple, Die Grenzen des Anthropomorphismus Jahwes im Alten Testament, ZAW 16 (1939): 75-85; Barr, Theophany and Anthropomorphism; Cherbonnier, The Logic of Biblical Anthropomorphism; Uffenheimer, Myth and Reality in Ancient Israel; idem, Biblical Theology and Monotheistic Myth; BarIlan, The Hand of God; Jacob Neusner, Conversation in Nauvoo about the Corporeality of God, BYU Studies 36 (1996-97): 730; Karel van der Toorn, God (1) ,in Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, Pieter W. van der Horst (edd.), Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible (2nd ed.; Leiden; Boston: Brill; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1999; hereafter DDD) 361-365; Kugel, the God of Old, 5-107; Hamori, When Gods Were Men ; Ulrich Mauser, God in Human Form, Ex Auditu 16 (2000): 81-100; idem, Image of God and Incarnation, Int 24 (1970): 336-356.
32

sentence by sentence, indeed, word by word. These sentences cannot be easily over interpreted theologically! Indeed, to us the danger appears greater that the expositor will fall short of discovering the concentrated doctrinal content.36

Because Genesis I contains the essence of Priestly knowledge in a most concentrated form, and this knowledge was esoteric, the Temple traditions represented by P are never explicitly communicated in these materials.37 Stephen A. Geller has observed that P more than any other biblical author, reveals what he has to say by how he says it.38 Instead of openly verbalizing his theological concepts, P employs a method of literary indirection through placement, juxtaposition, and subtle allusion to impress these unarticulated concepts on the structure of the Pentateuch. Employing the tools of literary analysis has allowed scholars to shed light on a number of these esoteric themes.39 Beginning with Martin Buber and Franz Rosenzweig, scholars have discerned Ps remarkable use of intratextuality between Genesis 1 (the creation account) and Exodus 25-31 (instructions for the building of the Tabernacle) to suggest a correspondence between the creation of the world and the building of the sanctuary.40 The widespread ancient Near Eastern (ANE) temple-as-cosmos motif undoubtedly lay behind this intratextuality.41 In Exod. 25-31 God in seven speeches instructs Moses regarding the construction of the Tabernacle and its furnishings as well as the priestly vestments. Peter Kearny argued that these seven speeches correspond verbally and conceptually to the seven days of creation of Genesis I.42 Thus, in the first speech the newly appointed high priest Aaron is instructed to tend the golden lampstand (menorah) at the evening and morning sacrifice (Tamid) (Exod. 30:7-8). This, Kearny suggests, corresponds to the appearance of light on the first day and the separation of day and night (Gen.1:3-5). 43 In the third speech (Ex. 30:16-21) the command is given for the construction
36 Gerhard von Rad, Genesis: A Commentary, translated from the German by John H. Marks (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1961) 45. 37 On P as an esoteric doctrine see Israel Knohl, The Sanctuary of Silence: the Priestly Torah and the Holiness School (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995) 153; Menahem Haran, Behind the Scenes of History: Determining the Date of the Priestly Source, JBL 100 (1981): 321-333; Chayim Cohen, Was the P Document Esoteric, JANES 1 (1969): 39-44. 38 Blood Cult: Toward a Literary Theology of the Priestly Work of the Pentateuch, Prooftexts 12 (1992): 101. 39 See e.g. Mark S. Smith, The Literary Arrangement of the Priestly Redaction of Exodus: A Preliminary Investigation, CBQ 58 (1996): 25-50; Bernhard W. Anderson, A Stylistic Study of the Priestly Creation Story, in G. W. Coats and B.O. Long (edd.), Canon and Authority: essays in Old Testament religion and theology (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1977) 148-162. 40 Martin Buber, Die Schrift und ihre Verdeutschung (Berlin: Schocken Verlag, 1936) 39-41; Umberto Cassuto, A commentary on the book of Exodus. Translated from the Hebrew by Israel Abrahams (Jerusalem, Magnes Press, Hebrew University,1967), ad 39:32, 43; 40:33; Joseph Blekinsopp, The Structure of P, CBQ 38 (1976): 275-292; idem, Prophecy and Canon (Notre Dame and London: University of Notre Dame, 1977) 56-69; Peter J. Kearney, Creation and Liturgy: The P Redaction of Ex 25-40, ZAW 89 (1977): 375-387; Michael Fishbane, Text and Texture: Close Readings of Selected Biblical Texts (New York: Schocken Books, 1979) 11-13; Moshe Weinfeld, Sabbath, Temple and the Enthronement of the Lord The Problem of the Sitz im Leben of Genesis 1:1-2:3, in A. Caquot and M. Delcor (edd.) Mlanges bibliques et orientaux en lhonneur de M. Henri Cazelles (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlaq, 1981) 501-11; Jon D. Levenson, The Temple and the World, JR 64 (1984): 275-298; idem, Creation and the Persistence of Evil: The Jewish Drama of Divine Omnipotence (San Francisco: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1985) Chapter 7; idem, Sinai and Zion: An Entry into the Jewish Bible (San Francisco: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1985) 142-145; Peter Weimar, Sinai und Schpfung: Komposition und Theologie der Priesterschriftlichen Sinaigeschichte, RB 95 (1988): 337-85; Bernd Janowski, Temple und Schpfung: Schpfungstheologische Aspekte der priesterschriftlichen Heiligtumskonseption, in I Balderman et al., Schpfung und Neusschpfung (Jahrbuch fr biblische Theologie 5; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1990) 37-70; Terence E. Fretheim, Exodus (Louisville: John Know Press, 1991)268-272; Eric E. Elnes, Creation and Tabernacle: The Priestly Writers ,Environmentalism, Horizons in Biblical Theological 16 (1994): 144-155. 41 William Foxwell Albright, Archaeology and the Religion of Israel (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 1946) 147-150; Gstra W. Ahlstm, Heaven on Earth-at Hazor and Arad, in Birger A. Pearson (ed.) Religious Syncretism in Antiquity (Missoula: Scholars, 1975): 6783; John M. Lundquist, The Common Temple Ideology of the Ancient Near East, in T.G. Madsen (ed.), The Temple in Antiquity (Provo: BYU Press, 1984) 53-76. On the biblical/Jewish temple-as-cosmos tradition v. also Jon D. Levenson, The Jerusalem Temple in Devotional and Visionary Experience, in Arthur Green (ed.) Jewish Spirituality, From the Bible Through the Middle Ages, (New York: Crossroad, 1986) 51-53; C.T.R. Hayward, The Jewish Temple: A non-biblical sourcebook (London and New York: Routledge, 1996) 8-10; Margaret Barker, Time and Eternity: the world of the Temple, The Month (January 2001) 15-21; James R. Davila, The Macrocosmic Temple, Scriptural Exegesis, and the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, Dead Sea Discoveries 9 (2002):1-19. Gregory Beale, The Final Vision of the Apocalypse and its Implications for a Biblical Theology of the Temple, in T. Desmond Alexander and Simon Cathercole (edd.), Heaven on Earth: The Temple in Biblical Theology (Carlisle: Paternoster, 2004) 191-209; idem, The Temple and the Churchs Mission: A Biblical theology of the dwelling place of God (Illinois: Inter Varsity Press, 2005) 29-66. 42 Creation and Liturgy. 43 Kearney, Creation and Liturgy, 375, 380. But cf. Levenson, Creation, 83. On Aarons mimicking in the Tabernacle Gods creative act of separation v. Frank H. Gorman, Jr., The Ideology of Ritual: Space, Time and Status in the Priestly Theology (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1990): 44, 51, 219-20; idem, Priestly Rituals of Founding: Time, Space, and Status, in M. Patrick Graham, William P. Brown and Jeffrey K. Kuan (edd.) History and interpretation: essays in honor of John H. Hayes (Sheffied, Eng.: JSOT Press, 1993) 50-54. Though not all of the specific correspondences uncovered by Kearney are convincing, the

of the bronze laver, which in the Solomonic temple is called simply the sea (I Kgs 7:23-26). This would correspond to the creation of the sea on the third day in Gen. 1:9-11. Again, the seventh speech (31:12-17) contains the command that Israel observe the Sabbath, and in Gen. 2:2-3 God rested on the seventh day. The net effect of this intratextuality is the impression, not only that the Tabernacle is a microcosm and the cosmos a sanctuary, but also that the liturgies carried out in the sanctuary reenact creation in the cultic setting; and as Crispin H.T. Fletcher-Louis has observed, in this drama the high priest Aaron acts in imitatio Dei.44 As God brought r (light) to darkness (Gen 1 2-3), so Aaron caused mar (light) to shine throughout the night.45 The Aaronic high priest represented the creator god in this reenactment.46 The high-priestly garments prescribed in Exodus 28 are Israels version of the ANE garments of the gods.47 The biblical " ,phd is analogous to the splendid jewel-studded garments that adorned the idols.48 An Ugaritic cognate (iphd) maybe denoting a divine garment has been found.49 This would make Aaron in his ephod correspond to the god-statue in non-Israelite cultures of the ANE.50 In the temple cult of the ANE the priest, by wearing the garment of his god, represented that gods visible presence. 51 When we also consider that the biblical high priest bears the name Yahweh on the front of his turban, is enveloped in Yahwehs own fragrance (the etheric robe of divinity52), and that he consumes Yahwehs own portion of leem pnm (Bread of the Presence),53 Aarons imitatio Dei seems certain. The various scholars impressed by this intratextuality used by P have paid little attention to the sixth day which culminates with the creation of man in the image and likeness of God.54 At first sight the correspondence to the sixth speech of Exodus is not so obvious. The focus of the latter is Bezalel, the master architect appointed by God and responsible for building the Tabernacle (31: 1-5). He was endowed with wisdom (hokm), ability (tebn), and knowledge (dt), the tools used by God to create the cosmos, and he was filled with the rah lhm, spirit of God, an allusion to Genesis 1:2 (and the Spirit of God
overall pattern cannot be denied. Though not all of the specific correspondences uncovered by Kearney are convincing, the overall pattern cannot be denied. 44 Crispin H.P. Fletcher-Louis, The Cosmology of P and the Theological Anthropology in the Wisdom of Jesus ben Sira in C.A. Evans (ed.), Of Scribes and Sages: Studies in Early Jewish Interpretation and Transmission of Scripture (2 vols.; SSEJC 8; Sheffield; Sheffield Academic Press, 2004) 69-113 (77). Fletcher-Louis has without doubt most clearly and convincingly elucidated the high priestly theological anthropology implied by this intratextuality. See also his The image of God and the biblical roots of Christian sacramentality, in Geoffrey Rowell and Christine Hall (edd.), the Gestures of God: explorations in sacramentality (London and New York: Continuum, 2004) 73-89; idem, Gods Image, His Cosmic Temple and the High Priest: Towards an Historical and Theological Account of the Incarnation, in Alexander and Cathercole, Heaven on Earth, 81-99; idem, All The Glory of Adam: Liturgical Anthropology in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Leiden: Brill, 2002) 56-87; idem, Wisdom Christology and the Parting of the Ways Between Judaism and Christianity, in Stanely E. Porter and Brook W.R. Pearson (edd.), Christian-Jewish Relations through the Centuries (JSNTS 192; Sheffield; Sheffield Academic Press, 2000) 52-68; idem, The High Priest as Divine Mediator in the Hebrew Bible: Dan 7:13 as a Test Case, SBL 1997 Seminar Papers 36 (1997): 161-193, esp. 186-193. On the ritual re-enactment of cosmogonic myth in the ANE and elsewhere v. Benjamin D. Sommer, The Babylonian Akitu Festival: rectifying the king or renewing the cosmos?, JANES 27 (2000): 81-95; Brian M. Hauglid, Sacred Time and Temple, in Donald w. Parry (ed.), Temples of the Ancient world: Ritual and Symbolism (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company; Provo, Utah: FARMS, 1994) 636-645; Mircea Eliade, The Myth of the Eternal Return, or, Cosmos and History, translated from the French by Willard R. Trask (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1954). 45 Kearney, Creation and Liturgy, 375. 46 According to Fletcher-Louis, within the liturgy of the cult the high priest plays the role of creator of the universe (emphasis original).All The Glory of Adam, 74; Margaret Barker, The High Priest and the Worship of Jesus, in Carey C. Newman, James R. Davila and Gladys S. Lewis (edd.), Jewish Roots of Christological Monotheism. Papers from the St. Andrews Conference on the Historical Origins of the Worship of Jesus (Leiden: Brill, 1999) 93-111. 47 Fletcher-Louis, The High Priest as Divine Mediator, 188. On the garments of the gods v. also Parpola, Sky-Garment; Herbert Sauren, Die Kleidung Der Gtter, Visible Religion 2 (1984): 95-117; A. Leo Oppenheim, The Golden Garments of the Gods, Journal of Near Eastern Society of Columbia University 8 (1949): 172-193; David Freedman, ubt Bti: A Robe of Splendor, JANES 4 (1972): 91-5. See also Alan Miller, The Garments of the Gods in Japanese Ritual, Journal of Ritual Studies 5 (Summer 1991): 33-55. 48 Fletcher-Louis, The High Priest as Divine Mediator, 188; CTA 5.I.I-5; The Anchor Bible Dictionary (6 vols.; New York, NY: Doubleday, 1992-; hereafter ABD) 2: 550, s.v. Ephod by Carol Meyers. On the ephod v. also Menahem Haran, Temples and Temple-Service in Ancient Israel (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1978) 166-68. 49 ABD 2: 550, s.v. Ephod by Carol Meyers; W.F. Albright, Are the Ephod and the Teraphim in Ugaritic Literature? BASOR 83 (1941): 39-42. 50 Fletcher-Louis, The High Priest as Divine Mediator, 188. 51 Sauren, Kleidung, 96-7. 52 Words quoted by P.A.H. De Boer, An Aspect of Sacrifice. II. Gods Fragrance, in Studies in the Religion of Ancient Israel (Leiden: Brill, 1972) 27-47 (39). See also C. Houtman, On the Function of the Holy Incense (Exodus XXX 34-8) and the Sacred Anointing Oil (Exodus XXX 22-33), VT 42 (1992): 458-465. 53 See Roy Gane Bread of the Presence and Creator-In-Residence, VT 42 (1992): 179-203. 54 The exception being Fletcher-Louis, The Cosmology of P, 89-93.

moved on the face of the deep).55 This analogy, as Joshua Berman observes, may be read as a statement that Bezalels creation of the Tabernacle is tantamount to Gods creation of the universe.56 Most commentators take the name to mean in the shadow of God , but Richard Friedmans insightful opinion is significant here:
Some have taken the name Bezalel to mean in the shadow of God (bsl l). To me it also intimates in the image of God (bselem lhm) from the creation storyAnd Bezalel was filled with the spirit of God, which also comes from the creation story (1:2). The allusions to creation are attractive because Bezalel, after all, as the great artist of the Torah, is the creative one, who fashions the Tabernacle and its contents, including the ark. Being creative is the ultimate imitatio Dei.57

