During my HUC orientation, we had some excellent times provided for us to get to know the faculty and other graduate students in our departments (often over a wonderful breakfast, lunch, or dinner).  At one point, myself and other new Graduate students–both those from the PhD programs and the MA programs–solicited advice from those more experienced than ourselves.  Dr. Nili Fox, the Director of the Graduate School–gave us the following advice:

1. No one will understand why you\’re doing this.
2. Everyone will wonder why it\’s taking you so long.
3. Your family won\’t understand why you\’re doing this.
4. You family will wonder what\’s taking you so long.
5. Everyone will think you\’re crazy.

1. Unseen: Unseen vocabulary are the words you don\’t remember ever seeing in your life. These are “new” words (or words that might as well be!). This is where all words begin.
2. Disremembered: Disremembered words are those words which you think you know, but just can\’t remember. They\’re the ones that once you flip your vocabulary card or are given the answer you shake your head in shame because you just knew that word and couldn\’t remember! Most of our unseen vocabulary quickly moves into this category.
3. Remembered: Remembered words are those which we see and can remember or figure out what they mean. We might have to think about it. This is the largest category for our vocabulary retention. Unfortunately, we often think that words in this category are in the next category—which causes all sorts of problems.
4. Known: Known words are the ones you don\’t even have to think about. You probably don\’t even remember not knowing what they were. These are the words you don\’t have to translate; they are a part of you. One of my Hebrew professors explained this category thus: “You don\’t remember your children\’s names; you know them!” These are words that you would have a harder time forgetting than remembering.

1. I move ~30 words from the Unseen to the Disremembered category. This is just to familiarize yourself with the word; it\’s an “introduction.” You\’re not really trying to learn it, just get the feel for it.
2. I move ~20 words from Disremembered to Remembered. These are my real “vocabulary” learning. You can move them into this category once you\’re able to know the meaning of a word after flipping through your list twice in a row.
3. I move __ cards from Remembered to Known. This is the trickiest part, because once you label a card as “known” it\’s not going to be seen very often at all. You have to be sure that it is known. For me, if I instantly know a card from the remembered stack then I put it in a “pending” stack. I check that stack the next session and any word I cannot instantly identify goes back into the Remembered stack. Anything I instantly remember stays there for one week when it gets reviewed again. If I still instantly know the card, it gets moved to known.
4. I review a random chunk of known card. If any aren\’t really known, I move them back to remembered.

• Identify your Weaknesses: We\’ve all got specific things we need help remembering, or remembering to do. Maybe you\’re terrible at procrastinating when writing papers; maybe you\’re just forgetful about assignments; maybe you need help breaking down large projects into workable sections. Whatever it is, you know what they are and your plan should take them into account.
• Consider Solutions: If you\’re bad a procrastinating, then scheduling “due dates” for pieces of a project can help you out. For example, if you have a paper due at the end of the term, then you can schedule due dates for a beginning annotated bibliography, for the conclusion of your research, and for your rough draft. This way you have four, smaller due dates that give you an idea of when things should be accomplished. (More on actually sticking to these below!)
• Know your Pressure Points: In the sales industry, a “pressure point” is something that you will do that make people stop listening. In our scenario, these are issues that would make you stop following the plan. In my case, missing deadlines would make me just give up following it because I\’d think it wasn\’t worth it. For you, it might be not having easy access to your plan, or it being too specific or not specific enough. Whatever would keep you from following the plan, make sure you have a way to avoid it.
• Choose a Medium: The major distinctions here are either digital or physical. There are definite strengths to both, but ultimately you need to choose what you\’re going to use. I am a huge fan of digital tools for keeping myself on track. My wife isn\’t. For her, all of my fancy online calendars and email invites are useless and she\’s always done better with a paper list or refrigerator calendar.
• Pick Some Rewards: You might think that “doing well in school” or “not flunking out” would be strong enough rewards for us to stick to a schedule, but they aren\’t. These goals are too far distant. Instead, we need goals that are more immediate and more tangible. Think of small rewards for yourself that you get for completing each of your due dates. Maybe it\’s just “get to eat out for dinner,” or “take the weekend off from school.” Maybe, for your larger projects, it\’d be something larger such as “When I finish my paper then I can buy a pleasure reading book.” The idea is that each time you reward yourself every time you attain a goal and therefore have more reason to attain the next goal. Don\’t be above bribing yourself; embrace your inner Pavlovian!

