Entre dieux et hommes
Anges, demons et autres figures intermediaires: Actes du colloque organise par le College de France, Paris, les 19 et 20 mai 2014
edited by Thomas Romer, Bertrand Dufour, Fabian Pfitzmann and Christoph Uehlinger
Hardback (Published)
(October 2017)
ISBN: 9783525544112
0.63 x 9.21 inches
Price: $113.00
In stock
It has long been an important issue for many religions, both ancient and modern, to imagine and question the differences between humans and deities as well as their means to communicate between each other. Ancient Near Eastern texts and iconography conceive this relationship in more than binary terms (i.e., human vs. divine): they presume the existence of various intermediate and often liminal entities, whom scholars have usually classified in terms of “angels”, “demons”, “heroes” etc.
It has long been an important issue for many religions, both ancient and modern, to imagine and question the differences between humans and deities as well as their means to communicate between each other. Ancient Near Eastern texts and iconography conceive this relationship in more than binary terms (i.e., human vs. divine): they presume the existence of various intermediate and often liminal entities, whom scholars have usually classified in terms of “angels”, “demons”, “heroes” etc. According to ancient belief, such beings (some anonymous, others named such as Pazuzu, Azazel, Gabriel, Metatron, or Satan…) could take over roles that were considered as unfitting for the gods themselves; they could act as messengers and intermediaries, or in contrast even rival the gods. The dead (or at least the prominent among the deceased, such as kings or prophets) could be considered as intermediates in their own right, since they were thought to have special knowledge of a sphere that the living could only imagine imperfectly. To keep such entities at a distance or to satisfy them and gain their sympathy could at times prove no less challenging than to serve the gods. On the other hand, imagining those entities helped ancient societies and individuals, and particularly the literary elites among them, to manage and structure the contingencies of the world they lived in. The present volume offers the proceedings of an international symposium, organized by the chair of Milieux Bibliques and held at the College de France on 19-20 May 2014, dealing with intermediate beings as imagined in ancient Near Eastern societies and reflected in their textual and visual records. The aim was to get a better sense of how such entities were conceived, what roles they were attributed and what functions they fulfilled in culture and society, religion and literature, ritual and belief. The contributions scrutinize cuneiform and other ancient Near Eastern texts, as well as biblical literature, in order to understand ancient Mesopotamian, Levantine and Israelite conceptions of human-divine hybrids and intermediaries; other papers address ancient Egyptian, Jewish, Manichaean, Christian, Zoroastrian, and Islamic sources and beliefs. In all their variety, and in the variety of the numinous figures (collectives or individuals, anonymous or named) that are analyzed, these studies provide vivid insights into how the ancients experienced and modeled the reality they lived in when mobilizing human-divine intermediates for their own concerns.
- Edited by Bertrand Dufour
- Edited by Fabian Pfitzmann
- Edited by Thomas Römer
- Edited by Christoph Uehlinger
Other Titles in this Series
Amulette, Siegel und Perlen
Studien zur Typologie und Tragesitte im Alten und Mittleren Reich
Volume 229
Architecture, Iconography, and Text
New Studies on the Northwest Palace Reliefs of Ashurnasirpal II
Volume 301
Handel als Medium von Kulturkontakt
Akten des Interdisziplinaren altertumswissenschaftlichen Kolloquiums (Basel, 30.-31. Oktober 2009)
Volume 277
When Gods Speak to Men
Divine Speech according to Textual Sources in the Ancient Mediterranean Basin
Volume 289
All the Wisdom of the East
Studies in Near Eastern Archaeology and History in Honor of Eliezer D. Oren
Volume 255
Die Erzählung von den beiden Brüdern
Der Papyrus d'Orbiney und die Königsideologie der Ramessiden
Volume 195
Die Selbstbehauptung Israels in der Welt des Alten Orients
Religionsgeschichtlicher Vergleich anhand von Gen 15/22/28, dem Aufenthalt Israels in Agypten, 2. Sam 7, 1.Kon 19 und Psalm 104
Volume 115
Israeliten und Phonizier
Ihre Beziehungen im Spiegel der Archaologie und der Literatur des Alten Testaments und seiner Umwelt
Volume 235
Divine Names on the Spot II
Exploring the Potentials of Names through Images and Narratives
Volume 299
Die Erzählung des Wenamun
Ein Literaturwerk im Spannungsfeld von Politik, Geschichte und Religion
Volume 209
Les fluides corporels en Égypte et au Proche-Orient anciens
Actes du colloque organisé à l'Université Paul-Valéry, Montpellier, 5-7 septembre 2019
Volume 309
L’Ecrit et l’Esprit
Etudes d'Histoire du texte et de theologie biblique en hommage a Adrian Schenker
Volume 214
Khirbet Qeiyafa in the Shephelah
Papers Presented at a Colloquium of the Swiss Society of Ancient Near Eastern Studies Held at the University of Bern, September 6, 2014
Volume 282
Formen für ägyptische Fayencen aus Qantir. Band II
Katalog der Sammlung des Franciscan Biblical Museum, Jerusalem und zweier Privatsammlungen
Volume 225
Images of Anonymous Women
A Semiotic Approach to Image-Text Relations in Interpretation of Ancient Near Eastern Art and the Hebrew Bible
Volume 310
‘Trinkt von dem Wein, den ich mischte!’ ‘Drink of the Wine which I have Mingled!’