On this reading Bezalel of the sixth speech corresponds, not only to the creator of the cosmos, but also to the man of day six made in the divine image. In as much as he is demiurgic, Bezalel would also correspond to Aaron, the creator analogue of this cultic drama. Through his high-priestly garments Aaron, like Bezalel, also corresponds to the man made in the divine image.58 Just as the creation of man on Day Six concluded the cosmogony, the final task during the erection of the Tabernacle was the manufacture of the priestly vestments (Ex. 39).59 If the ephod connects Aaron to the god-statues of Israels neighbors, this connection further links Aaron with Adam made in/as the image of God, , elem lhm.60 The Hebrew means primarily statute and is a cognate of the Akkadian alam ili/ilni, the common Mesopotamian term for god-statues.61 Several scholars have now seen that this terminological congruence contains conceptual congruence as well: Adam was created to be the living statute of the deity. Adamic beings are animate iconsThe peculiar purpose for their creation is theophanic: to represent or mediate the sovereign presence of deity within the central nave of the cosmic temple, just as cult-images were supposed to do in conventional sanctuaries. 62 This priestly man-as-the-true-idol/image theology, which
See Elnes, Creation and Tabernacle, 149-151; Kearney, Creation and Liturgy, 378; Levenson, Creation, 84. Both Philo and the rabbis remembered Bezalels demiurgic function. Regarding Philo v. below. On the rabbis see b. Ber. 55a: Bezalel knew the letters by which heaven and earth were created, as it is written here [Exod. 35:31]: He has endowed him with a divine spirit of skill [hokm] ability [tebn], and knowledge [dt], and there [Prov. 3:19] it is written: The Lord founded the earth by wisdom [hokm]/He established the heavens by understanding [tebn], and it is written, By His knowledge [dat] the depths burst apart [Prov. 3:20]. Similarly, Midrash Tanhuma Yelammedenu 11.3. See also Louis Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews (7 vols; Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1911, 1939) 3:154-56. 56 The Temple: Its Symbolism and Meaning, Then and Now (Northvale, New Jersey: Jason Aronson, Inc., 1995) 16. 57 Richard Elliot Friedman, Commentary on the Torah (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 2001) 277. 58 Fletcher-Louis, Gods Image 96. 59 See Douglas B. Clawson, Clothing From Heaven, Kerux 12 (1997):3-9; Meredith G. Kline, Images of the Spirit (Grand Rapids, Mi: Baker Book House, 1980) 42-47; idem, Investiture with the Image of God, Westminster Theological Journal 40 (1977): 46-51. 60 Ezekiel 28:11-19 seems to presuppose a primordial high-priestly Adam myth. V. 13, every precious stone was (his) covering, was understood in the LXX as an allusion to the 12 stones on the high priests breastplate worn on the ephod. This may suggest a quite early tradition picturing the primordial Adam as the Image of God bedecked in high priestly attire. See Dexter E. Callender, Jr., Adam in Myth and History: Ancient Israelite Perspective on the Primal Human (Harvard Semitic Studies 48; Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 2002), Chap. 3; idem, The Primal Human in Ezekiel and the Image of God, in The Book of Ezekiel: Theological and Anthropological Perspectives, eds. Margaret S. Odell and John T. Strong (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2002) 175-193. For a high priestly primal man here and a generally cultic background to the imagery in this passage v. also Robert R. Wilson, The Death of the King of Tyre: The Editorial History of Ezekiel 28, in Love & Death in the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of Marvin H. Pope, eds. John H. Marks and Robert M. Good (Guilford, Connecticut: Four Quarters Publishing Company, 1987) 211-218. 61 Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (hereafter HALOT) (5vols.; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1994-) 3:1028-29, s.v. ;The Assyrian Dictionary (hereafter CAD; Chicago: Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 1962) 16: 78b-80a, 84b-85a, s.v. almu; E. Douglas Van Buren, The alm in Mesopotamian Art and Religion, Orientalia 5 (1936): 65-92. 62 S. Dean McBride Jr., Divine Protocol: Genesis 1:1-2:3 as Prologue to the Pentateuch, in W.P. Brown and S.Dean McBride (edd.), God Who Creates: Essays in Honor of W. Sibley Towner (Grand Rapids, Michigan: W.B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2000) 16. See also Andreas Schle, Made in the >Image of God<: The Concepts of Divine Images in Gen 1-3, ZAW 117 (2005): 1-20; Ulrich Mauser, God in Human Form, Ex Auditu 16 (2000): 81-100 (90-93; Crispin H.T. Fletcher-Louis, The Worship of Divine Humanity as Gods Image and the Worship of Jesus, in Jewish Roots of Christological Monotheism, 113-128, esp. 120-128; Herbert Niehr, In Search of Yahwehs Cult Statute in the First Temple, in The Image and the Book, 93-94; John Kutsko, Between Heaven and Earth: Divine Presence and Absence in the Book of Ezekiel (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 2000), 53-60. See also idem, Will the Real elem lhm Please Stand Up? The Image of God in the Book of Ezekiel, SBL 1998 Seminar Papers, 55-85; idem, Ezekiels Anthropology and its Ethical Implications, in Odell and Strong, Book of Ezekiel, 119-141; Theological Lexicon of the Old Testament, eds. Ernst Jenni and Claus Westermann, trs. Mark E. Biddle (3vols.; Peabody, Massachusetts: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc, 1997; hereafter TLOT) 3:1080-82 s.v. ,by H. Wilderger; Garrett Green, Imagining God: Theology and the Religious Imagination (San Francisco, etc.: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1989) 91-97; Edward Mason Curtis, Man as the Image of God in Genesis in the Light of Ancient Near Eastern Parallels (Ph.D. diss., University of Pennsylvania, 1984); idem, Image of God (OT), in ABD 3:289-91.
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probably informed Ps use of the term in Gen. 1:26,63 together with the ephod-as-garment-of-the-idols tradition, confirms Ps literary identification of Adam and Aaron, an identification made later by Jesus ben Sira and also found in rabbinic tradition.64 2.1. Miqd dm: Adam/Aaron as Divine Sanctuary The description of the fabrication of the holy vestments in Exodus 39 invokes the seven divine speeches of Exodus 25-31 and the ten creative acts of Genesis 1.65 This suggests that the garments, like the Tabernacle, reflected the created cosmos. This garments::cosmos correspondence appears in Philo (Spec. 1.95; Mos. II.117) and the Wisdom of Solomon (18.24), but its presence in P might indicate that it is not Hellenic.66 The chromatic and textile homology between the high priestly garments and Tabernacle drapings also suggest a correspondence between the sanctuary and Aaron.67 We thus have a Cosmos::Tabernacle::Aaron/Adam homology: as the Tabernacle is a miniature replica of the cosmos, Aaron/Adam is a microcosmic replica of the sanctuary.68 This observation may illuminate an otherwise enigmatic aspect of Ps creation account (Genesis 1). The latter is regarded as a typical example of an ANE cosmogony.69 The apogee of these cosmogonies is the construction of a sanctuary for the creator god.70 This is conspicuously absent from Genesis, or so it would seem. Some scholars have understood the ANE temple to have been replaced by P with the Sabbath.71 Others suggest that the construction of the divine sanctuary was postponed by P until Sinai.72 While both of these readings have their merit, we suggest that a third alternative takes better account of the evidence of this intratextuality. Ps creation narrative, we submit, does conclude with the construction of the creator-gods sanctuary: Adam/Aaron. As Mircea Eliade
63 Kutsko, Real elem "lhm, 70-74. Pace Christian D. von Dehsen, The Imago Dei in Genesis 1:26-27, Lutheran Quarterly 11 (1997): 259-270 (265); John F.A. Sawyer, The Image of God, The Wisdom of Serpents and the Knowledge of God and Evil, in Paul Morris and Deborah Sawyer (edd.), A Walk in the Garden: Biblical, Iconographical and Literary Images of Eden, (JSOT Supplement Series 136; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1992) 66. 64 On Ben Sira v. below. On the rabbis v. Midrash Tanhuma-Yelammedenu, 11.2; Num. R. 12.13. Fletcher-Louis was therefore correct when he predicted that A longer discussion would demonstrate that the Adamic identity of Aaron is fundamental to the theology of P. Jesus and the High Priest, 5 n. 13, currently published online, http://www.marquette.edu/maqom/jesus/pdf. 65 See Casper J. Labuschagne, Numerical Secrets of the Bible. Recovering the Bible Codes (North Richland Hills, Texas: BIBAL Press, 2000) 45-6; Kearney, Creation and Liturgy, 380. 66 It exceeds the current evidence to describe the HB as a Hellenistic Book, as did Niels Peter Lemche, The Old Testament-A Hellenistic Book? SJOT 7 (1993): 163-93. (For various reactions to Lemches article see Lester L. Grabbe [ed.], Did Moses Speak Attic? Jewish Historiography and Scripture in the Hellenistic Period [JSOTSup, 317; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001]) or to suggest that, for example the Primeval History was written by a Jewish author (alternatively, leader of a group of authors) well versed in Greek literature (Jan-Wim Wesselius, Discontinuity, Congruence and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, SJOT 13 [1999]: 45.). On the other hand, there are noted correspondences between Greek and Hebrew historiography which might indicate a shared intellectual milieu (See especially J. Van Seters, In Search of History: Historiography in the Ancient World and the Origins of Biblical History [New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1983]: idem, The Primeval Histories of Greece and Israel Compared, ZAW 100 [1988]: 1-22; S. Mandell and D.N. Freedman, The Relationship between Herodotus History and Primary History [Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1993]; F.A.J. Nielsen, The Tragedy in History: Herodotus and the Deuteronomistic History [JSOTSup, 251; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997]; Wesselius, Discontinuity, 24-77 (38-48): idem, The Origin of the History of Israel: Herotus Histories as Blueprint for the First Books of the Bible [Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, XXX]). But it must be kept in mind that Homeric and Hesiodic myth owe not a little to the Semitic Near East. See e.g. Walter Burkert, Babylon, Memphis, Persepolis: Eastern Contexts of Greek Culture (Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 2004); idem, The Orientalizing Revolution: Near Eastern Influence on Greek Culture in the Early Archaic Age, trans. Margaret E. Pinder and Walter Burkert (Cambridge and London, 1992); Robert Mondi, Greek Mythic Thought in the Light of the Ancient Near East, in Lowell Edmunds (ed.) Approaches to Greek Myth (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990) 141-98. 67 On this homology v. Haran, Temples and Temple Service, 167, 171; idem, The Complex of Ritual Acts Performed Inside the Tabernacle, Scripta Hierolymitana 8 (1961): 279-80; Philip Peter Johnson, Graded Holiness: A Key to the Priestly Conception of the World (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1992) 105, 124-128. 68 See especially Kline, Images of the Spirit, 42-47; idem, Investiture, 46-51, who notes that Aarons garments were a scaled-down version of the Tabernacle (43;48). 69 Alexander Heidel, The Babylonian Genesis (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963) 82-140; E.A. Speiser, Genesis (AB; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1964) 8-13; Clause Westermann, Genesis 1-11: A Commentary, trns. John J. Scullion [Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1984] 43, 93-95. 70 Heidel, Babylonian Genesis, 127; Victor (Avigdor) Hurowitz, I have Built You an Exalted House: Temple Building in the Bible in the Light of Mesopotamian and Northwest Semitic Writings (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1992) 93-96. 71 Arthur Green, Sabbath as Temple: Some Thoughts on Space and Time in Judaism, in Raphael Jospe and Samuel Z. Fishman (edd.), Go and Study: Essays and Studies in Honor of Alfred Jospe (Washington D.C.: Bnai Brith Hillel Foundations, 1980) 287305; Weinfeld, Sabbath, Temple and the Enthronement; Shimon Bakon, Creation, Tabernacle and Sabbath, Jewish Bible Quarterly 25 (1997): 79-85; Edwin Firmage, Genesis 1 and the Priestly Agenda, JSOT 82 (1999): 110. 72 See e.g. Benjamin D. Sommer, Conflicting Constructions of Divine Presence in the Priestly Tabernacle, Biblical Interpretation 9 [2001]: 43.

pointed out, such a house::body::cosmos homology is ancient and quite common,73 and it is well documented in midrashic sources.74 Richard Whitekettle was able to discern such a homology implied in Lev. 15.75 In addition to the correspondence between the high priestly garments and sanctuary drappings, there are also verbal links between Gen. 1:26 and Exod. 25:8:
And God said: Let us make ( )Adam/man as our image, according to our likeness (( 67) Gen. 1:26) And let them make me ( ) a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them, according to ( )all that I show you concerning the pattern ( )of the sanctuary (Ex. 25:8)

James Barr77 and Tryggve N.D. Mettinger78 have observed that both Adam and the Tabernacle, and only these two according to P, are made according to a heavenly prototype (elem/tabnt). The P source had two great events in which something was made in an express analogy: firstly, man himself, created in the image of God, and, secondly, the tabernacle, built by men after a pattern revealed by God.79 As Mettinger notes, this can hardly be accidental.80 He goes on to proffer the thesis that the heavenly prototype in Genesis (the elem)81 refers to the heavenly beings who carry out worship in the heavenly temple.82 But it seems to us that this surprising analogy between man and the Tabernacle83 is more easily explainable by the clear pattern we have discerned in Ps use of this intratextuality. The Aaron/Adam::Tabernacle homology suggests that P intends to present the first man as the first divine sanctuary. Objections have been raised to Barrs and Mettingers reading. Walter Gross, for example, noting the terminological variation (elem-Gen. 1:26 vs. tabnt- Ex. 25:8), argues: Die Behauptung der Parallele zwischen Menschenschpfung und Errichtung des Heiligtums kann sich auf keinerlei sprachliche Argumente sttzen.84 But the significance of this so-called Fehlen sprachlicher Anklnge is overstated. As Peter Weimar has well pointed out:
Durch die nachdrckliche Betonung der Abbildhaftigkeit des Heiligtums vom Sinai will die Priesterschrift es allem Anschein nach als Medium der Offenbarung Jahwes selbst verstanden wissen. Auch wenn sprachliche Gemeinsamkeiten

The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1961) 172-84. See Raphael Patai, Man and Temple in Ancient Jewish Myth and Ritual (New York: KTAV Publishing House, Inc., 1967), 11317. C.R.A. Morray-Jones, The Temple Within: The Embodied Divine Image and its Worship in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Early Jewish and Christian Sources, SBL 1998 Seminar Papers, 400-427 has discerned a five-fold homology in this early Jewish motif: Divine Image::Body::Temple::Cosmos::Community (see graph on page 427). 75 Leviticus 15:18 Reconsidered: Chiasm, Spatial Structure and the Body, JSOT 49 (1991): 31-45. 76 We are convinced by the arguments in favor of reading the beth in as beth essentiae. See TLOT 3:1082 s.v. ,by Wildberger; TDOT 12:394 s.v. by Stendebach; D.J.A. Clines, The Image of God in Man, TynBul 19 (1968): 76-80. On beth essentiae v. J.H. Charlesworth, The Beth Essentiae And the Permissive Meaning of the Hiphil (Aphel), in H.W. Attridge, J.J. Collins and T.H. Tobin (edd.), Of Scribes and Scrolls: Studies on the Hebrew Bible, Intertestamental Judaism, and Christian Origins, Presented to John Strugnell on the Occasion of His Sixtieth Birthday (Lanham: University Press of America, 1990) 67-78; Cyrus H. Gordon, In of Predication or Equivalence, JBL 100 (1981) 612-613; Lawrence N. Manross, Bth Essentiae, JBL 73 (1954): 238-9. On the other hand, we understand the in as kaph of the norm; we therefore do not accept the synonymity of these prepositions. In our view Clines (Image of God in Man, 76-80, 90-93) argument is still persuasive: ...there is no reason why and should be equivalent, and a perfectly satisfactory interpretation is gained by taking as as our image, to be our image and not as synonymous with ,but a explanatory of the image, that it is an image made ,according to our likeness, like us then specifies what kind of image it is: it is a likeness-image, not simply an image; representational, not simply representative (77, 91). See also Ivan Golub, Man Image of God (Genesis 1:26): A New Approach to an Old Problem, in Wnschet Jerusalem Friedmen: Collected Communications to the XIIth Congress of the International Organization for the Study of the Old Testament, Jerusalem 1986 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1988) 227-28. 77 The Image of God, 16. 78 Abbild oder Urbild? Imago Dei in traditionsgeschichtlicher Sicht, ZAW 86 [1974]: 403-424, esp. 406-411; idem, Skapad till Guds avbild: En ny tolkning, STK 51 [1975]: 49-55. See also Weimar, Sinai und Schpfung, 350-352. 79 Barr, The Image of God, 16. 80 Abbild oder Urbild? 408 81 Mettinger reads as according to our image (beth of the norm) and thus understands elem as the prototype (Abbild oder Urbild? 411). But as Phyllis A. Bird correctly pointed out (Male and Female He Created Them: Gen 1:27b in the Context of the Priestly Account of Creation, HTR 74 [1981]: 142 n. 34), elem/almu is always the copy, not the original (unless, of course, you are Philo). In our view, the divine model is alluded to in according to our likeness. See Clines, Image of God in Man, 77. 82 (Abbild oder Urbild?, 407, 410-11; Mettinger, Skapad till Guds avbild,54. 83 Mettinger, Skapad till Guds avbild, 51 84 Die Gottebenbildlichkeit des Menschen im Kontext der Priesterschrift, Theologische Quartalschrift 161 (1981): 254. See alo Erich Zenger, Gottes Bogen in den Wolken. Untersuchungen zu Komposition und Theologie der priesterschriftlichen Urgeschichte (SBS 112; Stuttgart: Verlag Katholisches Bibelwerk GmbH, 1983) 84-86 n. 110.
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fehlen, ist dennoch nicht zu verkennen, da ein solches Heiligtumsverstndis im Rahmen des priesterschriftlichen Werkes eine Entsprechung in der Vorstellung vom Menschen als Bild Gottes (Gen 1, 26+27) hat. Ist zwischen der Menschenschpfung und der Errichtung des Heiligtums am Sinai ein derartiger Zusammenhang anzunehmen85

A closer look at Ps imago Dei theology will provide further support for our suggestion. Scholarly interpretations of Gen.1:26-7 are numerous and divergent.86 Recent studies, however, have made it clear that Ps elem is the Mesopotamian almu.87 The latter was distinguished by its ambivalent godnot god identity: while the idol is clearly distinguished from the god whom it represents, it is treated as the god itself.88 The reason is that the ANE cult statue was not only a representative replica of the god; it was also the dwelling place of that gods essence/spirit. It was not considered to resemble an original reality that was present elsewhere but to contain that reality in itself.89 It was the almus roles as both image and divine abode that justified its treatment as the god for whom it was a representative. The process by which the idol was incarnated by the divine spirit, the so-called ms p (Washing-ofthe-mouth) and pit p (Opening-of-the-mouth) rituals, is thought by a number of scholars to be behind the imagery of Gen. 2:7b: then the LORD GOD formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being (NOAB).90 Though the creation narrative of Genesis 2 dose not use the term elem (or demut), there can be no doubt that the imago concept is present.91

