Böcker i The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies-serien

Louis Jacobs has made a formidable contribution to Jewish scholarship over the last 40 years. In addition he has inspired a generation of students of Judaica as well as members of his own congregation at the New London Synagogue. The contributors to this volume in his honour include a wide range of distinguished scholars. Beginning with Jacob Neusner''s essay on the transformation of the Dual Torah in the first four centuries CE, the volume ranges over a variety of topics in the field of Bible, Talmud, history and theology, mirroring the wide range of Louis Jacobs'' own interests. In addition, a full bibliography of Louis Jacobs'' publications is included.

This book, an anthology of previously published writing about Michal together with some new and original essays, is something of an experiment. Its purpose is to provide reders with raw materials for developing their own reading of the Michal story. It does not offer a unified portrait of this biblical character, but rather invites readers to form their own assessment interactively with these readings of the Michal story. At the same time, this book presents some systematic guidance for coping with these divergent interpretations of the complex and tantalizing figure of Michal.

A Biblical Itinerary is dedicated to George Coats, former Professor of Old Testament at Lexington Theological Seminary, Kentucky and author of Rebellion in the Wilderness, From Canaan to Egypt, and Moses: Heroic Man, Man of God, and other books. The essays collected here, reflecting many of George Coats''s interests, include ''Structure and Meaning in the Sinai-Horeb Narrative'' (Joseph Blenkinsopp), ''Biblical and Early Islamic Moses'' (Malcolm Clark), ''What Does the Bible Say? A Question of Text and Canon'' (David Gunn), ''On the Task of Old Testament Theology'' (Rolf Knierim); ''Scripture and the Formation of Christian Identity'' (Roy Melugin); ''Some Reflections on the Canonical Moses: Moses and Abraham'' (Rolf Rendtorff), and other papers by Trent Butler, Eugene Carpenter, James Crenshaw, John Roffey, Lawson Stone, Gene Tucker and John Van Seters.

This provocative book combines literary and historical methods to examine the phenomenon of the ''forsaken firstborn'' in Genesis. The dignity of the firstborn sons of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph-Ishmael, Esau, Reuben and Manasseh-is disregarded in the narrative and the rights inherent in their status are taken from them and conferred on a younger brother. One might easily compare this with the motif in many folktales of the youngest son outdoing his elder brothers in cleverness and skill. But unlike the folklore motif, in the book of Genesis the younger brother''s success is not due to any courageous deed or heroic feat on his own part. Instead the displacement of the elder by the younger is usually the result of somebody else''s initiative and achievement.

Noegel here examines instances of Janus parallelism in the Hebrew Bible with particular attention to the book of Job, and with excursuses on the device in other ancient Near Esatern literatures. The author finds the punning device integral to the book of Job, serving a referential function. Within the context of dialogue and debate, the polysemous statements resemble a poetry contest among the participants (Job, his friends, and Elihu). The book also treats the relationship between wordplay and wisdom literature; polysemy as preserved in the Greek, Aramaic, Latin, and Syriac translations; and the impact of Janus parallelism on textual criticism and the unity of the book of Job.

Three major essays by Baruch Halpern, Brian Peckham and Paul E. Dion deal with traumatic changes in Israelite culture, in particular the transition from the traditional culture of Israel in Iron Age IIA (tenth-ninth centuries) to a new, more widely literate culture in the eighth-seventh centuries BCE. These essays throw into relief changes in legal, political and religious culture in Judah in the last 150 years of its independence. Their combined implications for the origins of Western law and civilization, and for the models from which Reformation and Enlightenment political theory were drawn, are substantial.

This book contains the F.D. Maurice lectures for 1992 and six Gifford lectures of 1994. The Maurice lectures present the first account of Maurice as an Old Testament interpreter. The lectures on Smith concentrate upon his theological interests as an interpreter of the Bible, as well as the first account based on unpublished material of Smith''s activity as a preacher. There is also a close investigation of Smith''s links with Germany, and the influence upon him of Richard Rothe is investigated in some detail for the first time. One of the aims of the book is to show how, in their different ways, Maurice and Smith tried to relate the Old Testament to the two different periods of Victorian Britain in which they lived. The book also is intended as a further contribution to our knowledge of the history of biblical criticism in Britain.

