This book focuses on the production, sale, and consumption of portable arts in regions covered today by the modern polities of Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, and the Palestine Authority. The reprinted chapters in this volume have been revised and updated. They offer interdisciplinary approaches to the material culture of the region from the twelfth to the early twentieth centuries, combining evidence from primary written sources, archaeology, and objects in museums and private collections. Topics include the production and distribution of pottery, importation of glazed wares into the Middle East, shadow puppetry, economic activity associated with the Syrian hajj, the manufacturing practices of the crafts operating in Damascus during the last decades of Ottoman rule, and the decoration of artillery shell cases during and after World War I. Also included are an introduction containing a critical evaluation of the main sources of information, a cumulative bibliography, and a previously unpublished study of leatherworking in the late Ottoman period.

This volume explores storm-/warrior-god motif as found in non-biblical ANE texts, followed by an analysis of the language and imagery in several noteworthy theophanic passages in the Hebrew Bible. These characteristics and vocabulary are used in later chapters to identify and analyze similar motifs in the Twelve Prophets, especially focusing on Mic 7:7-20; Habakkuk 3; and Zech 9:9-16 as test cases. By tracing the use of the storm-/warrior-god motif and language associated with it, a detectable shift is apparent in the use of the motif in the HB that corresponds with the development of monotheism within Ancient Israelite religion.

The Syriac Book of Steps collects 30 memre by an anonymous late 4th century author in Persia. It describes the struggle of an actual Christian community, not an idealized one, to live a life in the pursuit of perfection in the midst of a hostile culture. The author details the aspirations and standards of the two ranks of Christians prior to the advent of monasticism: the Upright—married people who work and perform acts of charity—and the Perfect who are celibate, do not work, but live a life of prayer, wandering through the region teaching and mediating conflicts.

The Syriac Book of Steps collects 30 memre by an anonymous late 4th century author in Persia. It describes the struggle of an actual Christian community, not an idealized one, to live a life in the pursuit of perfection in the midst of a hostile culture. The author details the aspirations and standards of the two ranks of Christians prior to the advent of monasticism: the Upright—married people who work and perform acts of charity—and the Perfect who are celibate, do not work, but live a life of prayer, wandering through the region teaching and mediating conflicts.