Simcha Gross

The call for papers closes on March 4th. Get your abstracts in for Rabbinic Literature and Culture at the Society of Biblical Literature.

Reposting this fantastic interview with Kevin van Bladel on his vision of the "Classical Near East", talking a lot about languages like Greek, (Christian) Arabic, Armenian, Coptic, Syriac, Mandaic, and Middle Persian. Also very interesting in terms of career paths and how our fields are structured.

YouTube video by Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies The Aramaic Incantation Bowls: Jewish Society and Culture at a Crossroads

A lecture on these fascinating objects, for anyone interested: www.youtube.com/watch?v=gshM...

Going to Marburg!

🎉 publication day! 🎉

editions & translations of the correspondence btw Umar b. Abd al-Aziz and Leo the Isaurian in medieval Latin, Christian Arabic, Muslim Arabic, Aljamiado, Armenian & early modern Latin. plus the intro to explain how they're all related!

open access & available here:

Screen shot from an email, which reads: PHEN 11.1–2: Special issue "The Critical Edition in the Infrastructure of Philology," edited by J. Gregory Given and Daniel Picus. 1. J. Gregory Given and Daniel Picus: "The Critical Edition as Technology: A View from Biblical Studies." 2. Gregory Fewster: "Edition as Communication: David Wilkins's 3 Corinthians in the Eighteenth-century Republic of Letters." 3. Kristine Palmieri: "Philology and the Politics of Self-Promotion: F. A. Wolf's Symposium (1782) as Critical Edition and School Text." 4. Andrew S. Jacobs: "'A Clear Account of the Codex Simonideios:' Ideological Infrastructures of Biblical Vulnerability in the Nineteenth Century." 5. Isaac Landes: "Our Most Pressing Need is the Critical Edition: J. N. Epstein and the Rise of Talmudic Philology." 6. Jennifer Knust: "The New Testament Apparatus and the Rise of the American Cold War." 7. Mark Vessey: "Afterpiece - Roads, Bridges, Precincts, Thresholds: The Critical Edition in the Infrastructure of Philology since Late Antiquity."

Very pleased to be able to finally announce "The Critical Edition in the Infrastructure of Philology," a special issue of Philological Encounters edited by me and @danielpicus.bsky.social out this Spring.

Now taking place tomorrow, Thursday, January 8th, at 4:45 PM CET!

Message me or Robert if you are interested in joining in person or online

Forgetting History and the Humanities in the American University Reflections on recent news from the University of Oregon, Virginia Tech, and the University of Chicago

On paper, 2025 looked like a great year for me. In lived experience, I was mostly filled w/alarm at attacks on US universities, Rel Studies, & Jewish Studies. My hope for 2026 is for more opportunities to use what I have to help protect & preserve knowledge-making

open.substack.com/pub/humanhis...

146. Ezana of Aksum, the first Christian king in Africa, with Aaron Butts

Great episode of Byzantium & Friends w/Aaron Butts!

While centering on Aksum, it engages key questions in the study of late antique empires, such as how to historicize the use of religious imagery in imperial self-presentation, & the proxy war model (e.g. Bowersock)
open.spotify.com/episode/4gkP...

Ethnic Relations in the Ancient Mediterranean A fresh perspective revealing how ethnographic thinking shaped the sociocultural landscape of the ancient Mediterranean.   With this book, Philip A. Harland presents a large-scale rereading of social ...

@philharland.bsky.social has a book coming out in Spring -already available for pre-order: press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

#ancientbluesky #classicsbluesky

Very grateful to @ssecunda.bsky.social for the generous and constructive book review at the AJS Review!

muse.jhu.edu/pub/56/artic...

This is a late ancient (5-7th c.?) Greek account of the life of a rich woman who was raised Jewish, converted to Christianity when her parents died, lived for 20 years as a male monk named John, was discovered & made head of a woman's monastery, & was later martyred

I am pleased to announce that John Penniman, Emanuel Fiano, and I are launching a new book series for the study of religion in late antiquity with Fordham University Press. If you have a book-in-progress looking for a home, please reach out to discuss your project!
fordhampress.com/theoria

Ellen Muehlberger, Podcast Episode · New Books in Late Antiquity · 11/10/2025 · 1h 14m

I got to go on @mikemotia.bsky.social 's podcast, New Books in Late Antiquity, and talk about my new book, Things Unseen!

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/n...

Babylonian Jews and Sasanian Imperialism in Late Antiquity Cambridge Core - Judaism - Babylonian Jews and Sasanian Imperialism in Late Antiquity

It is a book! www.cambridge.org/core/books/b...

YouTube video by Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies The Aramaic Incantation Bowls: Jewish Society and Culture at a Crossroads

In that case, this might be of use - a programmatic overview of the bowls from the perspective of contemporary scholarship: www.youtube.com/watch?v=gshM...

I'm flattered! I greatly enjoyed your first book!

Krista Dalton (Kenyon College) Presents: Table Fellowship as a Holy Altar: How Dinner Parties Shaped Rabbinic Judaism People often take the existence of rabbis and their authority as a given, but that role and institution also needed to be invented–and some of the forces that shaped it may surprise you. This lecture ...

Calling all Minnesota friends. I'm giving a book talk at the St. Paul JCC next Tuesday (Nov 4th) and would love to see you! cla.umn.edu/jewish-studi...

@philharland.bsky.social has an article out in MTSR.

Putting the Persian Back in “Magic”: Problems with Ignoring Ancient Ethnographic Discourses

brill.com/view/journal...

Open Access Cornucopia for scholars of late antique Judaism today! (1) William Smelik, “A New Aramaic Fragment of Toledot Yeshu as Targum Yerushalmi Isaiah 66.17” in Aramaic Studies = brill.com/view/journal... +

It's not too late to sign-up! Level 1 offered this fall and Level 2 offered in January. An affordable option for ancient language learners (and lovers)!

A 2nd article is also out today, w/Michele Scarlassara!

We present a previously unpublished Syriac incantation bowl from the Penn Museum, w/a formula paralleling several Mandaic bowls, w/intriguing social-historical implications

1st bowl published using spectral imaging!

brill.com/view/journal...

My article “Does an Arrow a Day Keep Satan Away? Late Antique Magical Subtexts in Babylonian Rabbinic Narratives” is now OA in HTR!

It argues that a Talmudic story about a rabbi’s encounter with Satan adjudicates between competing incantations in late antique Iraq

www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Rise of Islam

My interview with The Ancients podcast on the Sasanians and the Rise of Islam.

open.spotify.com/episode/42Mc...

Yes, of course.

Pharisees Party Group Game Pharisees Game

I ran a similar exercise, but with this card "game" - phariseesgame.com. The video lays bare how the Pharisees are cast as the eternal Christian other, the Christian antithesis. But the game’s playful tone highlights how deeply embedded these assumptions still are.

Warsaw Late Antique Seminar on Thursday 9 October (4.45 p.m.): Simcha Gross @simchagross.bsky.social (University of Pennsylvania), "Good Fences Make Bad Neighbors: Communities and Empire on the Roman-Sasanian Frontier". In person and online, as usual.

Hmm… I wrote a piece about the epistemic erasure of Jews & my institution posted about it in a manner that doesn’t mention Jews—should I be happy they proved my point or upset…? 🤔

Warsaw Late Antique Seminar. The programme for Winter Semester is ready. Take a look!
More on the seminar's website...