I-75 N coming to the Cincinnati Bridge from Northern Kentucky (Photo by Jared W. Saltz)

First off, let me say this: Cincinnati is a pretty neat city. It is both a historic city, with great old buildings, classic architecture, and old Philadelphia-style planning (look it up if you\’re not sure what I\’m talking about!). However, it\’s also a \”new\” city, there is a lot of new construction–new museums, new places for the arts, new expansion for music.  It\’s a great mix and an odd conglomeration of several cities that I\’ve lived at before (e.g., Birmingham, AL and Tampa, FL).  We\’ve moved into a nice apartment and we\’re slowly getting settled in (mostly thanks to a trip to Ikea!).

After we\’d been here for about a week and a half, it was time to start my orientation at HUC.

I\’ll post pictures of HUC later, but I can assure you–it\’s been everything I expected and more.  The orientation spanned Monday to Thursday, including social events where we met with faculty, staff, and even the board of overseers.  Throughout the entire process, myself and the other two Ph.D students were treated like part of a family.  Throughout the orientation and the social events, helpful discussions on classes, technology, and financial aid; tours of city, library, archives, and museum; and meetings with faculty, the GSA, and the rabbinical students.

The orientation culminated with one of the more nerve rattling experiences of which I\’ve been a part–the Hebrew placement exam. The \”exam\” was really more of diagnostic exercise, where I sat with Drs. Aaron and Fox sigh-tread and translated a passage of torah followed by a written exam.  The purpose of the test is to help HUC understand all of their incoming students, since previous language work can be quite disparate. The diagnostic helps identify students\’ strengths and weaknesses, as well as if they any additional Hebrew preparation.  To prepare for the test, aside from practicing my vocalization from reading straight from the Tanak, I also completely went through a first-year Hebrew grammar (and it\’s corresponding exercises; but that\’s another post!) and reviewed all of my vocabulary.  It served me well and I\’m able to proceed with my classes without interruption.  It\’s certainly nice to receive validation of my efforts and abilities!

One of the coolest things about HUC is that because of the Cincinnati consortium I can also take classes from the University of Cincinnati–particularly their history and Classics department. This, combined with HUC\’s own fantastic resources, made choosing classes incredibly difficult. That is one of the greatest recommendations for HUC I could give.  That said, I narrowed it down the below classes:

• Attic Prose (UC)
• Ancient Greek History (UC)
• Introduction to Biblical Prose (HUC)
• Book of Numbers (HUC)

As mentioned before, I was offered and accepted admission and funding to Hebrew Union College (HUC) in Cincinnati, OH.  I\’ve been excited about the school ever since I first visited in 2010 because of the quality of education, program history, access to the great Greco-Roman program at University of Cincinnati (through a consortium arrangement), and library.  Considering my interests focusing on the interaction of Greek and Jewish historiographies, it\’s quite the alignment.

However, the one thing I wasn\’t horribly excited about was the move.  You see, I despise moving. Well, let me rephrase that.  I don\’t hate moving per se: I like learning about new cities, I\’m always enjoy making new friends and connections, and I\’m excited to begin school again after my brief hiatus. What I don\’t care for are the particulars of moving: packing is just awful; finding a new place to live can be exhausting and stressful; you might have to find a new job for you, your spouse, or both; and you have to re-arrange your entire schedule. However, some of these horrors can be turned into only minor annoyances if you make a few preparations. This post will cover a few tips that I had for finding a place to live in a far-away city.

Whether just beginning grad school or just beginning our career, it\’s likely that we\’ll move around a lot in the next few years. Some of these moves might just be across town, but most of us will likely move across the state or even further at least once and probably a few times. It\’s stressful, especially if we don\’t have family or friends in the area to help us find a place to live.  Because of the short time frame I had (following my daughter\’s birth and work arrangements), I only had one shot to find a place for us to live.  I flew into town on Tuesday, but my flight was late and I didn\’t get to start my search until the next day, and I flew out Thursday morning. This wasn\’t a lot of time, so I knew I had to make the most of my time!