Sinai und Schpfung, 350-51. The literature is of course too vast to do justice to in a short note. For a history of interpretations up to 1982 v. Gunnlaugur A. Jnsson, The Image of God: Genesis 1:26-28 in a Century of Old Testament Research (CB.OT, 26; Stockholm: Almquist & Wiksell International, 1988) and the research cited there. Of special note see also sources sited above, esp. nn. 50-1 and further: R.McL. Wilson, The Early History of the Exegesis of Gen. 1.26, Studia Patristica 1 (1957): 420-37; J. Jervell, Imago Dei: Gen. 1:26 in Sptjudentum, in Gnosis und in den paulinischen Briefen (FRLANT 76; Gttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1960); Meredith G. Kline, Creation in the Image of the Glory-Spirit, Westminster Theological Journal 39 (1977): 250-72; Maryanne Cline Horowitz, The Image of God in Mam-Is Woman Included? HTR 72 (1979): 175-206; Jarl Fossum, Gen. 1,26 and 2,7 in Judaism, Samaritanism, and Gnosticism, JSJ 16 (1985): 202-239; Byron L. Sherwin, The Human Body and the Image of God, in Dan CohnSherbok (ed.), A Traditional Quest: Essays in Honour of Louis Jacobs (Sheffield: University of Sheffield, 1991) 74-85; Johannes C. de Moor, The Duality in God and Man: Gen. 1:26-27 as Ps Interpretation of the Yahwistic Creation Account, in Intertextuality in Ugarit and Israel (OTS, 40; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 1998) 112-125; W.Randall Garr, Image and Likeness in the Inscription from Tell Fakhariyeh, IEJ 50 (2000): 227-234; J. Andrew Dearman, Theophany, Anthropomorphism, and the Imago Dei: Some Observations about the Incarnation in the Light of the Old Testament, in Stephen T. Davis, Daniel Kendall, Gerald OCollins (edd.), The Incarnation: An Interdisciplinary Symposium on the Incarnation of the Son of God (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2002) 31-46; Yair Lorberbaum, Image of God, Kabbalah and Aggadah (Tel Aviv: Schocken Publishing House, 2004) [Hebrew]. 87 See above nn. 50-1 and HALOT 3:1028-1029; DDD s.v. Image, by A. Livingstone, 448-450; Samuel E. Loewenstamm, Beloved is Man in that he was created in the Image, in idem, Comparative Studies in Biblical and Ancient Oriental Literatures (AOAT, 204; Kevelaer: Butzon & Bercker; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1980) 48-50. 88 On this godnot god identity of the idol see especially T. Jacobsen, The Graven Image, in P.D. Miller Jr., P.D. Hanson and S.D. McBride (edd.), Ancient Israelite Religion: Essays in Honor of Frank Moore Cross (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987) 15-32, esp. 16-20; Michael B. Dick, The Relationship between the Cult Image and the Deity in Mesopotamia, in Ji Proseck (ed.), Intellectual Life of the ancient Near East: Papers Presented at the 43rd Rencontre assyriologique international, Prague, July 1-5, 1996 (Prague: Oriental Institute, 1998) 11-16. On the treatment of idols see Irene J. Winter, Idols of the King: Royal Images as Recipients of Ritual Action in Ancient Mesopotamia, Journal of Ritual Studies 6 (Winter 1992):13-42; Curtis, Man as the Image of God, 103-106. On this ANE practice and its biblical parody v. Michael B. Dick, Prophetic Parodies of Making the Cult Image, in in Michael B. Dick (ed.), Born in Heaven, Made on Earth: The Making of the Cult Image in the Ancient Near East (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1999), 1-53. 89 Zainab Bahrani, The Graven Image: Representation in Babylonia and Assyria (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2003) 127. See further K.H. Bernhardt, Gott und Bild. Ein Beitrag zur Begrndung und Deutung des Bildererbotes im Alten Testament (Berlin: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 1956) 17-68; David Lorton, The Theology of Cult Statues in Ancient Egypt, in Born in Heaven, 123-210, esp. 179-184; Curtis, Man as the Image of God, 97-102. 90 Schle, Made in the >Image of God<, 11-14; Edward L. Greenstein, Gods Golem: The Creation of the Human in Genesis 2, in Henning Graf Reventlow and Yair Hoffman (edd.), Creation in Jewish and Christian Tradition (JSOT Supplement Series 319; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002) 219-239 (224-229); James K. Hoffmeier, Some Thoughts on Genesis 1 & 2 and Egyptian Cosmogony, JANES 15 (1983): 46-48; ABD 3:390 s.v. Image of God (OT) by Curtis; Walter Wifall, The Breath of His Nostrils: Gen 2:7b, CBQ 36 (1974): 237-240; Cyrus Gordon, Khnum and El, in Sarah Israelit-Groll (ed.), Egyptological Studies (Jerusalem: The Magnes Press, 1982): 202-214 (204-5); Abraham Shalom Yahuda, The Accuracy of the Bible (London: William Heineman Ltd., 1934) 152. See also Gregory Yuri Glazov, The Bridling of the Tongue and the Opening of the Mouth in Biblical Prophecy (JSOT Supplemental Series 311; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 2001). On the ms p and pit p rituals see Victor Avigdor Hurowitz, The Mesopotamian God Image, From Womb to Tomb, JAOS 123 (2003): 147-157; Christopher Walker and Michael B. Dick, The Induction of the Cult Image in Ancient Mesopotamia: The Mesopotamian ms p Ritual, in Born in Heaven, 55-121. On the Egyptian ritual v. Lorton, The Theology of Cult Statues in Ancient Egypt,153-158. 91 Schle, Made in the >Image of God<; Iain Provan, To Highlight All Our Idols: Worshipping God in Nietzches World, Ex Auditu 15 (1999): 25-26; Greenstein, Gods Golem, 228-9; Sawyer, The Image of God, 64-66.
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Thus, the composite narrative (Gen. 1-2)92 presents us with a picture strikingly reminiscent of ANE cult tradition: a elem is made for/by the deity from mundane materials into which that deity subsequently enters and dwells.93 This indwelling enlivens the elem, making it god and king.94 Adam, as the elem of God, is himself the very body of God.95 We may thus have here the biblical justification for the later tradition of Adams heavenly enthronement and worship by the angels.96 In the Latin Life of Adam and Eve (Vita Adae et Evae) God commands the angels in heaven regarding Adam: Worship the Image of Yahweh (14:3)! As the very Imago of God, Adam is here the object of cultic veneration, as the temple language and imagery makes clear.97 Crispin Flectcher-Louis describes Genesis 1 as an incarnational cosmology.98 If our reading of Ps imago Dei theology is correct, this characterization would be justified.99 What is important here also is that Adam, as elem of God, is the abode of God as well: the image of a god was to be looked uponas a temple, where this god could be both encountered and truly worshipped.100 Adam/Aaron is therefore the first divine sanctuary.101 It may well be this Priestly Adam-as-Tabernacle tradition that lay behind Philos and the NTs Temple of the Body metaphor, and not the Hellenism of the Stoics.102 If so, the Gospel of Johns presentation of the possibly high priestly Jesus as the living abode of God on earth, the fulfillment of all the temple meant103 should not be seen as a decisive break with or radical revision of

As arranged by the final redactor. On reading Genesis I and 2 as parts of a (redacted) whole v. Sawyer, Image of God, 64-5. On the divine entering the form of the statue v. Winter, Idols of the King, 23; Dick, Relationship, 113-114; Curtis, Man as Image of God, 97-99. 94 On made from dust in Gen. 2 as a biblical metaphor for enthronement v. Walter Brueggemann, From Dust to Kingship, ZAW 84 (1972): 1-18. I. Engell already read Gen 1:26-8 as a description of a divine, enthroned Adam: see Knowledge and Life in the Creation Story, in M. Noth and D. Winton Thomas (edd.), Wisdom in Israel and In The Ancient Near East Presented to Harold Henry Rowley (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1955) 112. On the ritual attribution of the creation of the cult statute to the deity v. Walker and Dick, Induction; Dick, Relationship, 113-116. On the materials for the construction of the idol see Victor Hurowitz, What Goes In Is What Comes Out Materials for Creating Cult Statues in G. Beckman and T.J. Lewish (edd.), Text and Artifact Proceedings of the Colloquium of the Center for Judaic Studies, University of Pennsylvania, April 27-29, 1998, Brown Judaic Series, 2006 (in press). My thanks to professor Hurowitz for providing a manuscript copy of this work. 95 See Stendebach (TDOT 12:389 sv. :)The cult statue of a god is the actual body in which that deity dwells. See further above n. XXX. 96 D. Steenburg, The Worship of Adam and Christ as the Image of God, JSNT 39 (1990): 95-109; Pace Jarl Fossum, The Adorable Adam of the Mystics and the Rebuttals of the Rabbis, in Peter Schfer (ed.), Geschichte, Tradition, Reflexion: Festschrift fr Martin Hengel zum 70. Geburtstag Band I: Judentum (Tbingen : J C B Mohr, 1996) 529-539 (533) and Alexander Altman, The Gnostic Background of the Rabbinic Adam Legends, JQR 35 (1945): 382. 97 As persuasively argued by Corrine L. Patton, Adam as the Image of God: An Exploration of the Fall of Satan in the Life of Adam and Eve, SBL 1994 Seminar Papers: 296-98. 98 Image of God, 84, 99. 99 We thus need to amend Norbert Lohfinks statement that Ps conception of Gods nearness in cult must be supplemented by the New Testaments conviction of Gods nearness in the person of Christ. Creation and salvation in Priestly theology, Theological Digest 30 (Spring, 1982): 5. P combines Gods nearness in cult and person, the person of the high priest. 100 Frederick G. McLeod, The Antiochene Tradition Regarding the Role of the Body within the Image of God, in Broken and Whole; Essays on Religion and the Body (Lanham, Md: University Press of America, 1993) 24-25. See also ABD 3:390-91 s.v. Image of God (OT) by Curtis. Gebhard Selz remarks as well: Late texts provide evidence that the statue of ama was considered to be a place of epiphany of the sun-god100: the parallel with the Israelite Tabernacle/Tent of Meeting cannot be missed. The Holy Drum, the Spear, and the Harp. Towards an Understanding of the Propblem of Deification in Third Millennium Mesopotamia, in I. Finkel and M. Gellers (edd.), Sumerian Gods and Their Representations (Grnigen: Styx Publications, 1997) 183. 101 This may support Michael M. Homans suggestion that Aarons name, ,be taken as an Egyptianized form of Semitic ,tent, with an adjectival or diminutive suffix n; hence Aaron is the tent-man. See his discussion in To Your Tents, O Israel! The Terminology, Function, Form, and Symbolism of Tents in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East (Leiden: Brill, 2002) 12023. 102 Pace K.G. Kuhn, Les Rouleaux de Cuivre de Qumrn RB 61 (1954): 203 n. 1 followed by Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Qumrn and the Interpolated Passage in 2 Cor. 6,14-7,1, CBQ 23 (1961): 277. On Philo v. Somn. 1.21-34, 146-149, 225; Opif. 145f; Sobr. 62 (soul as temple of God); see also R.J. McKelvey, The New Temple: The Church in the New Testament (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969) 54-5. Paul: 1 Cor. 3:16; 6:19; Col. 1:19; see also McKelvey, The New Temple, 98-107; Jennifer A. Harris, The Body as Temple in the High Middle Ages, in Albert I. Baumgarten (ed.), Sacrifice in Religious Experience (Leiden: Brill, 2002) 232-256. Gospel of John: 1:14; 2:19-21; Alan R. Kerr, The Temple of Jesus Body: The Temple Theme in the Gospel of John (JSOT Supplemental Series, 220; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 2002); Mary L. Coloe, God Dwells With Us: Temple Symbolism in the Fourth Gospel (Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 2001); Jarl E. Fossum, In the Beginning was the Name: Onomanology as the Key to Johannine Christology, in his The Image of the Invisible God (NTOA 30; Gttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1995) 121ff; McKelvey, The New Temple, 75-84; Harris, The Body as Temple; Lars Hartman, He spoke of the Temple of His Body (Jn 2:1322), SE 54 (1989):70-79. 103 D.A. Carson, The Gospel According to John (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991) 182. Whether or not John presents a high priestly Jesus is debated, but we are persuaded that he does. See Kerr, Temple of Jesus Body, 314-370; Coloe, God Dwells, 201-206; John Paul Heil, Jesus as the Unique High Priest in the Gospel of John, CBQ 57 (1995): 729-745. See also Fletcher-Louis, Jesus the High
93

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the cultic tradition of Israel.104 Nor can we assume that John took this motif from earlier Christian tradition.105 If John was priestly, as has been argued,106 it is likely that the precedent for his Temple Christology was Ps Aaron/Adam-as-Tabernacle tradition. Indeed, the early worship of Jesus by Jewish Christians is probably predicated on the Jewish worship in Second Temple times of the high priest as the Image and Glory of God, the latter phenomenon clearly based on Ps imago Dei theology.107 Relevant too must be the ancient Near and Far Eastern tradition of the Temple as the anthropomorphic body of God.108 Gary Anderson has done interesting work on a theology of the tabernacle and its furniture giving evidence of a Second Temple theologoumenon in which the tabernacle and its furniture were identified with the observable form of God so closely that it was impossible to divide with surgical precision the house of God from the being of God.109 The relevance of this Temple-as-(Divine) Body motif to our study is suggested by those traditions identifying the tabernacle/temple veil and/or curtains with the divine flesh or skin. The anthropomorphization of the temple veil is found in Philonic,110 Gnostic,111 Samaritan,112 early Christian113 and rabbinic literature. 114 The Epistle to the Hebrews (10:20) identifies the tabernacle veil (prket) with the flesh of Christ.115 As the prket is predominantly blue (tekhelet),116 might this suggest an underlying blue-body divine tradition?117
Priest; Joseph E. Zimmerman, Jesus of Nazareth: High Priest of Israel's Great Fall Festival--The Day of Atonement, Evangelical Journal 17 (Fall 1999): 49-59. 104 Characterizations employed by Kerr, Temple of Jesus Body, 32, 133, 166, 373. 105 Coloe, God Dwells, 12. Mark Kinzer (Temple Christology in the Gospel of John, SBL 1998 Seminar Papers [Missoula, Mont. Scholars Press, 1998] 447-463, esp. 458-60) was also unable to find a Jewish Temple tradition paralleling Johns Temple Christology. 106 See esp. Kerr, Temple of Jesus Body, 8-18; Kinzer Temple Christology, 461-63. By John I mean the anonymous author of the Gospel of John. 107 See esp. Crispin H. P. Fletcher-Louis, Alexander the Greats Worship of the High Priest, in Loren T. Stuckenbruck and Wendy E.S. North (edd.), Early Jewish and Christian Monotheism (London: T&T Clark International, 2004) 71-102; idem, The Worship of Divine Humanity; Barker, The High Priest and the Worship of Jesus. 108 See e.g. Ragnhild Bjerre Finnestad, Image of the World and Symbol of the Creator: On the Cosmological and Iconological Values of the Temple of Edfu (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1985); Stella Kramrish, The Temple as Purusa, in Pramod Chandra (ed) Studies in Indian Temple Architecture, (American Institute of Indian Studies, 1975) 40-46. 109 According to Andersons reading, the tabernacle and its furniture constitute the theophanic form in that seeing them was tantamount to seeing Gods very being. This research was apparently part of a 2004 paper presented at the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature and is currently posted on the latters website: http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il/symposiums/ 9th/papers/AndersonPaper.pdf. This temple-as-body of God motif will later resurface in kabbalistic writings: Therefore the Holy One, blessed be He, said to Moses our master, peace be upon him: Tell the Israelite people to bring me [gifts] (Ex. 25:2), they should make me a body and soul for [their] God and I will take bodily form (etgashem) in it. Elliot Wolfson comments: According to this text, the Tabernacle functioned as the sacred space in which the divine assumed bodily or concrete form. See Through a Speculum that Shines: Vision and Imagination in Medieval Jewish Mysticism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), 64 n. 51. 110 The incorporeal world (i.e. the Holy of Holies/devir) is set off and separated from the visible one (i.e. the Holy Place/ heikhal) by the mediating Logos as by a veil (QE II. 94). As the mediating veil, the Logos is a duality whose very nature consists of both invisible (i.e. incorporeal) and visible substance (Ibid; see also Her. 205-206; Mos. II, 127). The visible substance is no doubt represented by the veil itself. According to Philo (QE II.56), the sense-perceptible sphere of existence has two sides: a light, upwardtending substance (air, ether), and a heavy, downward extending substance (earth, water). The veil, he says, is (made of) the ethereal and airy substance (QE II. 91). 111 In Orig. World NHC II.98. 21-24 Sophia functioned as a veil dividing mankind from the things above. On this veil and its Jewish sources see Ithamar Gruenwald, Jewish Sources for the Gnostic Texts From Nag Hammadi? Proceedings of the Sixth World Congress of Jewish Studies (3 vols.; Jerusalem: World Union of Jewish Studies, 1975-77) 3: 47-52 [art.=49-52]=idem, From Apocalyptic to Gnosticism [Frankfurt am Main, etc.; Peter Lang, 1988] 207-220). 112 E.g. the angel Kebala. See Jarl Fossum, The Angel of the Lord in Samaritanism, JSJ 46 (2001): 51-75. 113 See e.g. Melito, bishop of Sardis, Hom. Pasch. 98 (S.G. Hall [ed. and trans.], Melito of Sardis on Pascha [Oxford, 1979] 54). For a discussion of this and other examples of the personified veil in early Christian literature v. Fossum, Angel of the Lord, 59-60; Marinus de Jonge, Two Interesting Interpretations of the Rending of the Temple-Veil in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, Bijdragen, tijdschrift voor filosofie en theologie 46 (1985): 350-362; Campbell Bonner, Two Problems in Melitos Homily on the Passion, HTR 31 (1938): 175-190. 114 B. Gi. 56b relates a Jewish legend in which the Roman general Titus, after having entered the Holy of Holies committing fornication with a harlot on the outspread Torah scroll, pierced the veil with his sword and drew blood. As Fossum, The Angel of the Lord, 59 observes: This story apparently presupposes the idea of an anthropomorphic representation of God being mysteriously linked to the veil before the Holy of Holies. 115 On the difficult passage 10:20 v. Harold W. Attridge, The Epistle to the Hebrews Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1989) 285-87; N.H. Young, TOYT ETIN TH APKO AYTOY (Heb. X.20): Apposition, Dependent or Explicative, NTS 20 (1973-74): 100-104. 116 Haran, Temples and Temple Service, 162. 117 See also the Protoevangelium of James (11, 12), a second century Christian text. Mary is there pictured at the moment of the Annunciation spinning a skein of purple wool in order to weave a new temple veil, an allusion to the flesh of the Christ child. On the Prot. Jas. v. New Testament Apocrypha, Volume I: Gospels and Related Writings, edd. Wilhelm Schneemelcher and R. Mcl. Wilson

