Prof. Ada Taggar-Cohen

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Research project (abstract)

The Concept of Gender Appearance – Divine and Mundane – in Hittite and Biblical texts

Both societies, the Hittite of the second millennium BCE and that arising from the biblical texts of the first millennium BCE, offer a social construction that is strongly ritual-dependent. By using the combined words “Sacral Hierarchy” I wish to emphasize the concept by which both the Hittites and the ancient Israelites saw their mundane life directly under the control of the divine world. In the Hittite texts and iconography one can recognize the vivid appearance of females among the ruling and cultic classes. That can be clearly seen as disappearing in the biblical texts during the first millennium. The major question arising from this change in social construction, from the second millennium into the first millennium, can be discussed based on changes in religious concepts on the one hand, but probably also in light of social power changes on the other hand. One of the possible changes I would like to discuss regards the strength and weakness of the royal government in the Israelite kingdom of Judah.