Alter-Altars

Biblical ritual texts reflect a distinction between “consumptive” fires, for the incineration of sacred materials upon an altar, and “destructive” fires, for the incineration of leftovers at a distance from the cultic center. The dichotomy is evidenced by differences in terminology, geography, and legal detail, such that the former are characterized by a high degree of ritualization, and the latter by a low degree of ritualization. Yet this dichotomy reveals an instability inherent in ritual sacrifice: offering materia sacra inevitably generates leftovers, which occupy an ambiguous place within the ritual domain-they are not offerable, but they cannot be disposed of in any which way. The texts examined here responded to this instability with a conceptual shift, whereby destructive fires assimilated many of the features that initially characterized consumptive fires. From the earliest pentateuchal priestly strata through Ezekiel, the Temple Scroll, the Epistle to the Hebrews, and beyond, the data reflect a gradual gravitation toward a new way of thinking about “destructive” fires. They were reconceptualized as mirror-images of the “consumptive” type and were modeled after them in terms of language, geography, and legal detail. From the perspective of a history of ritual, the process analyzed here is part of a larger trajectory whereby ritual residues are reconceptualized as essential components of the cult.