Papyrus Amherst 63
The diverse collection of Aramaic-Egyptian prayers and
psalms written on Papyrus Amherst 63 (P. Amh 63) originated also in Upper
Egypt. Similar to the Elephantine material, this papyrus is thought to be the
product of Aramean and Judean mercenaries who were stationed near Egypt’s
southern border. It was written in the late fourth or early third century BCE
and contains twenty-one columns, 422 lines of text. Richard Steiner describes
the papyrus as a poetic “liturgy of the New Year’s festival of an
Aramaic-speaking community in Upper Egypt, perhaps in Syene.”
He supposed that this community was deported from Babylonia to Bethel by the
Assyrians, where they picked up the worship of YHWH before migrating to Egypt.
One of the most remarkable features of P. Amh 63 is the striking parallel
between Column XI and Psalm 20. Some parts of this column in P. Amh 63 contain
nearly identical wording to Ps 20, but in the former, the Tetragrammaton does
not occur. Instead, we find the typical three-letter Aramaic form of the divine
name, syncretized with Horus as “Horus-YHH”:
Table 5 Comparison of Column XI and Psalm 20 in P. Amh 63
|
P. Amh 63 col. XI, 11-19 |
Ps 20:2-7 (MT) |
|
May Horus answer us in our
troubles May Adonai answer us in our
troubles O crescent (lit. bow) Bowman in heaven, Sahar shine
forth; send your emissary from the
temple of Arash, and from Zephon may Horus help
us. May Horus fulfill— may Adonai not fall short in
satisfying— every request of our hearts. Some with the bow, some with
the spear; But (lit., behold) as for
us—Mar is our god; Horus-Yaho, our bull, is with
us. May the lord of Bethel answer
us on the morrow. May Baal of Heaven, Mar grant a blessing bless you; to your pious ones your
blessings. |
May YHWH answer you in time of trouble. May the name of the God of
Jacob keep you out of harm’s reach. May he send you(r) help from
the sanctuary and from Zion may he sustain
you. May he accept the reminders of
your meal offerings and accept the
fatness of your burnt offerings. May he grant you your heart’s
desire and may he fulfill your every
plan May we shout for joy at your
victory and in the name of our God
raise our banners. May YHWH fulfill all your
requests. Now I know that YHWH will give
victory to his anointed . . . |
Numerous features of this papyrus continue to be debated,
including direction of influence between column XI and Ps 20, the
singular versus plural pronouns, and especially the significance of the “name
theology”
of Ps 20 compared with the plethora of divine designations in P. Amh 63: Horus,
Mar, El, El Bethel, Baal of Heaven, Adonai, and Horus-YHW. Important for the
current study is the Aramaic divine name, which appears in apposition to Horus,
the chief sky-king deity of the Egyptians. Horus and YHWH are paralleled in Ps
20:2, 5, 6, which was likely facilitated by their similar spheres of authority.
The use of the divine name in P. Amh 63 is analogous to the
Elephantine material in that other deities are mentioned alongside YHW, in
similar expressions. In one instance
from Elephantine, the name of the Jewish deity is combined with Anat: “Anat-YHW.”
While these naming practices are similar, there are also important differences.
For example, the community that produced P. Amh 63 does not explicitly identify
themselves as yehudin, as do the authors of the Elephantine material. In
summary, this document shows the continued use of the divine name, during the
fourth or early third century BCE in Upper Egypt. (Anthony R. Meyer, Naming
God in Early Judaism: Aramaic, Hebrew, and Greek [Studies in Cultural
Contexts of the Bible 2; Leiden: Brill, 2022], 64-67)