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>Gustaf Dalman Enquete in the Austrian Hospice
>In Search of the Lord God - a new exhibition about the history of the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem

Gustaf Dalman Enquete in the Austrian Hospice

Gustaf Dalman (1855-1941) was one of the most significant German bible scholars. He left an enduring legacy, particularly in the areas of bible studies relating to the land of Palestine and biblical archeology, and has earned himself the moniker 'father of Palestine studies in the German language'. Seventy years after his death his work is currently in the public domain. His magnum opus "Work and Customs in Palestine" has become the subject of a long-planned international project initiated by Ronny Reich (Haifa University) and Friedrich Schipper (Vienna University) whose goal is the publication of a new annotated edition of the book, as well as its translation into Hebrew and other languages.
The Gustaf Dalman Symposium at the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem was the so-called kick off for this ambitious international project.

Born on 9th June 1855 in Niesky, in Saxon Upper Lusatia, Dalman was educated at local institutions and from 1874 studied at the Theological Seminary of the Herrnhut Brotherhood (of the Hussite persuasion) in Gnadenfeld, where he was a lecturer until 1887 in the Old Testament and in Practical Theology. He was offered a place at the Institutum Judaicum in Leipzig by Franz Delitzsch where theologians were trained to serve in the mission to the Jews. From 1891 he was a private lecturer and from 1895 he was a teacher of Old Testament and Judaism in Leipzig.
From 1902 til 1917 Dalman was the first director of the German Protestant Institute of Archaeology in the Holy Land. The First World War broke out while he was on holiday in Germany. Dalman's openly anti-British opinions ("deeply saddened that the British government....is allied with barbarians and idolators out to destroy the German cultural world mission" as Dalman wrote in his Palestine Yearbook 10, 1914 IV) initially prevented his return to Jerusalem. From 1917 he was a teacher of Old Testament and Palestine Studies in Greifswald where, in 1920, he established the Institute for bibleland and biblical Archaeology Studies (Link: http://www.deiahl.de/). From 1905 til 1926 he was the publisher of the Palestine Yearbook journal.
From 1903 til 1914 Dalman conducted regular courses for young theologians from Germany (these are still functioning, led today by DEIAHL) and observed, photographed and documented in his publications the conditions of the peasants and Bedouins he saw in Palestine. His work uniquely documents the lives of simple people in the late Ottoman period. He tried to draw conclusions from his research about the history of ancient Israel and the Levant. He wrote articles on archaeology and on regional studies. His second area of research was philology and he published comprehensive books of grammar and dictionaries of Aramaic dialects and Hebrew in post-biblical times.

His magnum opus "Work and Customs in Palestine" originally comprised seven volumes, with 3000 pages and 700 pictures. The manuscript for the eighth and final volume was half finished at the time of Dalman's death in 1941. His field studies were undertaken primarily in the years 1902 til 1914; the outbreak of the war obviously signaled a sudden break in his work. In the years following the war Dalman nevertheless returned to Jerusalem to continue his research and to collect remaining data. From 1925 he thoroughly evaluated his observations: the first volume of his work appeared in 1928, the others followed at regular intervals. The seventh volume appeared only posthumously, in 1941. The eighth volume appeared in 2001, as a fragment. Dalman died on 19th August 1941 not far from his place of birth in Herrnhut in Saxony.

The wealth and breadth of his work can hardly be imagined by the succinct title "Work and Customs in Palestine". He begins with a detailed description of the seasons: autumn and winter (vol 1/1) and spring and summer and daily routines (vol 1/2) explain how nature is experienced in Palestine from the personal perspective -the cold, heat, rain and drought. He describes the land, which is always the Holy Land to him, in all its idiosyncrasy and contradictions. He talks about the composition of the ground and the plants it yields and the animals it feeds, independent of any human activity. Only in the next volume does he talk about 'work', beginning with farming (vol 2): the grain harvest and all that it involves - threshing, winnowing, sifting, storing and milling the corn into flour (vol 3), as well as the baking of bread, the pressing of olives for oil and grapes for wine (vol 4). Plants used for making textiles are listed in the next volume (5): flax, hemp, cotton and silk etc, with descriptions of related themes such as weaving, spinning, and clothing. The animals that play a role in processes such as the production of textiles are also described: sheep for their wool, goats, horses and camels for their hair. The final two volumes deal more with 'customs' ie the different ways of life of the inhabitants of Palestine. Dalman first tackles the nomadic way of life, the tent and life inside the tent, then cattle breeding and milk production, hunting and fishing (vol 6). The last volume describes the home, chicken farming, bee keeping and pigeon breeding (vol 7). The intended final volume was going to deal with domestic life, song, music, birth, marriage, and death, but only a fragment exists (vol 8).
In all the descriptions, from his fieldwork on nutrition and clothing to that on the festivals, it becomes explicity or implicitly clear how deeply the people were influenced and shaped by the land, and how dependent they were on it. When Dalman finally began assessing the results of his lengthy field studies, the First World War and the British-European colonization had already had a negative influence on the local culture and much that Dalman had witnessed in earlier years began to disappear with remarkable speed.
The most comprehensive work on the bible-land and on Palestinian folklore, Dalman's "Work and Customs in Palestine" is still an indispensable standard work for Palestine studies in biblical times. The fact that it is only available in German, a language with which increasingly few scholars are currently conversant, makes the translation of this standard book a topical subject. Two archaeologists, Ronny Reich (Haifa University) and Friedrich Schipper (Vienna University), thus came up with the idea for an international project which would involve publishing a new annotated edition of the book and its translation into Hebrew and other languages, specifically English.
An historical, archaeological and ethnographic commentary seems significant and necessary since Dalman sought through his observations and interpretations to lay the foundations upon which later researchers could build to develop concrete theories about the history of ancient Israel and the Levant. An international group of experts, made up of Israeli, Austrian and German scholars, and to be gradually expanded, is currently being assembled to carry out this undertaking. The four experts so far are Ronny Reich and Friedrich Schipper, as well as Julia Männchen, custodian of the Gustaf-Dalman-Institute at the University of Greifswald and Dieter Vieweger, director of the German Protestant Institute of Archaeology in the Holy Land. The Gustaf Dalman Symposium, which was held on 18/19 August at the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem, was the so-called kick off for this ambitious international project which seeks to make Dalman's once seminal research accessible and applicable to contemporary and future researchers.