2.2. The High Priestly Garments and Divine Glory The chromatic homology between the Tabernacle drappings and the high priestly garments has been noted. In a number of ancient texts veil and garment are equated.118 As the Syriac saint Ephrem (d. 373) wrote: The Firstborn wrapped Himself in a body, as a veil (to hide) His glory; the immortal bride (the soul) shines out in that robe.119 Garment is a common metaphor for body in Jewish, Samaratain, Christian, and Gnostic literature and the body as garment of the soul motif was widespread in late antiquity.120 There is no explicit indication in the Pentateuch that P intended this metaphor. There are suggestive hints, however. Firstly, as we have noted, these garments are the Israelite version of the ANE garment of the gods.121 The high priestly dark blue robe (mel) and ephod with gold appliqu work bring to mind the divine skygarment.122 In the ANE and cognate Indian tradition this garment had somatic significance: it represented the body or skin of the deity, the stars covering the garment signifying rays of celestial light emanating from the hair-pores of the divine skin. This light seems to have produced a surrounding splendor described as a cloud. Thus, the Akkadian nalba am (sky garment) denotesthe star-spangled skyand the cloud-covered sky.123 Sky garment and cloud are therefore metaphors for the divine body surrounded by splendor. The high-priestly garments were given by God to be for glory ( )and beauty (( )Ex. 28:2, 40). In P these terms have special significance denoting the fiery, anthropomorphic form of Yahweh hidden behind a black cloud ( 421.) Elsewhere in the HB kbd and its synonyms (, , etc.) are described as garments of the divine (Ps. 93:1; 104:1f). In the Akkadian pulu melammu awe-

(Cambridge and Louisville, KY: James Clarke & Co. Ltd and Westminster/John Know Press, 1991) 421-439; Harm Reinder Smid, Protevangelium Jacobi: A Commentary (Assen, 1965), esp. 75-83. For this reading of the Prot. Jas. v. Nicholas Constas discussion, The Purple Thread and the Veil of the Flesh: Symbols of Weaving in the Sermons of Proclus, in idem, Proclus of Constantinople and the Cult of the Virgin in Late Antiquity (Leiden: Brill, 2003) 325-27; Margaret Barker, The Veil as the Boundary, in idem, the Great High Priest: The Temple Roots of Christian Liturgy (London: T&T Clark, 2003) 211. On the temple veil and incarnation in Christian theology and iconography v. Hlne Papastavrou, Le voile, symbol de lIncarnation: Contribution une etude smantique, Cahiers Archeologiques 41 (1993): 141-168. 118 In the Testament of Levi 10, 3, for instance, the temple is personified as an angel and the veil is its . See Marinus DeJonge, The Testament of the XII Patriarchs, 124; idem, Two Interesting Interpretations; Bonner, Two Problems. For other examples of this veil=garment motif in ancient literature v. Blake Ostler, Clothed Upon: A Unique Aspect of Christian Antiquity, BYU Studies 22 (1982): 35-6. On the homology between the ephod and Tabernacle veil see Menahem Haran, The Priestly Image of the Tabernacle, HUCA 36 (1965): 208ff. 119 Nisibis 43:21, trns by Brock, Luminous Eye, 95. 120 Jung Hoon Kim, The Significance of Clothing Imagery in the Pauline Corpus (London and New York: T&T Clark International, 2004); Nils Alstrup Dahl and David Hellholm, Garment-Metaphors: the Old and the New Human Being, Adela Yarbro Collins and Margaret M. Mitchell (edd.), Antiquity and Humanity. Essays on Ancient Religion and Philosophy Presented to Hans Dieter Betz on His 70th Birthday (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001) 139-158; April D. De Conick and Jarl Fossum, Stripped before God: A New Interpretation of Logion 37 in the Gospel of Thomas, VC 45 (1991): 123-150; April D. De Conick, The Dialogue of the Savior and the Mystical Sayings of Jesus, VC 50 (1996): 190-2; S. David Garber, Symbolism of Heavenly Robes in the New Testament in Comparison with Gnostic Thought (Ph.D diss., Princeton University, 1974); see also above. 121 See above nn. 31, 33-4. 122 In some later representations of Aaron the robe and ephod are depicted in such a way as to recall the association with sapphiric heavens. In the mosaic from the synagogue in Sepphoris (ca. fifth century) Aarons robe is depicted dark blue with golden dots and in a wall-painting at Dura Europos (3 cent. CE.) Aaron dons a wine-colored, jewel-studded cape, which some scholars take to be a representation of the robe or ephod (See Zeev Weiss and Ehud Netzer, Promise and Redemption: A Synagogue Mosaic from Sepphoris [Jerusalem: The Israel Museum, 1996], 20ff; Swartz, The Semiotics of the Priestly Vestments, 63 n. 16; C.H. Kraeling, The Excavations at Dura Europos: The Synagogue [Final Report vol. 8 Part 1] [New Haven: Yale University Press, 1956; repr. New York: Ktav, 1979] 127; Erwin R. Goodenough, Cosmic Judaism: The Temple of Aaron, in his Jewish Symbols, 9:16). The yellow jewels are similar to the gold dots on the priestly robe in the Sepphoris mosaic and both suggests the stars on the divine sky-garment. See Swartz, The Semiotics of the Priestly Vestments, 63 n. 16; Weiss and Netzer, Promise and Redemption, 45 n. 31. The parallel between lapis lazuli, the ANE sky-garment, and these depictions of the high-priestly vestments is unmistakable. 123 Oppenheim, Golden Garments, 187 n. 25. See also Parpola, Sky-Garment, 35-37. 124 On the relation between the divine and priestly and see John A. Davies, A Royal Priesthood: Literary and Intertextual Perspective on an Image of Israel in Exodus 19.6 (London: T&T Clark International, 2004) 158-9. On the anthropomorphic kbd of P and priestly tradition v. Moshe Weinfeld (Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomic School [Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1972] 191-209, esp. 200-206; idem, TDOT 7:31-33 s.v. ;Tryggve N.D. Mettinger, The Dethronement of Sabaoth: Studies in the Shem and Kavod Theologies (CWK Gleerup, 1982) Chapters Three and Four; J. E. Fossum, Glory, DDD 348-52; Rimmon Kasher, Anthropomorphism, Holiness and the Cult: A New look at Ezekiel 40-48, ZAW 110 (1998): 192-208; Andrei A. Orlov, Ex 33 on Gods Face: A Lesson from the Enoch Tradition, SBL Seminar Papers 39 (2000): 130-147.

inspiring splendor, which a number of scholars associate with the and its cloud,125 we have a fine parallel to the semantic nuances of the Hebrew kbd: the pulu (=Heb. )is conceived of as a fiery garment of the gods that also signifies the gods self and corporeal shape.126 The , not unlike the Akkadian nalba am, is a garment covering the fiery kbd through which the latter shinned producing a rainbow-like surrounding splendor. 127 This reading of P finds support from Second Temple evidence suggesting a priestly tradition of interpreting these garments as metaphor for Gods body. The (possibly) priestly author Jesus ben Sira (second century B.C.E.), who seems to have known this theology behind Ps intratextuality, presented the high priest, probably Simon II, as a new Adam and cultic analogue to the creator deity.128 In his cultic function and clothed in his vestments of glory, the high priest (Aaron/Simon II) reflected the divine glory of the creator. As Otto Mulder observed: Simon mirrors Gods glory in a worthy manner in his service and his radiance as High Priest.129 A number of scholars have observed that Ben Sira seems to identify the high priest in these garments with Gods anthropomorphic Glory as seen by the priest Ezekiel (Ezek. 1:28)130: the rainbow-like appearance of the kbds surrounding splendor is reflected in the variegated colors of the high priestly robe and ephod. 131 The priestly defectors from the Jerusalem Temple who established a yaad at Qumran seem likewise to have identified the colored vestments of the high priest with Gods rainbow-like glory. In the 12th and 13th Songs of Sabbath Sacrifice (4Q405 20 ii-21-22; 23 ii), Ezekiels vision of the kbd is reworked.132
125 Weinfeld, ;13-92 ,George Mendenhall, The Tenth Generation. The Origins of the Biblical Tradition (Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press, 1973) 52-62. 126 Oppenheim, Akkadian pul (u) (t)u and melammu; Mendenhall, Tenth Generation., 52-62. 127 On the cloud/garment association see Job 38:( When I made clouds its garments, and thick darkness its swaddling band (NOAB). Here, clouds ( )and thick darkness ( )are parallel and are described as a garment ( )and swaddling band ( .)On this black cloud/black garment association in biblical and rabbinic tradition see further H. Torczyner, The Firmament and the Clouds: Rqa and Shehqm, Studia Theologica 1 (1948): 188-96. According to Freedman and Willoughby, TDOT 11:255 s.v. nn, the theophanic cloud motif as found in Exodus is rooted in the ancient tradition of describing God as wrapped in a cloak of clouds or light. In Rev. 10:1 the garment of the angel of revelation is a cloud. See further TDNT 4:902-10 s.v. by Oepke. On the rainbow-like surrounding splendor see Ezek. 1:28. 128 In Chapter 50 of his Wisdom (Hebrew and Greek). As New Adam and embodiment of primordial divine Wisdom v Hayward, The Jewish Temple, 44-67; idem, Sacrifice and World Order: Some Observations on Ben Siras Attitude to the Temple Service, in S.W. Sykes (ed.), Sacrifice and Redemption: Durham Essays in Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991) 27-29; James K. Aitken, The Semantics of Glory in Ben Sira-Traces of a Development in Post-biblical Hebrew? in T. Muraoka and J.F. Elwolde (edd.), Sirach, Scrolls, and Sages: Proceedings of a Second International Symposium on the Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Ben Sira, and the Mishnah, held at Leiden University, 15-17 December 1997, (Leiden: Brill, 1999) 3-24. On Simon II as cultic manifestation of the Creator God v. Hayward (The Jewish Temple, 80) who suggests, regarding the Greek text 50:19, that the high priests completion of the order, kosmos, of the daily sacrificebelongs to the same sort of continuum as Gods ordering of the works of creation. See also Fletcher-Louis, The Cosmology of P, 97-110; idem, All The Glory of Adam, 72-84; idem, Some Reflections on Angelomorphic Humanity Texts Among the Dead Sea Scrolls, Dead Sea Discoveries 7 (2000): 293-95; idem, Wisdom Christology, 56-59; Barker, The High Priest and the Worship of Jesus, 101-103. James K. Aitken, The Semantics of Glory, noted also In the portrayal of Aaron in Sir. 45 we may also find divine attributes of God transferred to the priest (11). On a priestly Ben Sira see H. Stadelmann, Ben Sira als Schriftgelehrter (WUNT 6; Tbingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1980). On the common priestly ideology between Ben Sira and P v. Saul M. Olyan, Ben Siras Relationship to the Priesthood, HTR 80 (1987): 261-86. On Ben Siras familiarity with Ps intratextuality see Fletcher-Louis, The Cosmology of P, 69-113; idem, All The Glory of Adam, 7484; idem, Wisdom Christology, 52-68. 129 Regarding the Hebrew. Simon the High Priest in Sirach 50: An Exegetical Study of the Significance of Simon the High Priest as Climax to the Praise of the Fathers in Ben Siras Concept of the History of Israel (Leiden: Brill, 2003) 199. Mulder does not, however, discuss this text in the context of this intratextuality nor Simon II as cultic creator, but as builder of the Temple (according to Sirach 50:1-4). See ibid., 102. 130 In the Hebrew 50:5, 7 the high priest Simon II is compared to a bow that appears in a cloud, which seems to identify him with the anthropomorphic kbd seen by Ezekiel who was described like the bow in the cloud on a rainy day (Ezek 1:28). On this identification v. Martha Himmelfarb, Ascent to Heaven in Jewish and Christian Apocalypses (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993) 19; Fletcher-Louis, The Cosmology of P, 40; idem, Wisdom Christology, 56; idem. All The Glory of Adam, 72; P. W. Skehan and A.A. DiLella, The Wisdom of Ben Sira (ABC 39; New York: Doubleday, 1987) 552. 131 Ben Sira (Sir 50:5-21) is describing the high priest conducting the daily Whole-Offering (Tamid), or maybe during Rosh Hashanah (as argued by Mulder, Simon the High Priest, 168-175), but not likely Yom Kippur as was commonly assumed. Thus, the garments described are the glorious ornamented garments, not the simple linen tunic of Yom Kippur. See Hayward, The Jewish Temple, 49-51; Featghas Fearghail, Sir 50,5-21: Yom Kippur or the Daily Whole-Offering? Bib 59 (1978): 301-316. For recent arguments in favor of reading Sir 50:5 Hebrew as evidence of the Yom Kippur background of this passage v. Daniel M. Gurtner, The House of the Veil in Sirach 50, Journal for the Study of the Psuedepigrapha 14 (2005): 187-200. On the rainbow garment of the gods in ANE iconography see M. van Loon, The Rainbow in Ancient West Asian Inconography, in Diederik J.W. Meijer (ed.), Natural Phenomena: Their Meaning, Depiction and Description in the Ancient Near East (North Holland, Amsterdam, 1992) 149-168. 132 See the discussions by Christopher Rowland, The Visions of God in Apocalyptic Literature, JSJ 10 (1979): 142-145; Carol Newsom, Merkabah Exegesis in the Qumran Sabbath Shirot, JJS 38 (1987): 11-30. James R. Davila, The Dead Sea Scrolls and

The divine Glory is described as a [ra]diant substance, with glorious mingled colors, wonderfully hued (4Q405 20 ii-21-22 lines 10-11) and many-colored ( )as a work of a weaver (4 ;Q405 23 ii line 7).133 These descriptions associate the Glory of God with the colors of the high priestly robe. 134 Whether or not the Songs intend to identify the (angelic/human?) high priests of the 13th Song with Gods anthropomorphic Glory, as Fletcher-Louis has argued,135 the divine appearance is certainly reflected in the high priestly garments.136 This identification of the high priestly robe with the kbd may have been preserved in Syriac Christian (SC) literature where this blue-robe-as-body-of-God metaphor is most systematic articulated. 137 Alexander Golitzin and Andrei A. Orlov have argued for a kinship between the Qumran sectarians and early Syriac Christians based on studies of particular motifs found in both literatures. 138 The great extent to which Jewish traditions appear in SC sources make these latter potentially helpful in understanding some of the former.139 The comparison of Christs body to a royal/priestly purple robe was quite popular in some SC circles, as Sebastian Brock has shown.140 See also Clement of Alexandria (2nd century) who notes a tradition (and they say) in which the robe prophesied the ministry in the flesh by which he (Christ) was made visible (Stromateis V 39, 2). If Clement was indeed influenced by Jewish esotericism,141 and if SC literature is capable of shedding some light on traditions evidenced in the Qumran literature, then these Jewish and Christian sources give further evidence of a Jewish (priestly) tradition identifying the colored high priestly garments with the body divine. Underlying this identification, we suggest, is the ANE bluebody-divine motif.