1. Do your Research: There are a lot of great tools in your chest these days for finding a place to live from distance. Whether you\’re looking for an apartment or a house to rent or buy, you can try Craigslist, Trulia, or Apartment Guide. Apartment Guide was what ended up being most helpful for me.  You can either enter a city or zip code, but the most helpful option is to select a college or university and focus your search around it. It will give you a list arranged however you\’d like, whether based on proximity, price, or size. 
2. Make Contacts: Whether you want to contact a realtor, or the apartments themselves, you should always try and get the right information.  The answers might surprise you. Some questions that we needed to ask that were beyond the obvious were:
• Do you have any specials?
• Do you have availability for our move-in date?
• Are any of the utilities paid?  If not, what are the averages for those which aren\’t?
• Do you have central air/heating or window units? 
• What appliances are included (dishwasher, washer/dryer, connections)?
• What is the make-up of your tenants (students, seniors, families, immigrants, professionals)?
• What is the size of the deposit?
• Do you have access to high-speed internet? 
3. Check out the Area: It goes without saying that some areas of a city are better than others, especially when it comes to crime. But if you\’re not familiar with the city you\’re moving to, it can be really hard to find out what sections of town are better than others. And, from personal experience, you cannot trust the pictures on the apartment/housing ads.  Luckily, the internet has provided us with a few helpful tools:
• Google Maps: Most of us know about google maps and use it to help us plan our trips, but you can also use its street view option to check out the sections of the city!  I\’ve found this to be very helpful in \”scouting\” ares out prior to even seeing them and used it to eliminate a few apartments from our search.  When all of the stores have bars on the windows and all of the buildings are \”tagged\” with gang signs, it might not be the area you want to bring your wife and newborn.
• Raids Online: Raids Online is a pretty nifty website where you can track crime rates in specific areas (but only over the past six months) when used in conjunction with google maps, you can get a pretty good pictures of what\’s going on.
4. Record your Data: After you\’ve spoken to ten people and looked up statistics on seven places, your mind can get pretty muddled.  I created a google doc making notes which included the address, phone contact, distance from the school, crime rates, bed/bath count, square feet, cost, and then specials and notes about utilities/appliances/etc. This is really helpful for the next step.
5. Make a Plan of Attack: After you\’ve recorded all of your data, you can use it to solve the Travelling Salesman Problem.  I used my addresses and google maps to plot the most efficient way to visit all of my apartments without backtracking/running all around town. Thanks to this help, I was able to visit 14 apartments and homes in Cincinnati in less than a day, and still had time left over to do the next step!
6. Wait to Decide: Wait until you\’ve seen all of your options before you make a decision. What you might think will be the best at first, might change after you\’ve seen all of your options.
7. Check your Route: Because we only have one vehicle, it was really important to me to be near the school or have easy access to the school. However, we actually ended up at an apartment that was farther away than some of the others, but it was right on a direct bus line to the school.  Once I found that out, I looked up the bus schedules to make sure that the route was run enough to be useful.  I also drove around the neighborhood and found where the nearest grocery stores, banks, and gas stations were.  This might seem odd, but it\’s important when you\’ve got a newborn! 

It\’s been over two months since my last post. I would apologize, but it\’s entirely due to the birth of my (firstborn) daughter, Hadassah Ruth Saltz so I\’m sorry for nothing.  These past few months have been some of the most exhausting and rewarding of my life.  This new responsibility combined with the preparations for moving to Cincinnati at the end of the month have kept me absurdly busy.

1. This may be the last dig season here. Due to hard work over the past 3 weeks, this year’s team has pretty much resolved the remaining research questions for the Qeiyafa expedition. If this turns out to be the last season, the excavators have already decided on the next site they hope to excavate. Permits must first be obtained, so I’m not at liberty to post this information yet. I will say, however, that the new possibility is an exciting one.

2. We found another Early Iron Age inscription. Can’t say more than this right now.

Sounds interesting.

Next up, I\’ll discuss more of my preparations in the Grad School adventure.

Well, the finds at Khirbet Qeiyafa have raised the expected furor (if you’re unfamiliar with the history or significance of the dig, Todd Bolen gives a brief history here). I’ve tried to catalogue some of the carnage below for anyone just getting in on the ground floor of this melee.

