Michael Langlois

I’ve just published a new inscription mentioning biblical Makkedah. It is written in Aramaic and dated to the fourth century BCE.

It is an “ostracon,” i.e. a pottery shard recycled into writing medium. For more information, you may download the article in PDF format:

Langlois 2012, “Un nouvel ostracon mentionnant la ville biblique de Maqqéda”, Semitica 54, p. 51-63

Christian Palestinian Aramaic (CPA) is often associated to Syriac, from which it inherits its writing; as a result, most printed editions use a Syriac font. But in reality, CPA uses a specific writing, whereas its linguistic characteristics (phonology, morphology, syntax) associate it with other western Aramaic dialects.

For these reasons, a CPA-specific Unicode font was long due. I am pleased to offer a preliminary version of my “CPA Genizah ML” font.
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After years of silence, Semitica is back!

Semitica was created in 1948 by the Intitute of Semitic Studies of the University of Paris, with a board including R. Blachère, A. Dupont-Sommer, Ch. F. Jean, J. Nougayrol, and Ch. Virolleaud, its chairman. In 1973, the Institute was transferred to the College of France; Semitica was regularly published until the 2000s, when it slowed down.
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I was on yesterday’s MaCasbah.net TV show, where Saïd Oujibou interviewed me on the authenticity of Scriptures.

We addressed such questions as the birth of the Bible, the selection of the books that compose it, or the presence of variant readings in the earliest biblical manuscripts. Here is the full interview, which starts at 07:24:

My lastest book is out! It is a detailed study of the textual witnesses of Joshua 10: the masoretic Hebrew text, the Septuagint old Greek version and its later recensions, but also a new deciphering of the Hebrew Dead Sea Scroll fragments discovered in Qumran cave 4!

I am then able to offer an original reconstruction of this chapter’s textual history… A journey to the heart of the Bible!

Michael Langlois, Le texte de Josué 10. Approche philologique, épigraphique et diachronique (Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 252). Fribourg, Academic Press / Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2011. 280 p.

Here is a summary of the book:
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