Merkavah Mysticism, in Timothy H. Lim et al (edd.), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Their Historical Context (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2000) 249-64. 133 On these passages and their association with the kbd v. Carol Newsom, Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice: A Critical Edition (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1985) 315; idem, Shirot Olat Hashabbat, in E. Eshel et al (edd.), Qumran Cave 4: VI, Poetical and Liturgical Texts, Part 1 (DJD 11; Oxford: Clarendon, 1998) 352; Himmelfarb, Ascent to Heaven, 19-20. Crispin H.T. Fletcher-Louis, Heavenly ascent or incarnational presence: a revisionist reading of the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, SBL Seminar Papers Series 37 (1998) 367-399, esp. 385-99; idem, All the Glory of Adam, 346-50. Newsom took 4( Q405 23 ii line 7) as an ellipsis for spirits clothed with multicolored garments (Songs, 336), but Fletcher-Louis rejects this reading (All the Glory of Adam, 366). 134 Ibid. As Newsom (Songs, 336) noted, in 4Q405 23 ii line 7 is likely phonetic orthography of ,used in connection with the high priestly robe in Exod. 28:32; 39:22, 27. Newsom found it puzzling, however, that in the Songs the blue robe is described as multicolored .We find the same peculiarity in Philo; he too describes the robe as variegated: QE II, 107; Mos. II, 110. Such a description probably takes into consideration the hem of the robe which is multi-colored. 135 Heavenly Ascent, 393-94; idem, All the Glory of Adam, 373-74. 136 Newsom, Merkabah Exegesis, 27; Himmelfarb, Ascent to Heaven, 19-20. 137 See especially Sebastion Brock, Clothing Metaphors as a Means of Theological Expression in Syriac Tradition, in Typus, Symbol, Allegorie bei den stlichen Vtern und ihren Parallelen im Mittelalter (Eichsttter Beitrge 4; Regensburg 1982): 11-37. 138 Alexander Golitzin, Recovering the Glory of Adam: Divine Light Traditions in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Christian Ascetical Literature of Fourth-Century Syro-Mesopotamia, in James R. Davila (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls as Background to Postbiblical Judaism and Early Christianity. Papers from an International Conference at St. Andrews in 2001, (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2003) 274-308; idem, Temple and Throne of Divine Glory: Pseudo-Macarius and Purity of Heart, Together with Some Remarks on the Limitations and Usefulness of Scholarship, in Harriet A. Luckman and Linda Kulzer, O.S.B. (edd.), Purity of Heart in Early Ascetic and Monastic Literature. Essays in Honor of Juana Raasch, O.S.B., (Collegville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1999) 107-129; Andrei A. Orlov, Vested with Adams Glory: Moses as the Luminous Counterpart of Adam in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Marcarian Homilies, Mmorial Annie Jaubert (1912-1980) Xristianskij Vostok 4.10 (2002): 740-755; Andrei Orlov and Alexander Golitzin, Many Lamps are Lightened From The One: Paradigms of the Transformational Vision in Macarian Homilies, VC 55 (2001): 281-298. Kinship is a term used by Golitzin, Recovering the Glory of Adam, 307. 139 On Jewish traditions in Syriac Christianity v. also Sebastian Brock, Jewish Traditions in Syriac Sources, JJS 30 (1979): 212-32; idem, Clothing Metaphors; Frederick G. McLeod, S.J., Judaisms Influence upon the Syriac Christians of the Third and Fourth Centuries, in Religions of the Book (Lanham, Md: University Press of America, 1996) 193-208; G. Rouwhorst, Jewish Liturgical Traditions in Early Syriac Christianity, VC 51 (1997) 72-93; Robert Murray, Symbols of Church and Kingdom: A Study in Early Syriac Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975); idem, Some Themes and Problems of Early Syriac Angeology, in V Symposium Syriacum, 1988 ed. R. Lavenant (OCA 236; Rome; Pontifical Institute of Oriental Studies, 1990) 143-153; N. Sd, Les Hymnes sur la paradis de saint Ephrem et les traditions juives, Mus (1968) 455-501; Tryggve Kronholm, Motifs from Genesis 1-11in the Genuine Hymns of Ephrem the Syrian, with particular reference to the influence of Jewish exegetical tradition (Sweden: CW Gleerup Lund, 1978. 140 Brock, Clothing Metaphors, 18. 141 Guy G. Stroumsa, Hidden Wisdom: Esoteric Traditions and the Roots of Christian Mysticism (SHR 70; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1996) 111-17; Margaret Barker, The Secret Tradition, in idem, Great High Priest, 1-33; J. Danilou, Aux sources de lsotrisme judochrtien, Archivio de filosofia 2-3 (1960): 39-46.

2.3. Adam/Aaron as Divine Schattenbild The Akkadian almu means both image/statue and black, the latter meaning deriving from its verbal form almu, to become dark, to turn black.142 This semantic duality is found also in the Hebrew root lm (lm I: image/statue; lm II: dark, darkness, from lam II: to be dark).143 In an exhaustive philological study in 1972 I.H. Eybers suggested taking the Hebrew elem as el (shadow, dark image) expanded by the enclitic mem.144 Marshalling an impressive amount of comparative material Eybers concluded: Taking all the data into consideration the meaning of lm in Gen. 1:26-27 could be that man is a shadowy (and therefore weak) replica and creation of God.145 Earlier, Pierre Bordreuil, also noting the etymological relationship between the Hebrew elem and Akkadian almu,146 argued for a conceptual link between Gen. 1:26-27 and the ANE (specifically Mesopotamian) characterization of the king as both image of a god and as residing in that gods (protective) shadow.147 Adam, therefore, was created in tant quimage dElohim and dans lombra paisse dElohim.148 The relation of lm II and el to each other and to Gen.1:26-27 has been disputed.149 However, a connection between lm II and el is probable150 and comparative philological evidence makes a connection with elem likely.151 The fact that Ps elem is the lexical and conceptual equivalent of the

CAD 16:70,77-85. HALOT, 3:1028-1029 s.v. ;TDOT 12:396 s.v. by Niehr. 144 I.H. Eybers, The Root -L in Hebrew Words, JNSL 2 (1972): 23-36 (29-32). See also International Standard Bible Encyclopedia 4vols. (Grand Rapids, MI: W. B. Eerdmans, 1979-; hereafter ISBE) 4:440 s.v. Shade; Shadow, by G. Chamberlain. 145 Eybers, The Root -L, 32 n. 2. 146 The first to propose such as relation seems to have been the Assyrologist Friedrich Delitzsch who described elem as a Babylonian loanword: Prolegomena eines neuen hebrisch-aramischen Wrterbuchs (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs, 1886) 141. On denials of such a relation v. below n. 154. 147 Pierre Bordreuil, A LOmbre DElohim: Le theme de lombre protectrice dans lAncien Orient et ses rapports avec LImago Dei, RHPhR 46 (1996): 368-391. 148 Ibid., 390. 149 Two relevant issues were actually debated: (1) whether lm II to be/become dark ever existed in Hebrew or Northwest Semitic (NWS) at all and: (2) if so, whether it was in any way related to elem. This discussion often focused on the much disputed term ( Jer. 2:6; Pss. 44:20; 23:4; Job 16:16; 38:17; v. discussion in D. Winton Thomas, in the Old Testament, JSS 7 [1962]: 191-200). After Friedrich Delitzschs initial suggestion in 1886 of a elem/almu (black) relation, he was disputed by his father, OT scholar Franz Delitzsch (New Commentary on Genesis [Edinburgh, T. & T. Clark, 1888-89] 1:91. The longest lasting rebuttal came from Theodor Nldeke, first in a review of Friedrich Delitzschs Wrterbuchs (ZDMG 40 (1886): 733-34) and latter in an article devoted to the subject ( und ,ZAW 17 [1897]: 183-187). Nldeke doubted the existence of a Hebrew lm II to be/become dark and derived elem from an Arabic lm meaning to cut off (on the denial of a NWS lm II v. also J.F.A. Sawyer, Review of W.L. Holladay, A Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament in JSS 17 [1972] 257; D.J.A. Clines, The Etymology of Hebrew elem, JNSL 3 (1973):23-25; Walter L. Michel, LMWT, Deep Darkness or Shadow of Death? BR 29 [1984]: 5-13). The weakness of this Arabic derivation has been adequately demonstrated (Bordreuil, A LOmbre DElohim, 368372; James Barr, The Image of God in the Book of Genesis-A Study of Terminology, BJRL 51 (1968): 18-22; idem, Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament [1st ed.; Oxford, 1968; repr. With additions and corrections: Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1987] 375-380; Eybers, The Root -L, 31-32; Clines, Etymology, 19-21) and the existence of a NWS lm II to be/become dark has been affirmed and accepted (Paul Humbert, Etudes sur le recit du paradis et de la chute dans la Genesis (Mmoires de lUniversit de Neuchatel 14, 1940) 156; Baruch Margalit, A Matter of "Life" and "Death": A Study of the Baal-Mot Epic (CTA 4-5-6) [Kevelaer: Butzon & Bercker; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1980] 72 n. 1; HALOT 3:1028 s.v. ; TDOT 12: 396 s.v. by Niehr; Chaim Cohen, The Meaning of Darkness: A Study in Philological Method, in Michael V. Fox et al (edd.), Texts, Temples, and Traditions: A Tribute to Menahem Haran [Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1996] 287309). James Barr (Comparative Philology, 375) noted in 1987 that by that time the derivation of from a Hebrew root lm to be/become dark had become so completely accepted that some works have ceased to mention that the older tradition of meaning (viz. shadow of death) ever existed. Cf. Michel, LMWT, 5. 150 Pace Nldeke, und 581 ,and Clines, Etymology, 21-22. el is thought to derive from the basic form to be/become dark; cf. Ar. ll IV, Eth. salala II, Akk. illn. See TDOT 12:372-73 s.v. ;B. Halper, The Participial Formations of the Geminate Verbs, ZAW 30 (1910): 216. On v. further: The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon (1906; Peabody, Mass. : Hendrickson Publishers, 1996; hereafter BDB) 853 s.v. III ;HALOT 3:1027 s.v. III ;Lexicon in Veteris Testamenti Libros, ed. Ludwig Koehler and Walter Baumgartner (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1985) 804b s.v. III .On the Ar. ll IV v. E.W. Lane, Arabic-English Lexicon (2 vols.; Cambridge, England : Islamic Texts Society, 1984) 2: 1914 s.v. . On the Akk. illn v. CAD 16: 188 s.v. illn. 151 See e.g.: Akk. almu black::image/statue and illu shadow::likeness (in a transferred sense; v. CAD 16:190 s.v. illu); Old South Arabic lm/lm darkness/black::image/statue (see A.F.L. Beeston et al, Sabaic Dictionary (Louvain-la-Neuve: Editions Peeters; Beyrouth: Librairie du Liban, 1982) 143, 172. Thus Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg could note simply: Image-tselem in HebrewAt the heart of that word is the word shadow. In Bill Moyers, Genesis: A Living Conversation (New York: Doubleday, 1996) 19. See further Sawyer, The Image of God, The Wisdom of Serpents and the Knowledge of God and Evil, 66; Eybers, The
143

142

Akkadian almu suggests that we should expect the former to exhibit the same semantic range as the latter.152 Also, Ps intratextual paralleling of Adam the Image of God with Bezalel the shadow of God may further indicate that this semantic nuance was known by P. 153 Thus, Adam is both image and shadow of God, his shadow picture, as N.W. Porteous said it.154 This description of Adam as the dark image (shadow) of God may be related to the biblical designation for the material from which Adams body was made, admh (Gen. 2:7). This latter term suggests a dark reddish brown inclining towards black. 155 As elem (statue) of God Adam is also the terrestrial body of God. As the luminous kbd took up residence in the dark elem, we are probably to imagine the light passing through the hair pits producing a sapphiric blue surrounding splendor. This would explain the association of the kbd with the blue meil of the high priest. This would be consistent with ANE mythic tradition. Ps intratextuality implies a remarkable theological anthropology. Adam is implicitly presented as the high priestly, demiurgic Image and Shadow of God ministering within the cosmic Temple.156 This divine, prelapsarian Adam is garbed in the ornate cosmic garments of the high priest.157 Internal evidence along with the evidence of Second Temple priestly traditions, some of which show a relation to P, suggests that these garments might have a somatic significance in P. Ps Adam is the divine sanctuary into which the divine kbd entered and took up residence, i.e. incarnated.158 As the selem and tabernacle of God, Adam is the earthly body of God. This bodys appearance is somehow reflected in the long blue robe and golden ephod of the high priest. This theological anthropology, in as much as it is never explicitly articulated but subtly alluded to by means of Ps characteristic method of literary indirection, suggests an esoteric doctrine,159 the contours of which are discernable as well in the writings of Philo of Alexandria. 3. Philos High Priestly Logos With what we are now learning about the diversity of Second Temple Judaisms it is becoming increasingly clear that the Logos doctrine of the first century Torah exegete and philosopher Philo of Alexandria, Egypt was not simply the product of his intercourse with Middle Platonism as was commonly assumed.160 It seems instead to have been rooted in the same tradition of (Hellenistic) Jewish speculation as that of the Prologue of John and the Epistle to the Hebrews.161 What is more, this tradition is itself rooted in, or at least cognate with, Jewish ditheistic/binitarian traditions widespread in Palestine and the Diaspora
Root -L, 29-32; Barr, The Image of God, 21. Pace most recently Wildberger, TLOT 3:1080, s.v. ;Stendebach, TDOT 12:388, s.v. . 152 Thus Barr (The Image of God, 21), preferring to see two different but homonymous Hebrew roots at work here, acknowledged that by the time of P the semantic content came to overlap, the component image and the component dark, obscure reality coming to penetrate one another. See also J.F.A. Sawyer, who in 1972 was doubtful of a Hebrew cognate to Akkadian almu (Review of W.L. Holladay), argued in 1992: It is much more likely that the term tselem is used here (Gen. 1.26-27) in its older sense of shadow, dream, as in two Psalms on the subject of human nature (Ps. 39.6; 73.20): The Image of God, The Wisdom of Serpents and the Knowledge of God and Evil, 66. 153 We are reading with Beth essentiae as the parallel with Gen. 1:26-7 suggests. 154 George Arthur Buttrick et al (edd.), The Interpreters Dictionary of the Bible (New York: Abingdon Press, 1962; hereafter IDB) 2:3 s.v. Image of God, by N.W. Porteous. In his discussion of Poimandres in 1935 C. H. Dodd (The Bible and the Greeks [London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1935] 157-8, n. 1), observing that the Greek terms and used with regard to the divine Anthropos corresponded with the biblical and used in the creation account of Adam (Gen. 1:26-7), noted: certainly there is an old exegetical tradition according to which and in Genesis mean likeness and shadow respectively, corresponding fairly well with the and of Poimandres. Unfortunately, I cannot trace this tradition farther back than the Jesuit Cornelius a Lapide, who died in 1637. Is there any evidence that it was known at a date which would make it possible that the Hermetist was acquainted with this interpretation? We can now answer Dobbs question in the affirmative. 155 Cf. the Akkadian cognates adamtu, dark red earth and adamatu B black blood. CAD 1.94; TDOT 1:75-77 s.v. dhm by Maass; ibid, 1:88-90 s.v. adhmh by J.G. Plger; ABD 1.62 s.v. Adam by Howard N. Wallace. 156 High priest: Adam::Aaron correspondence. Demiurge: Aaron::Creator, Aaron::Adam, Adam::Bezalel, Bezalel::Creator. Shadow of God: Adam::Bezalel. 157 According to Kim, Significance, 18, 21, 24 the high priestly garments divinized the wearer. 158 See the interesting discussion by Kline, Creation in the Image; idem, Images of the Spirit, 13-34. 159 Geller notes that Ps theology is hiddenfrom casual gaze by the veil of literary stratagem. Blood Cult, 103. 160 See e.g Thomas H. Tobin, S.J., The Creation of Man: Philo and the History of Interpretation (Washington, DC: The Catholic Biblical Association of America, 1983) 65-67. On Philo and Middle Platonism v. John Dillon, The Middle Platonists: 80 B.C. to A.D. 220 (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1977), 139-183, esp. 155-166. 161 On Johns Prologue v. Thomas H. Tobin, S.J., The Prologue of John and Hellenistic Jewish Speculation, CBQ 52 (1990): 252269; David Runia, Philo in Early Christian Literature: A Survey (Minneapolis, 1993) 78-83. On Hebrews v. Kenneth L. Schenck, Philo and the Epistle to the Hebrews: Ronald Williamsons Study After Fifty Years, The Studia Philonica Annual 14 (2002): 112135; Runia, Philo in Early Christian Literature, 74-78.

(among Semitic and Greek-speaking Jews) during Philos time.162 Thus, Philos deuteros theos or second God, while described in the language of the philosophers, probably owes more to his Jewish (intellectual) heritage than to his Greek education.163 It is therefore the case that Philo can teach us something about preRabbinic Judaism, particularly as it relates to mediation.164 Philos value for reconstructing pre-Rabbinic Greek Judaism is known,165 but it may even be the case that Philo sheds light on Jewish esoteric and priestly tradition as well. Philo was likely of priestly lineage.166 Margaret Barker has seen in Philos Logos a demythologization of one of Israels ancient temple traditions. 167 Our research supports this suggestion. It is our position that Philos High Priestly Logos (HPL) doctrine demonstrates his awareness of a tradition similar to that evidenced in the writings of P, a tradition involving speculation on the blue body divine. 3.1. Deuteros Theos As is well-known, Philos Logos is the deity in his accessible aspect168; he is the Image of God through which the latter may be seen169; he is demiurgic-the instrument (organon) through which the universe was created and ordered.170 And he is anthropomorphic; Gods man (anthropos theou) and the Man after His Image.171 Significant too is that the name YHWH (Grk. kyrios) seems to be that of the anthropomorphic

