Research

My research focuses on the Canaanite-Phoenician-Punic religious continuum that stretches from the Late Bronze Age (1550-1200 B.C.E.) down to the Roman period. Present projects continue to cluster around two main poles:

1. Phoenician-Punic epigraphy in the eastern and central Mediterranean, and

2. ancient Israel’s complex reaction to Canaanite culture of the Bronze Age (outright rejection – and distortion – of Canaanite religion, on the one hand; appropriation of Canaanite literary conventions and religious symbols, on the other.

On the Phoenician-Punic side, my own work as staff epigraphist for both the American (ASOR) and British (British Academy) excavations at Carthage is reaching an end, though the final excavation reports have been delayed. Two studies of the Trophy Inscription from Kition (Cyprus) are now in press, the first a detailed study of the text’s grammar and structure, the second an evaluation of its historical importance. In addition, I am working on a new interpretation of the oldest complete Phoenician inscription from the western Mediterranean (from Nora, in Sardinia), and also on the Cebel Ires Dagi inscription from Rough Cilicia, whose editio princeps was published by James Russell and myself.

On the Israelite (biblical) side, I have submitted a revision of Deutero-Isaiah (Isaiah 40-55) for the New American Bible (expected publication date 2008), complete with textual notes . I am presently completing a major article on “Amos 5:18-27: Light, Darkness, and the Day of the Lord.”  Finally, I continue to work on aspects of the book of Job, including its relation to Canaanite, as well as inner Israelite, mythopoe(t)ic traditions, and  also on a. series of more specialized studies in Deutero-Isaiah.