2 Samuel 7 has always been a focal point in discussion about the Davidic covenant and its relationship to the exodus (or Sinai) covenant. This new rhetorical study of the speeches of Yahweh and David in 2 Samuel 7 examines the dynamics of the conversation between the two characters, a conversation essentially about houses and obligation. The reading proposes that talk of a Davidic dynasty is a diversionary strategy that Yahweh uses to deflect David''s interest from a temple building project. It also suggests that the manner in which Yahweh presents the offer of dynasty conceals an empty offer behind the facade of a grandiose and unending lineage. The history of religions problem of a Davidic versus sinaitic covenant may be resolved by attending less to the facade and more to the undertones of Yahweh''s offer.

Insights gained from the study of metaphorical language in other fields, particularly New Testament parable research, are here applied to the tree metaphors in Isaiah 1-39. The focus of investigation is the content of the metaphors , the intentions underlying their use, and the consequences of that use. The author suggests that (1) the informative function of the tree metaphors is to provide theological interpretations of the political situation; (2) the performative function of the metaphors is to engage the audience in such a way that they adopt the metaphors'' interpretation of reality as their own; (3) the use of metaphorical language encourages continual reinterpretation of the original proclamation. The tree in the Garden, the felling of trees, new growth of felled trees and the forest fire, are among the images Isaiah uses to make his political statements. He shows himself to be an extremely competent rhetorician in using these images to instil an active response in his audience. The modes in which the metaphors can be reinterpreted and reapplied in new contexts are perceived as significant not only for the composition of Isaiah, but for that of subsequent religious literature.

Critically tests Mowinckel''s hypothesis about the ''enthronement festival of Yahweh'' and asks whether this theory finds any support in the epic literature of Ugarit. Petersen tests Sigmund Mowinckel''s classical hypothesis about the enthronement festival of Yahweh and especially whether this theory, as urged by the followers of Mowinckel, finds any support in the epic literature of Ugarit. A careful study of the two corpora of texts, the Old Testament Psalms and the Ugaritic Baal-cycle, together with a discussion of the methodology of the cultic interpretation, shows the weaknesses of the hypothesis. In the history of scholarship, the idea of an enthronement festival of Marduk has been arbitrarily transferred from Babylon to Jerusalem and hence to Ugarit with little basis in the relevant texts. In fact, the method of ''cultic interpretation'' is to be rejected, since its circularity of argumentation determines the result of the analysis beforehand.

The fifteen articles in this volume, arising from work in the Chronicles-Ezra-Nehemiah Section of the Society of Biblical Literature, engage with the author''s thought and message through analysis of certain critical texts or by identifying and tracing larger themes through the work. The collection follows The Chronicler as Historian and The Chronicler as Author. Like these previous volumes, this book also endeavours to show the diverse approaches employed in Chronicles scholarship. Contributors: Robert H. Smith, Allen W. Mueller, Gary N. Knoppers, Gerrie F. Snyman, Ehud Ben Zvi, Philip Abadie, Mark A. Throntveit, Leslie C. Allen, Christopher T. Begg, Roddy L. Braun, John C. Endres, Isaac Kalimi, Brian E. Kelly, William M. Schniedewind and John W. Wright.

According to Fields, biblical narrative is didactic socio-religious commentary on human experience, reflected in ''history'', and that such ''history'' is a way of describing the conceptual universe of the ancient authors. Biblical narrative is strikingly free of abstract formulations but encapsulates abstract reflections, within recurring literary motifs, and by the reporting of ''historical information''. This perception of biblical narrative is strikingly illustrated by an analysis of the story of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19). The motifs of the Sodom tradition are compared with those in the stories about the concubine in Gibeah (Judges 19) and about the destruction of Jericho (Joshua 2).

This volume draws together essays by fourteen international scholars in the field of Aramaic and Syriac studies. It is published to pay fitting honour to Professor Martin McNamara, who has contributed so much to Targumic studies for almost forty years. The contributions in this collection reflect his interests in the study of the Targums, the development of the Aramaic language and early Jewish and Christian literature. Many of the contributors to this volume have worked with Professor McNamara in preparing volumes for the Aramaic Bible series, to which he has devoted so much time and energy.

Often working under severely restricted academic and social conditions, the Latvian scholar Joel Weinberg has made a unique and important contribution to biblical studies. Influenced by Soviet work in ancient Near Eastern history, Weinberg''s distinctive approach is in dialogue with scholarship in both Eastern and Western European traditions. This translation brings together seven essays originally published in Russian, then translated and expanded by Weinberg into German. The essays form the basis of what was originally Weinberg''s dissertation. Publication of these essays in English will not only allow students and scholars easier access to Weinberg''s thought, but will allow scholars to evaluate the studies together, and thus facilitate the current dialogue on the Babylonian exile, and the postexilic period.