162 Daniel Boyarin, Two Powers in Heaven; or, the Making of a Heresy, in The Idea of Biblical Interpretation: Essays for James Kugel (Lieden: Brill, 2004):331-370; idem, The Gospel of the Memra: Jewish Binitarianism and the Prologue to John, HTR 94:3 (2001) 243-84, esp. 248, 260. Boyarin argues that Logos-type figures were part of the religious Koine of Jews in Palestine and the Diaspora during the first and second centuries. Margaret Barker therefore seems correct when she suggested Philo drew his ideas of the mediator from his peoples most ancient beliefs, and only adapted them to Greek ways of thinking (Great Angel: A Study of Israels Second God [Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1992)] 116; emphasis original). On the Alexandrian mediator tradition as background to both Philo and Hebrews v. Ronald H. Nash, The Notion of Mediator in Alexandrian Judaism and the Epistle to the Hebrews, WTJ 40 (1977): 89-115. On the non-Hellenistic background v. M. De Jonge and A.S. Van der Woude, 11Q Melchizedek and the New Testament, NTS 12 (1966): 301-326; Anders Aschim, Melchizedek and Jesus: 11Qmelchizedek and the Epistle to the Hebrews in Newman, Davila and Lewis, Jewish Roots of Christological Monotheism, 129-174. 163 As argued by Boyarin, The Gospel of the Memra, 247-9. Cf. also Samuel Sandmel, Philo of Alexandria: An Introduction (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979) 98-9. On Philos Logos and Jewish binitarianism v. also Alan F. Segal, Dualism in Judaism, Christianity, and Gnosticism: A Definitive Issue, in his The Other Judaisms of Late Antiquity (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1987): 1-40; idem, Two Powers in Heaven: Early Rabbinic Reports about Christianity and Gnosticism (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1977), passim; Charles A. Gieschen, Angelomorphic Christology: Antecedents and Early Evidence (Leiden: Brill, 1998) 107ff; Barker, The Great Angel, 114-133; Jarl E. Fossum, The Name of God and the Angel of the Lord (Tbingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 1985) 197-204. 164 As demonstrated by N.A. Dahl and Alan Segal, Philo and the Rabbis on the Names of God, JSJ 9 (1978): 1-28. 165 See Gregory E. Sterling, Recherch or Representative? What is the Relationship between Philos Treatises and Greek-speaking Judaism? Studia Philonica Annual 11 (1999): 1-30; idem, Philo Has Not Been Used Half Enough: The Significance of Philo of Alexandria for the Study of the New Testament, Perspectives in Religious Studies 30 (Fall 2003): 251-268. 166 D.R. Schwartz, Philos Priestly Descent, in F.E. Greenspahn, E. Hilgert, and B.L. Mack (edd.) Nourished with Peace (Chico, 1984) 155-171. 167 Temple Imagery in Philo: An Indication of the Origin of the Logos? in William Horbury (ed.), Templum Amicitiae. Essays on the Second Temple presented to Ernst Bammel, (JSOT Supplement Series 48; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1991) 71-102; idem, Great Angel, 118, 123-25. 168 According to David T. Runia (Philo of Alexandria and the Timaeus of Plato [Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1986], 449) the Logos is, in general terms, that aspect or part of the divine that stands in relation to created reality. Cf. also David Winston, Logos and Mystical Theology in Philo of Alexandria (Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College Press, 1985) for whom Philos Logos is the face of God turned toward creation (50). 169 De somniis (hereafter Somn.) 1.239; De confusione linguarum (hereafter Conf.) 97. 170 De specialibus legibus (hereafter Spec.)1.81; De Cherubim (hereafter Cher.) 125-128; Legum allegoriae (hereafter Leg.) 3.96. While Philo may never have given the Logos the status of demiurgic creator, as argued by Runia (Philo of Alexandria, 449 and n. 244), he certainly served this function for Philo: Whenever God is described as engaged in creative or providential activity, he does so in the guise or through the agency of the Logos (ibid). It is God who creates, but he does so at the level of his Logosor in the guise of his creative power and through the agency of the Logos as instrument of creation (Ibid, 450; emphasis original). See also Tobin, The Creation of Man, 65-7. 171 Conf. 40-41, 62-63, 146-47. A.J.M. Wedderburns argument (Philos Heavenly Man, NovT 15 [1973], 316) that these passages do not imply that the Logos was regarded by Philo as really (like) a man any more than he regarded the Logos as like a rock or wells, symbols elsewhere used by our exegete, fails to take account of Philos use of the Logos to account for the anthropomorphisms of the biblical text from which God must remain aloof. Instead of allegorizing these texts, Philo attributes the anthropomorphism to the Logos. Segal observes: Thus, Philo can use his concept of logos both for philosophical argumentation and for explaining the anthropomorphisms in the Bible. The logos becomes the actual figure of God, who appears like a man in order that men may know His presence (Two Powers in Heaven, 165). See also idem The Incarnation: The Jewish Milieu, in Davis et al, The Incarnation, 133; Barker, Temple Imagery in Philo, 89, 96, 98; idem, Great Angel, 121-2.

Logos, the second God, while the true, transcendent God is simply To On, The Existent.172 This suggests that for Philo the Logos is the anthropomorphic god of the HB, Yahweh. 173 Philo read the biblical passages describing the high priest and his cultic duties, particularly on Yom Kippur, as allegories of the Logos in the cosmic temple, the universe. 174 Of particular significance for us is Philos treatment of the high priestly vestments. Philo was part of a tradition that allegorized the temple and its paraphernalia, seeing in them symbols of the sensible, material world.175 The four colors required for the production of the fabrics for the garments and temple drappings (curtains/veil; Exod. 26, 28) represented the four natural elements: air (=blue [Heb. tklet]), water (=purple [Heb. argmn]176), fire (=crimson [Heb. tlaat shni]), earth (=linen [Heb. ]). These garments symbolized the material body of the immanent Logos.177 As Erwin Goodenough put it: The priest in his cosmic robes (is) the Logos clothed in the material elements.178 Since the high priest signified Philos Logos, the high priestly vestments signified the material body of Philos second God, i.e. Yahweh.179 This is significant, but as far as this author knows much of its significance has gone unnoticed. That Philo allegorized the priestly vestments as the material body is known.180 What seems not to have been explored, however, are the implications and significance of interpreting the long dark blue robe as the body of (the second) God. Does the color of the robe have any significance in this garment-as-body metaphor? The significance of the white linen tunic has been explored; it represents, we are told, a

See Sandmel, Philo of Alexandria, 91-5. At times Philo also distinguishes between the anathrous and arthrous Theos (Heb. lhm), the latter denoting the true God, the former his Logos. Somn. I.228-30. See Segals discussion, Two Powers in Heaven, 170. 173 Barker, Great Angel, 144-133; Dahl and Segal, Philo and the Rabbis, 27. 174 Somn. 1.215; Quis rerum divinarum heres sit (hereafter Her.) 185; Leg. 3.45. See Ronald Williamsom, Philo and the Epistle to the Hebrews (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1970), 411. On Philos spiritualization of the Temple and its cult v. Valentine Nikiprowetzky, La spiritualization des sacrifices et le culte sacrificial au Temple de Jrusalem chez Philon dAlexandrie, Semia 17 (1967): 97-116; J. Danilou, La Symbolique du Temple de Jerusalem chez Philon et Josephe, in Le symbolisme cosmique des monuments religieux (Serie Orientale Roma XIV; Rome: Instituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente, 1957) 83-90. On Philos HPL v. Jean Laporte, The High Priest in Philo of Alexandria, Studia Philonica Annual 3 (1991): 71-82; Barker, Temple Imagery in Philo; John M. Scholer, Proleptic Priests: Priesthood in the Epistle to the Hebrews (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1991) 63-68; George L. Coulon, The Logos High Priest: An Historical Study of the Theme of the Divine Word as Heavenly High Priest in Philo of Alexandria, the Epistle to the Hebrews, Gnostic Writings and Clement of Alexandria, (Th.D. diss. Institut Catholigue de Paris, Paris 1966); Edwin R. Goodenough, By Light, Light: The Mystic Gospel of Hellenistic Judaism (Amsterdam: Philo Press, 1969), Chapter IV. 175 Quaestiones et solutions in Exodum (hereafter QE) II. 85; Mos. 2.87-88. See also Josephus Judean Antiquities III 151-186; Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis, V.6. On Philos allegorization of the vestments v. Hayward, The Jewish Temple, 108-118; Coulon, The Logos High Priest, 19-22; Margaret Barker, The Gate of Heaven: The History and Symbolism of the Temple in Jerusalem (London: SPCK, 1991) 111-15. On Jewish interpretation of the vestments in general v. Michael D. Swartz, The Semiotics of the Priestly Vestments in Ancient Judaism, in Baumgarten, Sacrifice in Religious Experience, 57-80; Robert Hayward, St Jerome and the Meaning of the High-Priestly Vestments, in William Horbury (ed.) Hebrew Study From Ezra to Ben-Yehuda, (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1999) 90-105. On Clements allegorization of the Tabernacle and high priestly vestments v. Salvatore R.C. Lilla, Clement of Alexandria: A Study in Christian Platonism and Gnosticism (London: Oxford University Press, 1971) 173-181; Annewies van den Hoek, Clement of Alexandria and His Use of Philo in the Stromateis: An Early Christian reshaping of a Jewish model (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1988) Chapter Five; Judith L. Kovacs, Concealment and Gnostic Exegesis: Clement of Alexandrias Interpretation of the Tabernacle, StPatr 31 (1997): 414-437. 176 Philo equates the color purple with the blood of the shell fish that bears the same name, from which the dye was produced. See De congressu eruditionis gratia (hereafter Congr.) 117; QE II. 85; Mos. 2.87-88. 177 De fuga et inventione (hereafter Fug.) 110; Somn. I.196-225; Leg. 2.55-6; De Migratione Abrahami (hereafter Mig.) 101-103. Harry A. Wolfson (Philo: Foundations of Religious Philosophy in Judaism, Christianity and Islam [2 vols.; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1947], 1:232-35, 327-29) posited three stages in the manifestation of Philos Logos: initially the Logos existed within God as his mind; this is the preexistent, uncreated Logos. At a secondary stage, the Logos is given an independent existence outside of God, created but not like mortals are. This is the created Incorporeal Logos. Finally, the Logos incarnates in the body of the world, wearing the sensible/material world as a garment; this immanent Logos is the instrument of divine providence. Wolfsons schema has been criticized as being artificial and overly systematic, but its overall correctness has been acknowledged. See Runia, Philo of Alexandria, 450, n. 247. On the robe as symbol of the body in Philo v. also Kim, Significance, 44-52; Conick and Fossum, Stripped before God, 128f. Dennis Ronald MacDonald observes that, One of Philos favorite images for the body is the garment. There is no Male and Female, 24. See also Goodenough, By Light, Light, 116 (robe as symbol of matter). 178 Goodenough, By Light, Light, 104. The human body is composed of the same elements represented by the four colors. See De Opificio Mundi (hereafter Opif.) 146; Her. 283. 179 Barker notes (Gate of Heaven, 116): Since the true high priest was a heavenly figure, he originally passed through the veil not to but from the presence of God (i.e. from the Holy of Holies). As he passed through the veil so he took form from it and thus became visible, robed in the four elements of the created order (emphasis original). Cf. idem, Temple Imagery in Philo, 91. On the veil/garment relation see idem, Gate of Heaven, 104. 180 See now Kim, Significance, 44-52.

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heavenly light-form similar to that of the angels.181 But the significance of the blue robe has not been clearly elucidated in the scholarly literature.182 3.2. Logos in a Blue Robe Harry Allen Wolfson discerned three stages of existence in Philos Logos.183 David Runia prefers to speak of three levels of operation.184 In both systems, there is a transcendent Logos, nearly indistinguishable from the incorporeal, ineffable deity; an immanent Logos, incarnate in or permeating through the material cosmos; and an intermediate Logos bridging the two. The latter is the demiurge of the material cosmos.185 These three stages/levels of the Logos bring to mind the three Adams found in various exegetical traditions of Gen. 1-2, 186 particularly in those texts termed Gnostic.187 According to the Nag Hammadi tractate On the Origin of the World 117:29-33, the first Adam is spirit-endowed (pneumatikos), and appeared on the first day. The second Adam is soul-endowed (psychikos), and appeared on the sixth day...The third Adam is a creature of the earth (choikos), that is, the man of law, and he appeared on the eighth day.188 These three Adams are not individual men; they are stages in the somatic (d)evolution of Man.189 This somatic tripartition, common in Gnostic texts, is based on a popular reading of Genesis 1-2. The pneumatikos or spiritual first Adam, born on the first day, is associated with the light of Gen. 1:3. The latter reading is based on a pun on the Greek word phs, used in the LXX translation of Gen. 1:3. The word could mean both light and man. Thus, the product of Gods command, Let there be light (phs), was a divine Light-Man, an anthropos enveloped within and consisting of light. This interpretation is Jewish and can be found as early as the second century B.C.E. in the drama Exagoge of the Alexandrian playwright Ezekiel190; it may even go back to the prophet Ezekiel himself.191 The second, soulendowed (psychikos), or rather soul-composed Adam of the Sixth Day is the man made according to the Image of God (Gen. 1:26f). His body, anatomically identical to a material body, is yet made of a psychic

For Philo, the white tunic, the heavenly garment of light (Fuga. 110), represents the purified soul, that fair and lovely form (; De Ebrietate [hereafter Ebr.] 157; 85-6; Mut. 45-6), most radiant light (Somn. I.202, 216-17). See also Margaret Barker, On Earth as it is in Heaven: Temple Symbolism in the New Testament (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1995), Chapt. V; idem, Temple Imagery in Philo, 91; idem, Gate of Heaven, 113-115; idem, Great Angel, 125; Harald Riesenfeld, Jsus Transfigur. LArrire-plan du Rcit vanglique de la Transfiguration de Notre-Seigneur (Kbenhavn, 1947) Chapitre VIII; W. Schwarz, A Study in Pre-Christian Symbolism: Philo, De Somniis I.216-218, and Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride 4 and 77, Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 20 (1973): 104-117; Haran, Temples and Temple-Service, 174. On the white robe as the luminous body of angels in rabbinic literature v. Pesiqta Rabbati (hereafter PR) 51.8; Midrash Tehillim 104.4. 182 Other than the cosmological symbolism provided by Philo. See e.g. Harald Hegermann, Die Vorstellung vom Schpfungsmitter im Hellenistischen Judentum und Urchristentum (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1961) 4749. 183 See n. 183. 184 Runia, Philo of Alexandria, 450-51. 185 Runia, Philo of Alexandria, 451; Wolfson, Philo, 1:331 186 A connection made already by Coulson, The Logos High Priest, 77-78. 187 On the dubiousness of the label Gnostic to categorize the polymorphus movements so designated v. Michael Allen Williams, Rethinking Gnosticism: An Argument for Dismantling a Dubious Category (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1996). See also Karen L. King, What is Gnosticism? (Cambridge, Mass. And London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2003). 188 Translation of Hans-Gebhard Bethge and Bently Layton in James M. Robibson (ed.), The Nag Hammadi Library (New York: HaperCollins, 1988) 183. On this passage and Gnostic exegesis of the Hebrew Bible v. Orval Wintermute, A Study of Gnostic Exegesis of the Old Testament, in James M. Efird (ed.), The Use of the Old Testament in the New and Other Essays. Studies in the Honor of William Franklin Stinespring (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1972) 241-270. 189 See discussion in Maria Grazia Lancellotti, The Naassenes: A Gnostic Identity Among Judaism, Christianity, Classical and Ancient Near Eastern Traditions (Mnster: Ugarit-Verlag, 2000) 75-86, 100-1. On the triple creation of man in Gnostic sources v. Michel Tardieu, Trois Mythes Gnostiques (Paris: tudes Augustiniennes, 1974) 85-139; Pheme Perkins, Creation of the Body in Gnosticism, Religious Reflections on the Human Body, ed. Jane Marie Law (Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1995) 21-35; Birger Pearson, Pneumatikos-Psychikos Terminology in I Corinthians. A Study in the Theology of the Corinthian Opponents of Paul and its Relation to Gnosticism (SBL Dissertation Series, No. 12; Missoula, Mont., 1973) 65-80. 190 On traditions of Adam as the Phs of Gen. 1:3 v. Elaine H. Pagels, Exegesis of Genesis 1 in the Gospels of Thomas and John, JBL 118 (1999): 477-496; April D. de Conick, Seek to See Him: Ascent and Vision Mysticism in the Gospel of Thomas (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1996) 65-79; Jarl Fossum, The Image of the Invisible God: Colossians 1.15-18a in the Light of Jewish Mysticism and Gnosticism, in idem, The Image of the Invisible God. Essays on the Influence of Jewish Mysticism on Early Christology (GttingenVandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1995) 13-39; idem, Name of God, 280; Gilles Quispel, Ezekiel 1:26 in Jewish Mysticism and Gnosis, VC 34 (1980): 1-13. 191 On the possibility that Ezekiels description of the anthropomorphic kbd YHWH in Chapter 1 is the prophets own interpretation of Gen. 1:3 see Ben Zion Wacholder, Creation in Ezekiels Merkabah: Ezekiel 1 and Genesis 1, in Evans, Of Scribes and Sages, 15-32.

