Date: Wednesday, February 26, 2025
Time: 9:00 AM - 6:00 PM (registration starts at 8:00 AM)
Location: Ezell 241, Lipscomb University
The biblical authors drew on the everyday work and lives of contemporary men and women to illustrate truths in the biblical text. The conference explores this world beneath the text by examining diverse crafts and labor specialization, with a focus on scribes, artisans, and domestic work. Through archaeological and historical research, experts will investigate how ancient technologies, artistic practices, and the social structures supporting them shaped daily life, religious practices, and cultural identity in the ancient Near East.
General registration: $45.00
Student registration: $15.00 (students may be from any institution)
Registration includes lunch, refreshments, and conference materials.
Registration is now open! You can register here.
GPS Address
The best address to use with your GPS is 3906 Belmont Blvd, Nashville, TN 37204. This will get you the closest to the building in which our conference is being held (#2 in the yellow circle), as well as the best options for parking.
Driving North on Belmont Blvd
If you come in driving north on Belmont Blvd, you will turn onto Belmont Blvd from Shackleford Rd. After you turn onto Belmont Blvd, you will take the second possible right onto campus, where you will find parking available to your left, right, and straight ahead.
Driving South on Belmont Blvd
If you come driving in south on Belmont Blvd, after you pass Glen Echo Rd, you will take the third possible left onto campus. You will find parking available to your left, right, and straight ahead.
The conference is being held in the Ezell Building, which is #2 in the yellow circle on the map. You may enter this building through several doors, including through the Shinn Event Center (#1 on the map).
The map shows the different areas of parking available all around the conference location, though please note that the day of the conference is also a regular school day for the university and so parking can be sparse if you arrive after 8 AM.
If the lots to the left and right of the recommended entrance to campus (see the directions above) are full, please continue straight ahead to the Arena West Parking Garage (#48/P2 in the yellow circle on the map) as this will be your best bet for close parking.
8:00 am - 9:00 am Registration
9:00 am - 9:15 am Welcome
9:15 am - 10:45 am Session I: Material Studies: Current Research of the Lanier Center for Archaeology
Rebekah Ross, From the Palace to the Insulae: Glass Artisans in the Ancient World
Kristen Flake, Footsteps in Stone: The Art and Craft of Ancient Mosaic Pavements
Charles Wilson, A High-End Cosmetic Bowl from Gezer
10:45 am - 11:00 am Break
11:00 am - 12:00 pm Session II: Ancient Israel: Guilds
Dr. Deborah Cassuto, Many Hands Make Light Work: Making Textiles in the Iron Age
Dr. Jennie R. Ebeling, Feeding the Elite in Ancient Israel
12:00 pm - 1:45 pm Lunch break
1:45 pm - 2:45 pm Session III: Stone and Scroll: Public Writing for the Community
Dr. Matthew J. Suriano, Words That Withstand Time: Monumental Funerary Inscriptions on the Mount of Olives during the Iron Age
Dr. H.H. "Chip" Hardy II, Updating the Decalogue: Textualization, Canonization, and Renovation in Early Hebrew Biblical Manuscripts
2:45 pm - 3:00 pm Break
3:00 pm - 4:00 pm Session IV: Scribes at Work
Dr. Robert R. Duke, Hebrew Scribal Practice on the Silk Road
Dr. Ryan E. Stokes, Why Did the Scribes Think Jesus Was Demon Possessed?
4:00 pm - 5:00 pm Break
5:00 pm - 6:00 pm Keynote Lecture: "Who Really Wrote the Bible? The Story of the Scribes" with Dr. William M. Schniedewind
Dr. Deborah Cassuto is a leading scholar on ancient textile tools of the Bronze and Iron Ages in the southern Levant. Debi’s research, which extends from her doctoral thesis, The Fabric of Society: Textile Production Workshops in the Southern Levant- a Case Study from Iron Age Tell eṣ-Ṣâfī/Gath, earned at Bar Ilan University, focuses on piecing together the chaîne opératoire (operational sequence) of textile production and consumption, in the absence of actual textile remains. In addition to her ancient textile interests, Debi’s publications include several articles on the excavations at Tel Burna, Israel, where she has been a team member since 2010 and is currently director of the Project’s lab at Ariel University. She is also an associate fellow at the Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem and a member of the Minerva Center for the Relations between Israel and Aram in Biblical Times (RIAB).
Dr. Robert "Bobby" Duke (University of California, Los Angeles) serves as the Chief Curatorial Officer and as the Director of the Scholars Initiative at Museum of the Bible. He is also a professor in the Honors College and former dean of the School of Theology at Azusa Pacific University. He is the author of The Social Location of the Visions of Amram (Peter Lang) and Biblical Hebrew and Aramaic Dictionary (Zondervan).
Bobby earned both his PhD and MA in Near Eastern Languages and Cultures from UCLA, as well as an MA in Hebrew Bible from Jerusalem University College and a theology degree from Multnomah University. He was also the recipient of a fellowship from the W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem to work on his dissertation, which focused on Aramaic documents from Qumran. His scholarly writing — especially Dead Sea Scrolls research — is widely respected. Before beginning graduate studies at Hebrew University and UCLA, Duke taught 6th and 7th grade in Southern California. From 2009–2012, he also chaired the Service-Learning and Biblical Studies workshop at the annual Society of Biblical Literature meeting.