Festschrift für Silvia Schroer zum 65. Geburtstag
Volume 303
The Awakening of Osiris and the Transit of the Solar Barques
Royal Apotheosis in a Most Concise Book of the Underworld and Sky
Volume 262
From Most Ancient Sources
The Nature and Text-Critical Use of the Greek Old Testament Text of the Complutensian Polyglot Bible
Volume 215
La Samarie, la Diaspora et l’achevement de la Torah
Territorialites et internationalites dans l'Hexateuque
Volume 284
Eine königliche Weisheitslehre?
Exegetische Analyse von Sprüche 28-29 und Vergleich mit den ägyptischen Lehren Merikaras und Amenemhats
Volume 234
Similar Books
Ḫattušaš utnē išḫameški
Hittite and Other Ancient Near Eastern Studies Presented to Piotr Taracha on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday
Punning in Odd or Elegant Constructions in Jeremiah
The Convergence of Linguistics, Rhetoric, and Textuality in the Hebrew Text of Jeremiah
Shame in the Worlds of the Hebrew Bible and Akkadian Texts
A Linguistic Study and Its Implications
Volume 33
Telling Contexts
Archaeological and Textual Studies in Honor of Elizabeth Bloch-Smith and Mark S. Smith
The Therapeutae as the Best Paradigm for the Contemplative Life
A Contextual Reading of Philo of Alexandria's De Vita Contemplativa
Die Entwicklung erdbebensicherer Bautechniken in der Frühen und Mittleren Eisenzeit in Ostanatolien
Volume 11
Kultur – Kontakt – Kultur
Beiträge anlässlich der 66. Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale in Frankfurt/Main und Mainz, 25.–29. Juli 2022
Volume 35
Parola di Dio, di uomo e di Re
L'assoluta verità della Bibbia nella dottrina cattolica di Bacchisio Raimondo Motzo
Sprachwissenschaftliche und kulturhistorische Reflexionen
Festschrift zu Ehren von Jörg Klinger
Volume 31
Wie JHWH spricht
Die temporelle Steuerung von Verbalaussagen in den Reden nach den Gottesspruchformeln
A Numismatic History of Barikot
Catalogue and Analysis of the Coin Finds from the Excavations at Bir-koṭ-ghwaṇḍai (Barikot), Swat, Pakistan (1984-2022) Pakistan (1984-2022). With a contribution by Luca M. Olivieri
Volume 69
Alexander the Great and the Campaign of Gaugamela
New Research on Topography and Chronology. IAMNI 1 (Italian Archaeological Mission to Northern Iraq)
Volume 53
Archaeology of Eastern Anatolia II: From Prehistoric Times to the End of the Iron Ages
Proceedings of the 2nd Archaeology of Eastern Anatolia Colloquium, 23-25 April 2021, Online (Arkeolojihaber Youtube Channel)
Volume 43
Ash-sharq: Bulletin of the Ancient Near East No 9 1-2 2025
Archaeological, Historical and Societal Studies
Assyria and the West
A Fresh Look at the Unshakeable Pillars of Late Bronze and Iron Age Chronology in the Eastern Mediterranean World
Autocratic Rule in Antiquity
Proceedings of the 14th Melammu Workshop, Krakow, 46 October 2021
Volume 12
Bogazkoy Tablets in the Museum of Anatolian Civilisations (Bo 95-Bo 3993)
Anadolu Medeniyetleri Muzesinde Bulunan Bogazkoy Tabletleri (Bo 95-Bo 3993)
Volume 3
Breaking New Ground in John
Imagery, Parables, Characters, Christology, and Ethics in the Fourth Gospel
Volume 531
Bridging the Gap: Disciplines, Times, and Spaces in Dialogue – Volume 2
Sessions 3, 7 and 8 from the Conference Broadening Horizons 6 Held at the Freie Universität Berlin, 24–28 June 2019
But the Wise Shall Understand
Reuse of Prophecies, Chronotope, and Merging of Eschatological Horizons in Daniel 10-12
Ceramic Finds in Context (Roman to Early Islamic Times)
Final Publications from the Danish-German Jerash Northwest Quarter Project VII
Volume 13
