Digital Samaritans issues from a contentious panel at the Society for Biblical Literature conference, where disagreements arose over the purpose of translating the Samaritan version of the Torah. As Ridolfo himself puts it, the crux of this panel and of his work is in “the difference between understanding manuscripts strictly as objects of study or artifacts for biblical exegesis and understanding manuscripts and cultural stakeholder-work around and with them as an ongoing rhetorical process with communicative goals and objectives.” The specific “communicative goals and objectives” Ridolfo is interested in are those of the Samaritan Elders as they do and do not correspond to “the contemporary existential and rhetorical situation of the Samaritans as a living, breathing, people.” Ultimately, Ridolfo sets out to interrogate the Samaritan Elders’ motivations in disseminating Samaritan religious manuscripts beyond the 780 extant members of the group. At the same time he aims to contextualize these motives in relation to the rhetorical circumstances and future goals and objectives of the group, some of whom are themselves exploring the powerful expressive affordances of digital environments.