Jennie Ebeling earned the MA and PhD in Near Eastern Archaeology from the University of Arizona and is an Associate Professor of Archaeology at the University of Evansville in Indiana. A ground stone artifact specialist, her interests include ancient food and drink technology, women in Canaan and ancient Israel, and religion and cult in the Bronze and Iron Age Levant. She has also conducted ethnographic research on traditional clay ovens and contemporary bread culture in Jordan. The author of Women’s Lives in Biblical Times, Dr. Ebeling has co-edited five volumes and is currently working on a book entitled Reconstructions of Life in Biblical Israel: From Early Ethnography to Household Archaeology for Cambridge University Press. She has worked as a stone artifact specialist for more than a dozen archaeological projects in Israel and co-directed the Jezreel Expedition with Norma Franklin, which is currently in publication phase.
Kristen Flake is currently a PhD candidate working on her dissertation, while also working for Lipscomb’s Undergraduate Admissions as an Assistant Director. She also serves as Adjunct Faculty, teaching Bible courses at Lipscomb. She received her BA in Ancient Studies from Southwestern Assemblies of God University in Waxahachie, TX. Kristen then went on to receive her MA in Archaeology and Biblical Studies from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, TX. Her dissertation research focuses on mosaic pavements of churches in Jordan from the 5th-6th century AD. Specifically, her research analyzes the symbolism of the mosaic floors in churches at Abila and Mount Nebo and how the placement of the images in the mosaics communicate early Christian theology.
Chip Hardy (Ph.D., University of Chicago) is associate professor of Divinity at Beeson Divinity School, Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. His work engages with the cultural and historical background of the peoples of the Ancient Near East, specifically the languages of the Bible and the religious literature related to biblical texts. He has authored and edited numerous articles and essays. His most recent books include Exegetical Gems from Biblical Hebrew: A Refreshing Guide to Grammar and Interpretation (Baker Academic, 2019), The Development of Biblical Hebrew Prepositions (ANEM 28; SBL Press, 2022), “Like ʾIlu Are You Wise”: Studies in Northwest Semitic Languages and Literatures in Honor of Dennis G. Pardee (Oriental Institute of University of Chicago, 2022), Going Deeper with Biblical Hebrew: An Intermediate Study of the Grammar and Syntax of the Hebrew Bible (B&H Academic, 2024), The State of Old Testament Studies: A Survey of Recent Research (Baker Academic, 2024), and Exegetical Journeys from Biblical Hebrew (Baker Academic, 2025).
Rebekah Ross is a PhD candidate in the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East program at Lipscomb University and she teaches at Clemson Area Academy. She received her BA in English and History from the University of North Georgia, her Master of Library and Information Science from the University of South Carolina in Columbia, and her MA in Archaeology and Biblical Studies from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. She has excavated in Cyprus and Jordan and is part of the publication staff for the Kourion Urban Space Project in Cyprus.
William Schniedewind is Professor of Biblical Studies at UCLA, and the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Director of the Alan D. Leve Center for Jewish Studies. He received his Ph.D. in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies from Brandeis University, and he has been a Visiting Scholar at the Hebrew University and a Research Fellow at the Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem. He also served for many years as the Chair of the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at UCLA. He is the author of seven books, including How the Bible Became a Book (Cambridge University Press, 2004), A Social History of Hebrew (Yale University Press, 2013), The Finger of the Scribe: How Scribes Learned to Write the Bible (Oxford University Press, 2019), and Who Really Wrote the Bible: the Story of the Scribes (Princeton University Press, 2024).
Ryan Stokes serves as Associate Professor of Biblical Studies and Associate Dean of the School of Biblical and Theological Studies at Carson-Newman University, where he teaches courses on the Bible and its ancient Jewish context. In addition to numerous scholarly articles and essays about the Bible, he has authored the book The Satan: How God’s Executioner Became the Enemy (Eerdmans, 2019), which has been translated into Italian.
Matthew Suriano specializes in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, ancient Near Eastern religions, Northwest Semitic epigraphy, and the archaeology of the Levant. His first book The Politics of Dead Kings: Dynastic Ancestors in the Book of Kings and Ancient Israel (Mohr Siebeck, 2010) examined the motifs used to describe a king's death. His recent book, A History of Death in the Hebrew Bible (Oxford University Press, 2018), which won ASOR's Frank Moore Cross Award, looks more broadly at death and burial in biblical literature. His current projects includes a study of Iron Age monolithic-tombs in Jerusalem, MMO:VAS, a new edition of Hebrew funerary inscriptions from Iron Age Judah for the Society of Biblical Literature's series Writings from the Ancient World (with Jacqueline Vayntrub), and a project on the Book of Kings.
Charles is a PhD candidate at the University of Chicago where he is completing a dissertation on the Iron Age IIA pottery of the Akko plain with a focus on assemblages from Tell Keisan and Horbat Rosh Zayit. His research interests include ancient daily life, economy, household archaeology, and city planning.