[Avodah] The shape of the Menorah of the Temple

[Zev Sero]

On 9/12/20 1:30 pm, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> The news carried
> more data points attesting to the curviture of the arms of the menorah
> in the Chashmonaim's and Herod's version of the BHMQ.

Not the Chashmonaim's original version, which was made of iron spears 
and therefore presumably the arms were straight.  But later, when it was 
replaced with a golden one.


> Which RET and I revived for similar reasons in 2008 & 2009, respectively,
> reports came from other excavations, and again in 2010 because the IE's
> position ended up discussed on Areivim.

*Not* the IE's position.  He makes two statements about the menorah's 
structure, neither of which is about the shape of the arms.

1. (in the short IE printed in chumashim) that the arms were like reeds, 
being round in *cross-section* and hollow; that would seem to imply that 
they were also straight like a reed, but he doesn't say so, and maybe in 
that aspect they were not like reeds.

2. (in the long IE that's published as a separate book) that the arms 
were not arranged in a flat vertical plane, as everyone else seems to 
think, but rather the six arms were arranged in a semi-circle behind and 
around the seventh one, like half of a chandelier.  This is equally 
consistent with straight arms and with curved ones.

-- 
Zev Sero            Wishing everyone a *healthy* and happy 5781
zev at sero.name       "May this year and its curses end
                      May a new year and its blessings begin"