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substance.192 The third Adam is the man molded from the earth (Gen 2:7), possessing now, along with the above two bodies, a material body. This trisomatism in man reflects the same trichotomy in the celestial sphere, for anthropogony mirrors and recapitulates theogony. 193 According to Tripartite Tractate (NHC I, 5: 118: 14-119:15), three races originate from this trichotomy in the demiurgic logos:
Mankind came to be in three essential types, the spiritual, the psychic and the material, conforming to the triple disposition of the Logos, from which were brought forth the material ones and the psychic ones and the spiritual onesThe spiritual race(is)like light from lightThe psychic race is like light from a fireThe material race, howeveris dark, it shuns the shining of light.194

This trichotomous anthropology may very well have been a popular Alexandrian tradition.195 It was known to Philo who elsewhere shows a number of points of contact with Gnosticism.196 That Philos Logos possessed all three concentric bodies197 is demonstrated by his discussion of the pure white, speckled, and ashy-sprinkled he-goats shown to Jacob in a dream (Gen 31:1012; Somn. I.196-225). These, Philo says, represent three seals that marked the great High Priest, i.e the Logos. The pure white is analogous to the rational soul and is symbolized by the white linen tunic worn by the high priest on Yom Kippur. The speckled is read by Philo as variegated, an allusion here to the blue robe (Somn. I.203208)198; this symbolized the lower, irrational soul of the HPL.199 While the rational soul is inward and invisible, the irrational soul is outward and visible.200 The ash-sprinkled is taken as a reference to the high priest sprinkling himself with ash and water prior to offering sacrifices (Somn. I.209-212). The ash and water, symbolized by the pomegranates and flowers that line the hem of the blue robe, are the two elements brought together to make the earthly body of man.201

192 E.g. in the Ap. John NHC II 15, 13-19, 10. On the creation of the psychic body in Gnosticism v. R. van den Broek, The Creation of Adams Psychic Body in the Apocryphon of John, in R. van den Broek and M.J. Vermaseren (edd.), Studies in Gnosticism and Hellenistic Religions, presented to Gilles Quispel on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday. (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1981) 38-57; Gerard P. Luttikhuizen, The Creation of Man and Woman in The Secret Book of John, in Gerard P. Luttikhuizen (ed.) The Creation of Man and Woman: Interpretations of the Biblical Narratives in Jewish and Christian traditions, (Leiden: Brill, 2000) 140-155; Richard Valantasis, Adams Body: Uncovering Esoteric Traditions in the Apocraphon of John and Origens Dialogue with Heraclides, SecCent 7 (1990): 150-162. 193 Lancellotti, Naassenes, 103; Ragnhild Bjerre Finnestad, The Cosmogonic Fall in Evangelium Veritatis, Temenos 7 (1971): 3949; Ingvild Saelid Gilhus, The Gnostic Demiurge-An Agnostic Trickster, Religion 14 (1984): 307 who described the demiurge as model of biological man. 194 See also the Naassen divine anthropos of Hippolytus Ref. V. 1; Lancellotti, Naassenes, 75-86. On the three bodies/three races association v. Pearson, Pneumatikos-Psychikos, 76-81; Francis T. Fallon, The Enthronement of Sabaoth: Jewish Elements in Gnostic Creation Myth (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1978) 120-21. 195 Gilles Quispel ( Hermes Trismegistus and the Origins of Gnosticism, in Roelof van den Broek and Cis van Heertum [edd.], From Poimandres to Jacob Bhme: Gnosis, Hermetism and the Christian Tradition [Amsterdam: Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica, 2000] 148) suggested that this trichotomy can be traced back to and localized in a Hermetic lodge of Alexandria, but one clearly of pagan origin. According to Elaine Pagels it was widely known and shared among various groups of Genesis readers. Exegesis, 479. 196 Quod Deterius Potiori insidiari soleat (hereafter Det.) 89; De Gigantibus (hereafter Gig.) 60-61. Hans Jonas pointed out the similarity between the Gnostic and Philonic categories of men already in his Gnosis und sptantiker Geist, Vol. 1: Die mythologische Gnosis (FRLANT N.f. 33; Gttengen, 1934) 212-214. On the trichotomy in Philo v. also Birger A. Pearson, Philo, Gnosis, and the New Testament, in idem, Gnosticism, Judaism, and Egyptian Christianity (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990) 179-81; idem, Hellenistic-Jewish Wisdom Speculation and Paul, in Robert L. Wilken (ed.), .Aspects of Wisdom in Judaism and Early Christianity, (Notre Dame: University if Notre Dame Press, 1975) 53-55. Louis Painchaud even suggested that the trisomatic anthropogony of Orig. World cited above is inspired by Philo. See The Redactions of the Writing Without Title (CG II5), SecCent 8 (1991): 226, 228. On the difficulty in determining the relationship between Philo and Gnosticism v. R. McL. Wilson, Philo and Gnosticism, Studia Philonica Annual 5 (1993): 84-92; idem, Philo of Alexandria and Gnosticism, Kairos 14 (1972): 84-92; idem, The Gnostic Problem (London: A.R. Mowbray & Co. Limited, 1958); Birger A. Pearson, Philo and Gnosticism, ANRW II.21.1:295-342; idem, Philo, Gnosis and the New Testament, in idem, Gnosticism, Judaism and Egyptian Christianity, 165-182; Karen L. King, The Body and Society in Philo and the Apocryphon of John, in John Peter Kenney (ed.), The School of Moses: Studies in Philo and Hellenistic Religion, (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995) 82-97. 197 According to Theodotus (Excerpts 59.1-4), the Aeon Jesus, on his descent through the cosmic heavens to earth in order to redeem the pneumatics, put on (as successive envelopes) a spiritual body from the Ogdoad (eighth heaven), a psychic body from the Hebdomad (seventh heaven), and then on earth (what appeared) as a corporeal body. As April D. De Conick observes: So Jesus seems to have three bodies: a spiritual body, a soul body, and a special corporeal body. See Heavenly Temple Traditions and Valentinian Worship: A Case for First-Century Christology in the Second Century, in Jewish Roots of Christological Monotheism, 333. 198 On the robe as a variegated fabric v. QE II, 107; Mos. II, 110.. 199 See also Dodd, Bible and the Greeks, 192. 200 On the white and blue robes as higher/inward and lower/outward parts of the soul v. Ebr. 85-6; Mut. 45. 201 See also Spec. I.263-6.

According to Philo, the white tunic represented most radiant light (Somn. 1:216-17), which he likened to a cloudless ray coming from the suns beams would appear in a clear atmosphere at noontime (Somn. I.202). Read somatically this tunic represents a light-body similar to that traditionally attributed to the divine and angels. The substance of this pneumatic body of the Logos and the rational soul was ether, the purest and most subtle of all matter.202 As this ether is represented by gold (QE II. 63, 113), the gold frontlet of the high priest and his golden ephod 203 seem also to have symbolized this pneumatic body. 204 The gold frontlet is a likeness of the divine Logos (QE II. 123), just as the light of Gen. 1:3 is an image (eikn) of the divine Logos (Opif. 31).205 This all recalls the Light-Man (Phs) read into Gen. 1:3. The dark blue robe (it is almost black, QE 2.123) signifies a dimmer and therefore more senseperceptible soul-body.206 This lower soul-body is aereal, composed of the blue-black air of the sub-lunar heavens.207 This intermediate body, between the pneumatic/ethereal and the earthly, is associated with the man of Gen. 1:26-7 made after the Image (Logos).208 This man born on the sixth day of creation is thus presented by Philo as aereal/psychic and associated with the blue robe of the high priest. Finally, as noted, the earthly body made of dust, here the ash-sprinkled, was symbolized by the hem of the blue robe lined with cloth pomegranates and flowers signifying the elements from which the earthly body was made.209 Thus, the bodies of the three Adams are represented in Philos exegesis on Jacobs dream by the white tunic (1:3), the blue robe (1:26-27), and the hem (2:7). 210 Based on the above observations, and at the risk of being overly systematic, we get the following associations:
Pure White Speckled Ash-Sprinkled = = = White Tunic Blue Robe Hem = = = Light/Pneumatic Body Aereal/ Psychic Body Earthly Body = = = Gen. 1:3 Gen. 1:26-27 Gen. 2:7

3.2.1. Gods Schattenbild This areal/psychic body signified by the blue robe is in some way related to Philos designation of the demiurgic Logos as both Gods Image and Shadow (Leg. III.96). Philo identifies the Logos with the chief
202 On the rational soul as ethereal v. Her. 283; Leg. III. 161. On the pneumatic body of Logos v. Fug. 133 and discussion in John Dillon, ASMATOS: Nuances of Incorporeality in Philo, in Philon dAlexandrie et le langage de la philosophie. Actes du colloque international organize par le Centre detudes sur la philosophie hellenistiqu (Brepols, 1998) 99-110 (106-7). On Philos different levels of corporeality or incorporeality v. ibid. 203 On gold as the predominant ingredient in the ephod v. Haran, Temples and Temple-Service, 167. 204 A somatic interpretation of the gold frontlet was known to Theodotus and/or Clement of Alexandria. In his Excerpta ex Theodoto 27.1-2, Clement (or his Gnostic source) allegorized an otherwise unknown Yom Kippur ritual, the priests removal of the gold frontlet upon entering the Holy of Holies:

The priest on entering within the second veil removed the plate at the altar of incense, and entered in silence with the Name engraved upon his heart, indicating the laying aside of the body that has become pure like the golden plate and nimble through purificationthe laying aside as it were of the souls body on which was stamped the luster of pietyNow he discards the body, the plate which had become weightless, within the second veil, that is, in the rational sphere As commentators have noted, the body here is not the material body, but a spiritual or psychic body discarded in the spiritual sphere. Lilla, Clement of Alexandria, 178; Kovacs, Concealment and Gnostic Exegesis, 435 n. 96. 205 On the identity between the gold frontlet and the transcendent Logos v. Mig. 102-103. Goodenough identifies the gold plate with the higher Logos, By Light, Light, 114, 116. See also discussion in Coulon, The Logos High Priest, 20; David D. Hannah, Michael and Christ: Michael Traditions and Angel Christology in Early Christianity (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999) 88. 206 Ebr. 85-6; Mut. 45. 207 On the sub-lunar air as home of lower souls v. Plant. 14; Conf. 174; Somn. I. 134-5, 144-46. On the blue-black sub-lunar air as signified by the blue robe v. Spec. I.85. On areal souls in Philo v. also A. Lemonnyer, Lair comme sjour danges, daprs Philon dAlexandrie, Revue des sciences philosophiqes et theologiques 1 (1907): 305-311. 208 Mut. 30 (Adam of Gen. 1:26 as soul of intermediate stage); Somn. I.219; Spec. I.94 (robe as intervening/intermediate); Ebr. 856; Mut. 43-46 (robe as lower soul). Now Philo has interpreted the Man after the Image (Gen. 1.26) as both the rational soul (Plant. 1820; Spec. I. 81; Det. 83-87; Her. 230-1) and the lower, irrational soul (Mut. 30; Leg. III.95-6). This discrepancy can be resolved however. According to Philo, the first person plural used here (Let Us make Adam) indicates that both God and lower powers (viz. the Logos and other angels) participated in the creation of this man: God provided the immortal soul and the lower powers provided the mortal soul (Fug. 66-70; Opif. 72-75; Conf. 179-182). That is to say, Gen. 1:26-27 actually alludes to the creation of both souls. See also Fossum, Gen. 1,26 and 2,7, 203-208. 209 Somn. I:216-17; Spec. I.263-6. 210 Opif. 134-36.

craftsman of the Tabernacle Bezalel.211 The tabernacle that Bezalel constructs, says Philo, is the soul (Leg. III. 95-96). As noted, Philo identified the soul with the man of Gen 1:26-7212; this makes Bezalel/Logos demiurge of the psychic man/body, a notion found in Gnostic sources as well.213 This Adam-as-Tabernacle motif recalls P. What is important here is that this psychic Adam made after the Image, whom Philo associates with the blue robe of the high priest, is also called a shadow (Plant.27; Somn. I.206). This association of shadow with image and with the (psychic) man/body of Gen. 1:26 parallels some Gnostic texts. In the Apocraphon of John (NHC II 15. 1-14), whose anthropogony is but a (characteristically gnostic) midrash on Genesis 1 (particularly 1:26f. and 2:7),214 as well as in the Hypostasis of the Archons (89.26), shadow is a designation for the bodies of Adam and Eve made according to the image of the Light-Man.215 We might understand by this that, while the Logos is the Shadow/Image of God, the man of Gen. 1:26-7 is the shadow/image of the Logos, a shadow of a shadow, as it were. It must be kept in mind, however, that Philo identified the Logos with both the Image (Urbild) and the Man after the Image (Abbild).216 This suggests some sort of identity between the demiurgic Logos as Shadow/Image, the high priest garbed in his blue robe, and the psychic Adam of day six.217 While we are free to account for this apparent conflation by appealing to the diverse pre-Philonic exegetical traditions that made their way into Philos own exegesis,218 or accuse Philo of some illegitimate exegetical methods,219 this is unnecessary. Behind Philos exegesis may well be a tradition of the somatic devolution of Phs/Logos. As the Man after the Image of Gen. 1:26-7, the Logos has taken on an aereal/psychic body called shadow.220 Thus we read in Opif. 31:
Now that invisible light (Phs, Gen. 1:3-WW) perceptible only by mind has come into being as an image of the divine (Logos) who brought it within our ken. It is a supercelestial star, fount of the perceptible stars, such as it would not be inappropriate to call it all-brightness to signify that from which the sun and moon, and all the other planets and fixed stars draw, in accordance with the capacity of each, the [degrees of] light befitting them; for that unmixed and pure radiance is dimmed (amauroumens) as soon as it begins to experience the change which is involved in the passage from intelligible to sensible; for nothing in the realm of sense is absolutely pure.

211 The craftsman Bezalel would represent the Logos in the lower of the latters two demiurgic functions. As Runia (Philo of Alexandria and the Timaeus of Plato, 166) has pointed out regarding Philos building-of-a-city metaphor used in Opif. 17-18, the demiurgic process involves three functions and functionaries: the king, who calls for the citys establishment; the architect, who designs the city; and the craftsman, who actually executes the creative activity. For Philo, the Logos functions as both the architect and craftsman. 212 Spec. I.81, 171. 213 I.e. that the psychic body of Adam was the work of a lower demiurge. See above n. 203. On Gnostic and Philonic exegesis of Gen. 1:26-27 v. also Fossum, Gen. 1,26 and 27, 202-239. 214 On the Apocraphon of John and Gen. 1:26f and 2:7 v. Birger A. Pearson, Biblical Exegesis in Gnostic Literature, in idem Gnosticism, Judaism, and Egyptian Christianity, 29-38. See also Gerard P. Luttikhuizen, The Critical Rewriting of Genesis in the Gnostic Apocryphon of John, in Florentino Garca Martnez and Gerard P. Luttikhuizen (edd.), Jerusalem, Alexandria, Rome: Studies in Ancient Cultural Interaction in Honour of A. Hilhorst (Leiden: Brill, 2003) 187-200; Sren Giversen, The Apocraphon of John and Genesis, Studia Theologica 17 (1963): 60-76; Schenke, Der Gott Mensch, 120ff. 215 On HypArch see Bently Layton, Critical Prolegomena to an Edition of the Coptic Hypostasis of the Archons (CG II, 14), in M. Krause (ed.), Essays on the Nag Hammadi Texts in honour of Pahor Labib (Leiden: Brill, 1975) 98-99; idem, The Hypostasis of the Archons or the Reality of the Rulers, HTR 69 (1976): 57; U. Bianchi, Docetism: A Peculiar Theory about the Ambivalence of the Presence of the Divine, in Joseph M. Kitagawa and Charles H. Long (edd.), Myths and Symbols: Studies in Honor of Mircea Eliade (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1969) 265-273; I.P. Culianu, La Femme Celeste et son Ombre: Contribution ltude dun mythologme gnostique, Numen 23 (1976): 191-209. On shadow as a designation for matter in Gnosticism v. also Einar Thomassen, The Derivation of Matter in Monistic Gnosticism, in John D. Turner and Ruth Majercik (edd.) Gnosticism and Later Platonism: Themes, Figures, and Texts, (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000) 13. 216 Conf. 146-47. See also Tobin, The Prologue of John, 261-62. 217 C.T.R. Hayward, Philo, the Septuagint of Genesis 32:24-32 and the Name Israel: Fighting the Passions, Inspiration and the Vision of God, JJS 51 (2000): 215-16, observed that in Philo the Logos, the high priest, and the first man (and Israel) stand in a theological continuum, and R.A. Stewart, The Sinless High-Priest, NTS 14 (1967-68): 132 bemoaned that in Philo the Logos, the generic rational soul, and the Aaronic priest after the flesh, are not sharply enough differentiated. 218 la Tobin, The Creation of Man. 219 Wedderburn, Philos Heavenly Man, 323. For Stewart, Sinless High-Priest, 134, the conflation is a symptom of Philos frequently careless manner of writing. 220 This designation of the soul-body as a shadow-image is not peculiar to Philo. As James G. Frazer demonstrated, it is a widespread association (shadow/soul/image) in many indigenous and European societies (See his The Soul as a Shadow and a Reflection, in idem, The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion, II: Taboo and the Perils of the Soul [London, 1911; third edition 77100]) and it was current in the Mediterranean countries in the first century as well (See e.g. P.W. van der Horst, Peters Shadow, NTS 23 [1976-77]: 204-212).

As John Dillon has pointed out, the archetypal light, viz. the Logos (Somn. 1.75),221 in its progressive descent into the cosmos, becomes somehow mixed with the darkness of matter, which leads to its becoming sense-perceptible (i.e. visible).222 This cosmic descent of the Logos is probably analogous to the descent of nous (mind). 223 When the warm, ethereal mind descends from the upper heaven to the sub-lunar sphere, it cools and, now enveloped by air, becomes (lower) soul. 224 Origen (second century CE), who took his doctrine of the pre-mundane fall of souls from Philo,225 understood the biblical account of the fall of Adam and Eve as an allegory of the later stages in the fall of pre-existent, rational souls:
all rational creatures, incorporeal and invisible, if they be negligent, gradually slip to lower levels and take to themselves bodies according to the quality of the places into which they descend; that is, first ethereal bodies, and then aereal. And when they reach the vicinity of earth they are enclosed in denser bodies, and finally are bound to human flesh (Jerome, 226 Con. Joh. Hieros. 16).

