Some Remarks on the Synagogues of Capernaum and Khirbet Shema': A Response to Jodi Magness JAMES F. STRANGE

Some Remarks on the Synagogues of Capernaum and Khirbet Shema ' : A Response to Jodi Magness JAMES F . STRANGE Magness is to be commended for her thoroughly researched and detailed regarding the typology and chronology of ancient synagogues . Her on the subject cannot be ignored either on simply historical grounds that all the fourth-century synagogues have disappeared ) or on the scholarly consensus , but must be addressed on their own merits . I confine my response to her separate analyses of the Capernaum and Shema' synagogues . The Capernaum Synagogue wish to explain that the 'black basalt platform' upon which this limestone synagogue was built is better described as a public building . for temples are well known , and they were not ordinarily built one . fact that the limestone walls are not in the same alignment as basalt walls underneath has alerted the excavators that this ' platform ' have been built originally for some other purpose . ' However , Magness that the homogeneous ...  To the book