The attractive program of the Gustaf Dalman Symposium drew nearly one hundred guests to the Austrian Hospice. Friedrich Schipper, who in partnership with the Austrian Hospice has been running a summer school "Archaeological Field Studies: Jerusalem" for the University of Vienna for some years, greeted the colorful assembly of guests in the Hospice's salon. In a tour de force, Rector Markus St. Bugnyar gave a presentation on the 150 year history of the Hospice. He then welcomed special guest Shua Kisilevitz of the Israel Antiquities Authority who had been in charge of excavations around the Hospice prior to work in spring 2011 to shore up its northern wall. The symposium offered the perfect opportunity for her to explain the results of her excavations to a wider public. Professor Haim Goren, vice chancellor of Tel-Hai College and the Israeli expert on the history of Holy Land research in German, kicked off the session with a short overview of the history of 19th century German research. Dieter Vieweger, director of the German Protestant Institute of Archaeology in the Holy Land and as such, a successor in office to Gustaf Dalman, talked about Conrad Schick and his excavations in the area and under the Redeemer Church in Jerusalem. Together with his colleague at the Institute of Archaeology, Andreas Mehnert, he talked symposium guests through these excavations which are currently closed to tourists. Julia Männchen of Greifswald University, the expert on the life and works of Gustaf Dalman, gave the next talk. Finally, Professor Ronny Reich introduced the international project: "Gustaf Dalman's 'Work and Customs in Palestine', Hebrew edition. Commentary and Translation". The concluding reception in the garden of the Hospice gave guests a further opportunity not only to enjoy the hospitality of the Hospice, but to exchange words on specialist subjects close to their hearts.

In Search of the Lord God - a new exhibition about the history of the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem

In Search of the Lord God
a new exhibition about the history of the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem

When is a pilgrim at his destination?
Least of all in his own abode. There he finds board, respite and counsel; the reasons for his journeying are, however, the holy places that he visits.

Since the establishment of the Austrian Hospice of the Holy Family in 1856, thousands of pilgrims have, as our Founding Father Archbishop Joseph Othmar von Rauscher puts it, found a 'home away from home' here for the duration of their stay. These pilgrims have numbered members of the aristocracy as well as scientists, artists and, most importantly, the 'simple believer'.

They all wanted to witness the places of the Bible with their own eyes and to follow in the footsteps of Christ.

The title of our exhibition, In Search of the Lord God, recalls Easter morning in Jerusalem when the faithful women and Jesus' disciples discovered the empty tomb.
In Search of the Lord God is also the name given to the processions which proceed along our lanes on Easter morning when we search for He who was resurrected.

The exhibition presents a decidedly small selection of well-known personages who were guests in the Austrian Hospice. The signatures are taken from our guest-books; texts and illustrative pictures are from our own archive or from a private source, or are freely accessible on the Internet. Some are taken from Dr Helmut Wohnout's book, "Das Österreichische Hospiz. Die Geschichte des Pilgerhauses an der Via Dolorosa".
(The Austrian Hospice. The History of the House of Pilgrimage on the Via Dolorosa.) Despite intensive searching we have been unable to clear all rights to pictures; we are happy to comply with justified claims.

The main burden of the exhibition was borne by Florian Schiemer who conscientiously deciphered and researched the names in the guest-books; he was assisted in this task by Anselm Becker and Günther Fuchs, Samuel Barwart and Johannes Safron, Philipp Nigitsch and Matthias Perkonigg, here for their civil service, who brought the work to its current - provisional - end.

In Search of the Lord God is first and foremost a testimony to the historical nature of our House, but also an indication that in our search and pilgrimage, we are not and have never been alone. In their search for truth and authenticity every individual is called upon to examine God's calling in their own life.