CALL. 28.02.2019: [SESSION 1] Gods in Translations: The Many Names of Ancient Semitic Gods (EABS 201
FECHA LÍMITE/DEADLINE/SCADENZA: 28/02/2019
FECHA CONGRESO/CONGRESS DATE/DATA CONGRESSO: 11-12-13-14/08/2019
LUGAR/LOCATION/LUOGO: University of Warsaw (Warsaw, Poland)
ORGANIZADOR/ORGANIZER/ORGANIZZATORE: Corinne Bonnet; Christophe Nihan; Fabio Porzia.
INFO: call - corinne.bonnet@univ-tlse2.fr - Christophe.Nihan@unil.ch - fabio.porzia@univ-tlse2.fr
CALL:
In the context of the ongoing ERC Advanced grant “Mapping Ancient Polytheisms” (MAP), this workshops aims at encouraging a common reflexion on ancient Semitic gods focusing on an innovative perspective: divine names and epithets.
From a comparative perspective (Greek and West Semitic worlds), the MAP project takes into account “divine onomastic sequences”, that is to say combinations of various types of divine names or elements identifying a particular god (nouns, epithets, titles, appellatives, sentences, etc.). Applied on a large scale, in a long-term historical perspective, this perspective can help to better understand the complex strategies of interaction between humans and gods and the capacity to elaborate pragmatic and exploratory knowledge regarding the latter. Ancient gods are, indeed, multifaceted powers and the divine names are meant to provide a first and crucial access to their “theological” identity and to their cultic role. The large range of onomastic attributes, mobilized in ritual or narrative contexts, in specific spaces and times, sometimes reserved to one god, sometimes shared by several gods, conveys important information on the functions of the gods, on their appearance, origin and diffusion, on their modes of action.
Among the many possible declinations of the topic, the workshop focuses on the translatability of divine names and epithets in different religious systems (especially between polytheisms and monotheisms), in different languages or literary traditions (mainly North-Western Semitic languages and Greek) and in different media (in particular comparing texts and iconographies).
In order to study the translatability of divine names, the workshop is organised around three axes. For this reason, scholars are encouraged to present papers dealing with at least one of these aspects: - comparing divine names and epithets in different traditions and languages (translations, adaptations, interpretations, etc., considering in particular Masoretic Text, Septuagint, Qumran, but also New Testament and later versions of the Bible); - comparing divine names and epithets in different religious systems (for example, Levantine, Anatolian, Egyptian or Mesopotamian religions, Graeco-Roman religions, Judaism, early Christianity and Islam) in order to redefine the limits of the opposition between “polytheism” and “monotheism” and to promote an anthropological approach to ancient religious systems; - studying the relations between divine names attested in texts and inscriptions and iconographic representations. The 2019 EABS Annual Conference will take place in Warsaw, Poland, 11-14 August 2019. The deadline to submit a paper is 28 February 2019 through the site:
https://www.eabs.net/EABS/Research-Units/Research_Units/Workshops_2019/Gods_in_Translations_The_Many_Names_of_Ancient_Semitic_Gods.aspx