Wisdom at the Interface between God and Humans
📅20th - 23rd March 2023
An International Conference on Divine-Human Dimensions of Wisdom in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient World
Wisdom or knowledge have a striking role in the narratives about the Garden of Eden in Gen 2–3 and Ezek 28:11–19 – both in the synopsis of the two texts and in the context of the Hebrew Bible. Whereas in Gen 2–3 the primal humans first acquire knowledge by grasping the fruit from the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" and are there-upon banished from the garden, in Ezek 28 the king of Tyre is endowed from the beginning with wisdom and beauty, both of which he loses because of his hubris. In both narratives, wisdom or knowledge is more than just a life-serving ability that can be acquired and learned by humans. Rather, by linking it to the mythical space of the Garden of Eden, it appears as a divine quality. Wisdom thus has superhuman dimensions and is located at the interface between God and humans. In Gen 2–3, humans become “like God” by attaining knowledge; in Ezek 28, the king endowed with wisdom is the exclusive human inhabitant of a mythical sphere. In both texts, wisdom or knowledge is an ambivalent quality insofar as it is related to the fall of the respective protagonists and their banishment from the garden.
The conference takes Gen 2–3 and Ezek 28:11–19 as a starting point for conceptions of wisdom and knowledge that crucially concern the divine-human relationship. However, it does not limit itself to these two texts, but places them in larger horizons of the Hebrew Bible, the ancient Near East and early Jewish literature. The aim is, on the one hand, to better understand the subject of wisdom or knowledge in Gen 2–3 and Ezek 28 and, on the other hand, to shed light on the superhuman and divine dimensions of wisdom and knowledge in the different textual areas and cultures.
The guiding questions of the conference can be summarized as follows:
- What makes wisdom and knowledge a divine or superhuman quality according to the view of the sources?
- How can humans attain and participate in divine wisdom?
- What effects and consequences do wisdom and knowledge have for humans?
- How and to what extent do wisdom and knowledge affect the relationship between God and humans?
Planning Team
Dr. Marcel Krusche, Research Assistant, University of Hamburg
PD Dr. Thomas Wagner, Academic Senior Councilor, University of Wuppertal
Conference venue
University of Hamburg
Department of Protestant Theology
Gorch-Fock-Wall 7
20354 Hamburg
Room C1053
Participation and Registration
The participation is possible both in person and via Zoom. For participation in person we charge a conference fee of 50 euros in order to cover the costs of catering. For registration, please write an informal e-mail to Marcel Krusche (marcel.krusche(at)uni-hamburg.de) in which you declare whether you will participate in person or via Zoom. For participation in person, please register until January 31st, 2023.
Programme (Download)
Introduction
3.00pm Words of Welcome
3.15–4.15pm Konrad Schmid (Zürich) – The Way to Wisdom: From Human Intuition to Divine Knowledge
4.15–4.30pm Coffee Break
Section 1: Marking the Boundaries between Divine and Human Wisdom
4.30–5.15pm Suzanna Millar (Edinburgh) – Wisdom at the Interfaces of Divinity, Humanity, and Animality in Genesis 2–3
5.15–6.00pm Josephine Fechner (Göttingen) – At the Threshold between the Divine und Human World: The Ambivalent Character of the Primeval Mythical Sages of Ancient Mesopotamia
6.30–8.00pm Reception/Dinner
March 21, 2023 (Tuesday)
9.00–9.45am Alexandra von Lieven (Münster) – Accessible and Inaccessible Wisdom and Knowledge in Ancient Egypt and Its Dangers
9.45–10.30am Seth Bledsoe (Nijmegen) – Ahiqar, Eden and the Limits of Human Knowledge in the Divine Garden
10.30–11.00am Coffee Break
11.00–11.45am Fiodar Litvinau (München) – The Distinction between Good and Evil in Its Application to the Wisdom Concept in the Dead Sea Scrolls
11.45–12.30am Hindy Najman (Oxford) – Understanding, Wisdom and Creation in 4QInstruction and Philo of Alexandria
12.30am–2.00pm Lunch Break
2.00–3.00pm Final Discussion Section 1
3.00–3.30pm Coffee Break
3.30–5.30pm Social program
Public Keynote
6.00–7.00pm Bernd Schipper (Berlin) – From Empirical Knowledge to Critical Wisdom: Concepts of Wisdom in the Book of Proverbs
7.15–9.00pm Conference Dinner
March 22, 2023 (Wednesday)
Section 2:
Overcoming Boundaries: Human Acquisition of Divine Wisdom
9.00–9.45am Alan Lenzi (Stockton) – Hearing and Seeing Secrets in Ancient Mesopotamia
9.45–10.30am Kianoosh Rezania (Bochum) – Gaining Divine Knowledge in Its Ancient Iranian Way
10.30–11.00am Coffee Break
11.00–11.45am Thomas Wagner (Wuppertal) – Gaining Knowledge – Attaining Emotions: On the Relation of Knowledge and Shame in Gen 2–3
11.45–12.30am Mirjam Bokhorst (Halle) – Abominable Mysteries and Saving Knowledge – Perspectives of Wisdom in 1 Enoch
12.30am–2.00pm Lunch
2.00–2.45pm Jaco Gericke (Vanderbijlpark) – Folk-metaphysical Assumptions in the Religious Language of Divine Knowledge/Wisdom in Gen 2–3 and Ezekiel 28 – An Analytic-Philosophical Perspective
2.45–3.45pm Final Discussion Section 2
4.00–6.00pm Social program
6.00–7.30pm Dinner
Section 3:
Transgressing Boundaries: Wisdom and Hubris
9.00–9.45am Will Kynes (Samford) – Pride Comes before the “Fall”: Wisdom, Human Hubris, Defiance of Divine Limits, and Death in Genesis 2–3, Ezekiel 28, and the Epic of Gilgamesh
9.45–10.30am Marcel Krusche (Hamburg) – Super-Human Wisdom and Mythical Traditions in Ezek 28
10.30–11.00am Coffee Break
11.00–11.45am Isaac Kalimi (Mainz) – The Violence, Hubris, and Punishment of the Assyrian King (Isaiah 10 and 14)
11.45–12.30am Mark Sneed (Lubbock) – The Confluence of Torah, Wisdom, and Prophecy: Gen 2–3, Ezekiel 28, and Prov 30 as Hubristic Wisdom
12.30am–1.30pm Final Discussion Section 3 and Farewell