To mark the retirement of John F. A. Sawyer, Professor of Religious Studies in the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, colleagues and former students from around the world have contributed studies on his areas of interest: the study of Hebrew, the books of the Jewish Bible, and the culture and traditions of Judaism. The essayists consider not simply the origin of the meaning of word and text, but also the many and strange ways in which word and text become transposed, re-oriented and often enough traduced by later interests and purposes. The roll call of scholars reads: Philip Alexander, Francis Andersen, Graeme Auld, Calvin Carmichael, Robert Carroll, David Clines, Richard Coggins, Jon Davies, Philip Davies, James Dunn, John Elwolde, John Gibson, Graham Harvey, Peter Hayman, Dermot Killingley, Jonathan Magonet, Robert Morgan, Takamitsu Muraoka, Christopher Rowland, Deborah Sawyer, Clyde Curry Smith, Max Sussman, William Telford, Marc Vervenne, Wilfred Watson, Keith Whitelam and Isabel Wollaston.

The themes of this volume encompass the lifelong interests of one of the most eminent and learned Jewish scholars of our time: Qumran, Hellenism, Rabbinics and chronography. The contributors, leading scholars in these fields, have produced what is a benchmark of modern scholarship of Judaism in the Graeco-Roman period.

An illuminating examination of the emergence of deuteronomic theology in pre-exilic Judah. Judaean deuteronomism grew as a response to the social unrest of the Assyrian period, channelling popular discontent away from the Davidic monarchy and towards foreign imperialism. The author brings together different strands of current scholarship, studying the economy of monarchical Judah and Israel, and examining the commanding social role of the Davidic monarchy. Lowery also discusses Ahaz and the economic and religious impact of Assyrian imperialism, and concludes with a discussion of the Manasseh narrative in Kings as a systematic rejection of the pre-deuteronomic First Temple status quo.

In the last two decades, there has been a resurgence of interest in the value of the Old Testament for modern ethical questions. John Rogerson is a scholar who has dedicated much of his academic life to probing the possibility of the abiding significance of the Old Testament for moral issues today. This volume brings together for the first time many of his contributions-both published and unpublished-to Old Testament social ethics. This volume can serve both as a general reference work as well as a textbook for classes in Old Testament ethics at seminaries and theological colleges.

The first chapter of this unusual and instructive work shows how the study of sound patterns in Old Testament Hebrew poetry is integral to the investigation of bublical poetry. Then several chapters describe and systematize the sound patterns, beginning with simpler examples of assonance and alliteration. The analysis gradually moves on to more complex configurations which link words and phrases, emphasize key words, mark off syntactical and semantic units, and highlight word repetition and word play. A relationship between sound pattern and meaning in each proverb is shown throughout.

An intriguing and subtle study of five Genesis dreams: Abimelech''s (20.1-18), Jacob''s (28.10-22; 31.10-13), Laban''s (31.24) and Abraham''s (15.1-21). Like many of their ancient Near Eastern counterparts, all occur at times of uncertainty, concern status, and emphasize divine involvement in human affairs. At a deeper level, they also address doubts arising from God''s promise of land, descendants and a unique role for Israel among the nations. Their particular treatment of relations between Israelites and non-Israelites and of Israel''s absence from the land points to the Babylonian Exile as the background against which the patriarchal dream texts achieved their present form. Revisions of the Night shows how dreams combine the highly personal with the ardently political in an inspired response to national crisis.

A vigorous imagination is the principal source for many of the abnormalities of fictional characters. Many of the motifs also bear some relation to the rituals and religious symbols embraced by the people among whom they are or were at one time, current. Another important source can be found in symbolism of a religious or social kind. This motif-index is the first to present and analyse this material in biblical narrative and post-biblical literature down to the twelfth century CE; it lists all possible abnormalities, deformities and disabilities, arranged according to the parts of the body affected and the type of deformity, sums up the narrative and gives the explicit or implicit reason for its appearance.