Luke Chandler has dug at the site for the past few seasons, so it wasn’t surprising when he led off with his first discussion of the published article, followed by a clarification on the differences between idolatry and imagery (you’ll want to read Peter Hagyo-Kovacs comment below on Luke’s (mis?)use of aniconism. In fact, you should probably read all of the comments on that post because there’s some good stuff there and presents the greater argument in a microcosm.

Other bloggers followed suit in rapid succession, with Tom Veranna pointing out that the clay shrine looks a lot like Canaanite versions. Chesnut agrees. George Athos argues that KQ is strong evidence for a power in the region… just not a Judahite one of the Saul-David-Solomon persuasion. He follows up with some good information from Aren Maeir who also agrees that the site continues to turn up important–if not Judahite of the SDS persuasion–evidence about the region and epoch.

Seth Sanders, Matthew Suriano, and Jacqueline Vayntrub chime in to give a good history of the dig’s importance and lend a more balanced view while still questioning whether this was an SDS city, and ask the excellent chicken-and-egg question regarding the KQ temple shrines and the proposed Solomonic temple of Samuel-Kings.

John Hobbins and James McGrath also provide early roundups, but disagree on the significance. Hobbins calls the finds “boring” because they continue the status quo of “it seems possible/probably that Samuel-Kings are somewhat reliably historical,” whereas McGrath believes this is merely evidence that at some point Canaanite religion began to transition to proto-Israelite religion.

KQ even polled Douglas Magnum out of his reverie! (Though only to caution us to be careful what sweeping strikes we take at the beginning of this controversial find).

Luke then updates us all with some clarifying comments from Garfinkle himself which might deflate some of the furor surrounding some of the embellishing that the media no doubt loves (after all, who reads an article which reads “things were found somewhere which might mean something… but no one’s sure yet”?) and is absolutely worth a read.

I guess I’m somewhere in the middle on all of this. While (like Magnum, Hobbins, and Chandler) I’m receptive to a maximalist reading of these finds, I’m not entirely convinced of all of the hype. I don’t think this proves anything on it’s own–and I honestly doubt that anyone (including Garfinkle) is trying to say that they do. What they do actually accomplish is give more evidence regarding the region and the time period, and that evidence is starting to indicate (to me, at least) that there is absolutely a Judahite power in Iron IIA Palestine in the mode of SDS. Why else build such a gargantuan fortress where it’s placed? What else explains the architecture (case-mate walls and notable gates), the preponderance of cultic rooms paired with the (so far) absolute lack of idols, and the thousands of bones sans a single porkie?

If it were just one of these aspects, I would be completely with the minimalists in noting that this is hogwash. But when we look at the site holistically, the maximalist assertion begins to gain traction.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t believe that this site proves that the bible is perfectly historical and that every iota of information presented there is now indisputable. I don’t even believe that this site proves that the SDS account is true. What I do believe is that KQ seems to indicate that the SDS account could be true. And also don’t get me wrong, I’m also completely open to the possibility/probability that this season’s dig opens up a room chock-full of Asherim buried in pig intestines and drowned in Philistine armor. But that’s not what we have right now. So, if I’m to make a judgment, I’ll do it with the evidence we have so far.

That said, no one should be surprised at any of the bloggers’ reactions. We know Garfinkle will believe this validates his claims. We know that Finkelstein will say otherwise. People have reacted to the finds in character to their placement on the maximalist vs. minimalist continuum–and it is a sliding scale; the either-or approach continues to represent a fallacy. That said, I admit that I’m really looking forward to what scholarship looks like in 10 years.

New information about the dig a Khirbet Qeiyafa\’s recent finds was published today.  I have to say that–whatever one\’s thoughts on the minimalist v. maximalist debate are–Khirbet Qeiyafa has been a goldmine of information.  The written inscription, the facts of its architecture, placement, and time of building, and now this!  Taken apart, each of these evidences are interesting, but far from earth shattering, but when placed together they (in my humble opinion) seem to convey a much larger case for a maximalist approach to 9-10th century Palestine.

Of particular interest to myself, were the architectural and decorational elements found on the stone ark.  See below, the pictures show what the article notes,

\”The stone shrine is made of soft limestone and painted red. Its façade is decorated by two elements. The first are seven groups of roof-beams, three planks in each. This architectural element, the \”triglyph,\” is known in Greek classical temples, like the Parthenon in Athens. Its appearance at Khirbet Qeiyafa is the earliest known example carved in stone, a landmark in world architecture.\”

Photo owned by University of Jerusalem.