This anthropogonic descent also strikes a resemblance to Porphyrys description of the descent of the astral body: Originally of an ethereal substance, in the course of its descent the is progressively darkened and thickened as it absorbs moisture from the air, until it finally becomes fully material and even visible.227 That this descent applies to the Logos is confirmed by the fact that the latter is said to dwell in man (Fug. 117; Post. 122). While mans body is the abode of the soul, the soul is the abode of the Divine Logos.228 Once the archetypal, etherial light (the Logos) enters the sublunar world it darkens, becoming areal and, finally, earthly. This accounts for the sense of identity, yet distinction, noted above between the Logos as Urbild and Abbild, and the hight priest. We can therefore discern in Philos writings the contours of a probably pre-Philonic tradition of the somatic devolution of Phs.229 The intermediary stage of this
221 On the Logos as light in Philo v. Arkadi Choufrine, F. Excursus: Philos ontology of Light, in his Gnosis, Theophany, Theosis: Studies in Clement of Alexandrias Appropriation of his Background (New York: Peter Lang, 2002) 152-158; Tobin, The Prologue of John, 262-65; Alexander Altmann, A Note on the Rabbinic Doctrine of Creation, JJS 7 (1956): 195-206. 222 Dillon, Asmatos, 105. 223 Sandmel declared that The Logos never descends from the intelligible world into the sensible world (Philo, 95), but this is certainly wrong. See also Cher. 99-102; Somn. I. 75, 85-6; II. 242. 224 Her. 281-83; Leg. III. 161(nous/ higher soul ethereal); Somn. I.31; Her. 281-3 (cooling of mind to become aereal soul); Opif. 134; Gig. 13f, 17f; Somn. I. 138 (descent of souls into bodies) 225 See Gerald Bostock, The Sources of Origens Doctrine of Pre-Existence, in Origeniana Quarta; die Referate des 4. Internationalen Origenskongresses (Innsbruck, 1987) 259-264. 226 On Origens anthropology v. Manlio Simonetti, Alcune Osservazioni SullInterpretazione Origeniana di Genesi 2,7 e 3,21, Aevum 36 (1962): 370-381; C.P. Bammel, Adam in Origen, in Rowan Williams (ed.), The making of orthodoxy. Essays in honour of Henry Chadwick (Cambridge, et. al.: Cambridge University Press, 1989) 62-93; Hermann S. Schibli, Origen, Didymus, and the Vehicle of the Soul, Origeniana quinta (1989): 381-391; Lawrence R. Hennessey, A Philosophical Issue in Origens Eschatology: The Three Senses of Incorporeality, Origeniana quinta (1989): 372-380; Ugo Bianchi, Origens Treatment of the Soul and the Debate Over Metensomatosis, Origeniana quarta (1985): 270-280. On notions of corporeality and incorporeality with Origen v. further D.G. Bostock, Quality and Corporeity in Origen, Origeniana secunda (1980): 323-337; Ccile Blanc, Dieu est pneuma: Le sens de cette expression daprs Origne, StPatr 16 (1985): 224-241; Gedaliahu Stroumsa, The Incoporeality of God: Context and Implications of Origens Position, Rel 13 (1983): 345-358. 227 Quote from E.R. Dodds, Appendix II: The Astral Body in Neoplatonism in idem, Proclus: The Elements of Theology (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963): 318. Cf. Porphyry, On The Cave of the Nymph 62-66. 228 Opif. 139; Somn. I.26; Mig. 193 (earthly body as abode of the soul); Somn. I.113, 149; II. 248, 250; Cher. 98-100 (soul as abode of God/Logos); Her. 225 (Logos as the 7th part of mans heptadic soul); Spec. IV. 123 (the Divine Spirit [viz. Logos, Plant. 18] as essence of the soul). On Philos doctrine of the fall of areal souls into terrestrial embodiment v. John Dillon, Philos Doctrine of Angels, in David Winston and John Dillon, Two Treatises of Philo of Alexandria: A Commentary on De Gigantibus and Quod Deus Sit Immutabilis (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1983) 197-205; Bernard Barc, Samal Saklas Yaldabath. Recherche sur la gense dun myth gnostique, in idem (ed.) Colloque International sur les Textes de Nag Hammadi (Qubec, 22-25 aot 1978) (Qubec/Louvain: Les Presses de lUniversit Laval/ditions Peeters, 1981) 133-34. 229 This dimming of the light of the Logos as it enters the sense perceptible realm recalls the Gnostic and later Jewish (rabbinic and kabbalistic) myth of the dimming of the demiurges light. See e.g. the Apoc. John NHC II, 1, 13.14-17: Then the mother (Sophia) began to move to and from. She became aware of the deficiency when the brightness of her light diminished. And she became dark because her consort had not agreed with her. See also the parallel Mandean myth of the demiurge Ptahil: Ptahil-Uthra rose up, he went and descended below the kinas, to the place where there is no world. He trod in the filthy mud, he entered the turbid wateras the living fire (in him) changed/disappearedHis radiance has changedhas become deficient and imperfectArise, see how the radiance of the alien Man has diminished (Right Ginza III, 98-100; translation by Kurt Rudolph in Gnosis: A Selection of Texts by Werner Foerster [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1974] II: 171-3.) See also Howard Schwartz, Tree of Souls: The Mythology of Judaism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004) 58 who, drawing from rabbinic and Zoharic texts, narrates the following Judaic myth:

After the Temple had been destroyed and the Shekhinah had gone into exile, all the angels went into mourning for Her, and they composed dirges and lamentations for her. So too did all the upper and lower realms weep for Her and go into mourning. Then God came down from heaven and looked upon His house that had been burned. He looked for His people, who had gone into exile. And He inquired about His bride, who had left Him. And just as she had suffered a change, so

corporeal descent is the aereal/psychic body, schattenbild of the ethereal/pneumatic body. What is of significance for our study is that this body was signified by the blue robe of the high priest. There are remarkable parallels between P and Philo. The latters HPL, the demiurgic Image and Shadow of God drapped in high priestly garments, corresponds to Ps high priestly demiurgic Adam, who is also the Image and Shadow of God. As the tabernacle in P parallels both the cosmos and Adam, so it does in Philo. The high priestly garments in P might signify the surrounding splendor as the light of Yahwehs kbd shines through the hair pores of his dark image or shadow, Adam. In Philo, the high priestly garments signify the body divine. Ps Adam subtly effaces the Creator/creature distinction,230 just as Philos HPL stands on that border and whose nature mediates between the two.231 Now these parallels could of course be coincidental, but in our view, they are better accounted for by assuming Philos knowledge of a priestly tradition similar to, if not identical with that implied by P. Philos HPL doctrine couldnt be purely exegetical. That is to say, this doctrine is not based on an interpretation of the biblical text, for which he used the Greek LXX, but obviously existed as an independent tradition and only secondarily justified by or harmonized with his text.232 Both P and Philo seem to be interacting with a Blue Body Divine tradition. We get from Philo our first glimpse of the myth associated with this tradition: Yahwehs blue body is the result of his cosmic descent. No such myth is clearly articulated by P but little of Ps theology is. 4. Priestly Tradition and Rabbinic Literature Echoes of this priestly/Philonic tradition appear in a number of rabbinic sources. Rabbinic ambivalence towards priestly tradition is well-known. While the priesthood is conspicuously absent from the (Oral) Torah chain of transmission (Pirq Abot 1:1), a number of priestly traditions were preserved in rabbinic literature.233 The tradition behind Ps intratextuality was preserved. Some rabbis explicitly articulated the correspondences between creation and tabernacle implied by P.
R. Jacob son Issi asked: Why does it say; I love the habitation of Thy house, and the place where Thy glory dwelleth? (Ps. 26:8)? Because the Tabernacle is equal to the creation of the world itself. How is that so? Concerning the first day it is written: In the beginning God created heaven and earth (Gen 1:1), and it is written elsewhere: Who stretched out the heavens like a curtain (Ps 104:2), and concerning the Tabernacle is written: And thou shall make curtains of goat hair (Exod. 26:7). About the second day of creation it states: Let there be an firmament, and let it divide [mabdl] the waters from the waters (Gen. 1:6). About the Tabernacle it is written: And the veil shall divide [hibdl] between you (Exod. 26:33). With regard to the third day it states: Let the waters under the heavens be gathered (Gen. 1:9). With reference to the Tabernacle it is written: Thou shalt also make a laver of brassand thou shalt put water therein (Exod. 18). On the fourth day he created light, as it is stated: Let there be lights in the firmament of the sky (Gen. 1:14), and concerning the Tabernacle it is said: thou shall make a candlestick of pure gold (Exod. 25:31). On the fifth day he created birds, as it is said: Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let the fowl fly above the earth (Gen. 1:20). And with reference to the Tabernacle, He directed them to offer sacrifices of lambs and birds, and it says as well: And the cherubim shall spread out their wings on high (Exod. 25:20). On the sixth day man was created, as it says: And God created man in his own image, in the image of God He created him (Gen. 1:27), and about the Tabernacle it is written, a man who is a high priest who has been anointed to serve and to minister before God. On the seventh day, The heaven and the earth were finished (Gen. 2:1). And with regard to the Tabernacle, it is written: Thus was completed all the work of the Tabernacle (Exod. 39:32). Concerning the creation of the world, it is written: And God blessed (Num. 2:3), and of the Tabernacle, it is said: Moses blessed them (Exod. 39:43)Of creation it says: [And God] hallowed it [i.e., the Sabbath] (Gen. 2:2), and of 234 the Tabernacle, he anointed and consecrated it (Num. 7:1)

too did Her husband-His light no longer shone, and He was changed from what He had been. Indeed, by some accounts God was bound in chains. McBride, Divine Protocol, 16-17. Her. 205-6; Somn. II.188-89; Spec. I.116; Mig. 101-105. 232 Harald Hergermann was able to show that Philos high priest symbolism was unoriginal and reflected pre-Philonic tradition: Die Vorstellung vom Schpfungsmitter im Hellenistischen Judentum und Urchristentum (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1961) 78ff. 233 On the priesthood in rabbinic Judaism v. Steven D. Fraade, From Tradition to Commentary: Torah and its Interpretation in the Midrash Sifre to Deuteronomy (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1991) 70-71, 232;Micheal D. Swartz, Ritual about Myth about Ritual: Towards an Understanding of the Avodah in the Rabbinic Period, Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 6 (1997): 145-46 and sources cited in nn. 39, 40. 234 Midrash Tanhuma-Yelammedenu, 11.2 (Eng. 648); Num. R. 12.13; Ginzberg, Legends, I:51; Patai, Man and Temple, 105-07.
231 230

While differences in detail exist between this midrash and the correspondences suggested by P,235 the overall agreement seems to confirm the insight of Blenkinsopp, Kearny and others. Some rabbis also fleshed out, excuse the pun, the somatic significance of the tabernacle. See for example Bereshith Rabbati ad Exod 26:33:
In the hour when the Holy One blessed be He said to Moses, Make me a temple, Moses said, How shall I know how to make it? The Holy One blessed be He said: Do not get frightened; just as I created the world and your body, even so will you make the Tabernacle. How [do we know] that this was so? You find in the Tabernacle that beams were fixed into the sockets, and in your body the ribs are fixed into the vertebra, and so in the world the mountains are fixed into the fundaments of the earth. In the Tabernacle the beams were covered with gold, and in the body the ribs are covered with flesh, and in the world the mountains are covered and coated with earth. In the Tabernacle there were bolts in the beams to keep them upright, and in the body limbs and sinews are drawn to keep man upright, and in the world trees and grasses are drawn in the earth. In the Tabernacle there were hangings to cover its top and both its sides, and in the body the skin of man covers his limbs, and his ribs on both his sides, and in the world the heavens cover the earth on both its sides. In the Tabernacle the veil divided between the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies, and in the body the diaphragm divides the heart from the stomach, and in the world it is the firmament, which divides between the upper waters and the lowers waters.

As implied by P, the building of the tabernacle is paralleled with the creation of microcosmic Adam: The Temple corresponds to the whole world and to the creation of man who is a small world.236 This World::Temple::Body homology237 which agrees with P and Philo is certainly related to, if not actually the source of, the tendency observed in some rabbinic sources to read biblical passages referring to the sanctuary as metaphoric allusions to Adam.238 As the Image/statue of God, Adam is paralleled with the Tabernacle, also described as Gods earthly Image/statue.239 Here we may draw another parallel to the Priestly and Philonic traditions: the Tabernacle (read: Adam), constructed by the demiurgic Bezalel, is the Shadow of God.240 Thus, like P and Philo, the Tabernacle/Adam is both the divine Image and Shadow. According to the body::tabernacle::cosmos homology offered in Bereshit Rabbati the black241 goathair coverings of the Tabernacle (v. Exod. 26:7-11) correspond to the skin of Adam and the visible heaven. The latter was usually designated ( Veil, Latin velum), the first of seven heavens.242 As William Brownlee pointed out, in Jewish tradition the visible heaven was thought of as sapphire in color, and as crystalline and transparent.243 In a number of rabbinic texts the sapphiric blue high priestly robe is metaphor for Adams prelapsarian body.244 This might suggest a sapphiric body. This is significant for our
E.g. the menorah here is identified with the celestial lights created on Day Four, while in Ps account it corresponds to the light of Day One. Midrash Tanhuma-Yelammedenu 3. 237 As demonstrated by Morray-Jones, The Temple Within. 238 E.g. Gen. R. 21.1, 66.23 (Jacob; on the Adamic identity of Jacob v. below). On fallen Adam/Israel as destroyed Temple v. below. 239 In Exod. R. 35.6 Gods command to Moses to build the Tabernacle according to the heavenly prototype shown him on Mt. Sinai (Exod. 25:40) is compared to a king who had a fine image and who instructed one of his household to make a bust of him replicating this image. The heavenly tabernacle is here Gods fine image, and the earthly tabernacle His bust, which identifies it with Adam, the statue/image of God. The similarity to our reading of P is not likely accidental. On Adam as Image/statue of God in rabbinic literature v. Deut. R. IV.4; Morton Smith, The Image of God: Notes on the Hellenization of Judaism, With Special Reference to Goodenoughs Work on Jewish Symbols, BJRL 40 (195758): 473-512, esp. 475-478; idem, On the Shape of God and the Humanity of Gentils, in Jacob Neusner (ed.), Religions in Antiquity: Essays in Memory of Erwin Ramsdell Goodenough Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1968) 315-326; Alexander Altman, Homo Imago Dei in Jewish and Christian Theology, JR 48 (1968): 235-244; Alon Goshen Gottstein, The Body as Image of God in Rabbinic Literature, HTR 87 (1994): 171-95. 240 Num. R. 12.3; Exod. R. 34.1; Cant. R. 2.1, 1. 241 The common domestic goat of Palestine and Syria was the usually black Capra hircus mambrica: ISBE 2:491-2 s.v. Goat, by A.E. Day; ABD 2:1040-41 s.v. Goat, Goatherd, by Jack W. Vancil; Homan, To Your Tents, 182; Cant. 1:5; 5:11; 4:1; 6:5. 242 On the seven heavens in Jewish cosmology v. Adela J. Collins, The Seven Heavens in Jewish and Christian Apocalypses, in Collins and Fishbane, Death, Ecstasy, and Other Worldly Journeys, 57-93. 243 Ezekiel 1-19 (Waco, TX: Word Books, 1986) 13. 244 See sources and discussion in Gary Anderson, Genesis of Perfection: Adam and Eve in Jewish and Christian Imagination (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001) 117-134; idem, The Garments of Skin in Apocryphal Narrative and Biblical Commentary, in James L. Kugel (ed.), Studies in Ancient Midrash, (Cambridge: Harvard University Center for Jewish Studies, 2001) 110-125; Louis Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews [7 vols; Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1911, 1939], 1:177, 332, 5:93; Stephen D. Ricks, The Garment of Adam in Jewish, Muslim, and Christian Tradition, in Benjamin H. Hary, John L. Hayes and Fred Astren (edd.), Judaism and Islam: Boundaries, Communications and Interactions (Leiden: Brill, 2000) 209; M.E. Vogelzang and W.J. van Bekkum, Meaning and Symbolism of Clothing in Ancinet Near Eastern Texts, in Scripta signa vocis: studies about scripts. Scriptures, scribes, and languages in the Near East, presented to J.H. Hospers by his pupils, colleagues, and friends (Groningen: E. Forsten, 1986) 275. On the blue of the high priestly robe as sapphiric see e.g. Sifr to Numbers 115.2; b. Men. 43b; Num. R. 4.13,
236 235

discussion of a possible priestly Blue Body Divine tradition because bodily descriptions of prelapsarian man in rabbinic texts as a rule apply equally to God, for Adam originally had a physical appearance which was indistinguishable from that of God.245 Jacob Neusner has demonstrated this point well.246 This, like the Priestly and Philonic evidence, suggests an underlying Blue Body Divine tradition.247

17.5 and Ben Zion Bokser, The Thread of Blue, Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research 31 (1963): 12-13 [art.=1-31]. 245 Fossum, Adorable Adam, 532. 246 He makes the point that, according to the theology of the Oral Torah, God and man look exactly alike, being distinguished only by actions performed by the one but not the other. The Theology of the Oral Torah (Montreal and Kingston: McGill and Queens University Press, 1999) 364-65. This applies especially to Primordial Man. Neuser cites as a proof-text Gen. R. 7:10.1: A. B. Said R. Hoshaya, When the Holy One, blessed be He, came to create the first man, the ministering angels mistook him [for God, since man was in Gods image,] and wanted to say before Him, Holy, [holy, holy is the Lord of hosts]. To what may the matter be compared? To the case of a king and a governor who were set in a chariot, and the provincials wanted to greet the king, Sovereign! But they did not know which one of them was which. What did the king do? He turned the governor out and put him away from the chariot, so that the people would know who was king.

The clear point of this midrash is the corporeal identity between God and Adam. See also Jacob Neusner, Judaism When Christianity Began: A Survey of Belief and Practice (Louisville and London: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002) 29-31.; idem, Judaism, in God, ed. Jacob Neusner (Cleveland: The Pilgrim Press, 1997) 17-18; idem, The Incarnation of God: The Character of Divinity in Formative Judaism (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1988) 14-15. See also David H. Aaron, Imagery of the Divine and the Human: On the Mythology of Genesis Rabba 8 1, JJTP 5 (1995): 1-62. On rabbinic anthropomorphism generally v. also Wolfson, Through A Speculum, Chapters One and Two.
247