The volume contains the contributions to a symposium in which specialists in different fields worked together in the attempt to throw by their cooperation more light on the conditions - theological convictions and worldview, political climate, influence of state officials, educational institutions and churches - which were influential in the development of biblical studies in the second half of the 19th century. The discussion originated with a special problem: the thesis of William Farmer, one of the co-editors of the volume, that the appointment of Heinrich Julius Holtzmann, who defended the priority of the gospel of Mark as the oldest synoptic gospel, to the New Testament professorship in Strasbourg in 1872 was the result of a direct intervention of the emperial chancellor Bismarck in the context of the kulturkampf, who wished thereby to weaken the Roman Catholic position defending the supremacy of the chair of St Peter by the authority of the gospel of St Matthew (Mt 16,18). The question belongs in the broader context of the presuppositions of Bible exegesis in the second half of the 19th century. As both editors agreed that the matter is not yet finally settled, it seemed to be essential for coming to deeper insights into the conditions under which biblical exegesis was enacted in the 19th century to broaden the scenery and to include other aspects that might throw more light on a period widely unknown to many scholars belonging to the present generation. Therefore specialists of different fields joined a symposium in order to elucidate from their respective viewpoints and interests basic themes and methods of biblical exegesis, scientific theology and the relations between state and university in the 19th centruy, especially during the period of the second Reich. But the themes were not restricted to this special area. They included also a wider outlook into the first half of the century and across the borders of Germany into other European countries. So the volume contains a collection of essays which have in common that all of them contribute to a better knowledge of the inner and outer conditions which formed climate and results of Biblical interpretation in the period.

This is the first comprehensive study of Herder''s preoccupation with the Song of Songs, Baildam considers the importance of this poetry in his thinking, and examines his commentaries and translations of 1776 and 1778. Despite Herder''s claims to the contrary, his own cultural position is revealed in his translations, and in his unique interpretation of the work as the voice of pure, paradisal love. Starting with Herder''s interest in the Song of Songs between 1765 and 1778, this book sets his reflections in the wider context of his relativistic views on the nature of poetry, contemporary German culture, and the importance of primitive poetry in general and the poetry of the Bible in particular. Then Baildam looks at current literary critical theories with implications for Herder''s translations of these ''Lieder der Liebe'', and discusses Herder''s theories of language and translation in comparison with German translation theories. Herder''s reading of the Song as the most primitive, natural and sublime example of Hebrew poetry is placed in the context of earlier and contemporary interpretations, his opinion of which is examined. In the last part of the book, there is an appraisal first of Herder''s commentaries themselves, analysing how the details reflect his overall concept of the work, and then of his translations, comparing them with each other, with the Lutheran text to which Herder ultimately directed his readership, and with the Hebrew text. A concluding chapter reviews the reception of Herder''s work, and three appendices offer a parallel presentation of Herder''s translations of 1776 and 1778, Luther''s translation of 1545, and Goethe''s translation of 1775.

The main methodological thesis of this study is that the book of Job, more than any other book in the Bible, should be treated as an artistic work in which form and content cannot be separated. Hence, a good acquaintance with the literary aspects of the book, including its relations with other ancient Near Eastern texts, is a precondition to the understanding of its theology. The deep structure of the book is that of a catalogue-which is a key to understanding its approach to the problem of theodicy. The difficult language of Job is scrutinized, and is proved to be an original and immanent characteristic of the book. A synthesis of the literary, linguistic and theological characteristics of Job leads to its paradoxical-not absurd-definition as ''a blemished perfection''.

This ''close reading'' of Exodus 19-40 focuses on the repetition of the ''encounter on the mountain''. This double encounter is expressed in a narrative structure of preparatory episodes climaxed by the theophany. The tension of the narrative is linked to ''the people'' as the unlikely heroes of encounter and solved by the divine descent from the divine mountain to the man-made tent. The new situation of permanent encounter is foregrounded by the juxtaposed stories of pre- and post- Sinai journey, and the theme of the ''substitution of Moses'' underlines a radical reinterpretation of traditional concepts, inviting the reader to embark on a process of identification.

Glazov demonstrates that the interlinked themes of bridling the tongue and opening the mouth, well-known components of wisdom teaching, are also crucial to understanding much in the prophets, as well as later Jewish and Christian writings, especially liturgical texts. His comprehensive survey and analysis of the theme contribute to both a literary and a historical perspective on the prophetic literature of the Bible.

This monograph explores the structure and rhetoric of the book of Isaiah. Its thesis is twofold. First, the book of Isaiah best manifests its structural unity, thematic choherence and rhetorical emphasis when read as an exemplar of prophetic covenant disputation. Second, the principal arrangement of the book comprises seven asymmetrical concentric sections, each made up of complex (triadic and quadratic) framing patterns. They are: an exordium (1.1, 2-5), two threats of judgment (2.6-21; 3.1-4.1), two programmes for the punishment and restoration of Zion and the nations (4.2-11.16; 13.1-39.8), an exoneration of Yahweh (40.1-54.17), and an appeal for covenant reconciliation (55.1-66.24).