Photo owned by Cornell College

It is interesting to see something so linked to Hellenistic architecture surface in Palestine.  Now, I\’m am by no means an expert on classical architecture, but this does continue to make my research revolving around the literary sharing of classical Hellenistic historiography and the works of the biblical Chronicler seem more and more possible.

I recommend that you read the entire article and look forward to rejoinders from Israel Finkelstein and others.   In the meantime, feel free to drop by Luke Chandler\’s blog. True to is hipster-self, Luke has been blogging about KQ almost since before it was cool to know about it, has dug at the site several times, and is generally in-the-know about such things.

Applying to grad school is can be a nerve wracking experience.  You expose yourself and your ego to a lot of schools and programs that you care a lot about but who don\’t know you at all (or, at least, very little).  Putting yourself out there is scary because you can be rejected.  And, if you\’re like me, you will likely be rejected by at least one of the schools to which you apply.

But, if you\’re like me, you can learn a lot from that experience. Here\’s what I learned.

1. Getting rejected isn\’t fun
2. Sometimes you\’re not a good fit
3. Sometimes you are a good fit and the other party just doesn\’t see it right away
4. Persistence pays off

As that ancient philosopher, Tomulinus Pettius, said: \”Waiting is the hardest part.\”  I\’m not entirely certain that he formulated the statement in regards to grad school applications, but it works–waiting is tough.  During November and December, I was so hectic trying to finalize the schools to which I would apply, talking to professors at those schools, formulating purpose statements and soliciting requesting professors to write letters of recommendation for me that time flew.  Even into January and February, I was busy enough with my job and family (my wife and I are expecting our first child in early May!) that I didn\’t really notice the time.

However, once March started ticking I began to think: Why haven\’t I heard anything yet? I should start hearing something by now. I wonder if anyone else has heard anything back from schools yet? Then the time started to crawl. Slowly. I started to think, Even a rejection letter would be welcome!  Anything would be better than nothing.  I thought that for about a week until my first rejection letter came.  And then the second. And then the third (I\’ll talk about dealing with rejection in my next post).  After that, I was a firm believer in the \”no news is good news\” philosophy.  Luckily, after that, I received a few \”waiting list\” letters and some acceptance letters with funding offered that helped soften the blow.  However, by that point we were well through March and I was just waiting on the last few schools.

Now, into April, I\’ve heard back from all but one of the schools to which I  have applied (I decided to drop them an email just to make sure they hadn\’t forgotten me!) and time has really slowed down.  The closer that we draw to that April 15 deadline, the slower time seems to proceed.  It is as though Zeno\’s Paradox has taken on a chronological guise just to spite me and other like me.

Luckily, another week and a half will put me out my agony, but even while I\’m waiting there are still things I\’ve done to stay productive that you might want to consider if you\’re in a similar position:

1. Start making your decision: You might not know all of the schools that offer you admission, but you do know some of those that will and some of those that won\’t.  You can use this information to start formulating your decision even before you hear back from everyone.

• Discuss your program with your potential advisor
• Email students in your program again with specific questions
• Figure out financial aid or fellowships
• Make note of any special status/prereqs you need
• Make a tentative \”top choice\”

2. Start considering logistics: Time may feel like it\’s crawling by now, but from April 15 to Orientation is a very short four months that you will need every minute to figure out…

• Where will you live? (Campus? Apartment? House?)
• Will you need a job (if you don\’t receive enough funding)? If so, start considering the market.
• Will you spouse need a job?
• Will your children need to be enrolled in a school? When is the first day?
• How will you move? 
• When will you pack?

3. Start prepping yourself for your future: No matter how prepared you are for graduate school, you will never be completely prepared until you know exactly where you\’re going. Part of this should have been done before you applied, but the field is much narrower once you know where (or probably where) you will end up.

• Completely familiarize yourself with the program (what date is your Hebrew entrance exam? What dates for your German, French, or X language exam? Etc.)
• Completely familiarize yourself with your professors major publications
• Fill any gaps in your knowledge
• Get reading lists from current students
• Brush up on your German
• Learn German!