Books in the The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies series

This volume presents an important insight into the history of scholarship on the Old Testament over the last 100 years. Presented in collaboration with the Society for Old Testament Study, which celebrates its centenary in 2017, the volume examines the shifting patterns in scholarship on the Old Testament over the last century, from the types of subject studied to the demographic make-up of the scholars working on the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible themselves. The volume has been written by several longstanding members and officers of the society. As such the volume presents a remarkable history of scholarship of Old Testament studies.

This volume provides a series of contributions on the crucial aspects relating to the Bible and the Late Bronze Age period. The volume is introduced with a background essay surveying the main areas of history and current scholarship relating to Late Bronze Age Palestine and to the Egyptian New Kingdom (Dynasties 18-20) domination of the region, as well as the question of the biblical account of the same geographical area and historical period.Specific chapters address a range of key concerns: the history of Egypt''s dealing with Canaan is surveyed in chapters by Grabbe and Dijkstra. The Amarna texts are also dealt with by Lemche, Mayes and Grabbe. The archaeology is surveyed by van der Steen. The Merenptah Stela mentioning Israel is of considerable interest and is discussed especially by Dijkstra. This leads on to the burning question of the origins of Israel which several of the contributors address. Another issue is whether the first Israelite communities practised egalitarianism, an issue taken up by Guillaume, with a response by Kletter.

Engages space and explores how the Bible does not contain one, or even several, notions of sacred/holy space.

An edited volume of papers presented in regional, national, and international meetings of the Society of Biblical Literature.

This volume on intercultural biblical interpretation includes essays by feminist scholars from Botswana, Germany, New Zealand, Nigeria, South Africa, and the United States. Reading from a rich variety of socio-cultural locations, contributors present their hermeneutical frameworks for interpretation of Hebrew Bible texts, each framework grounded in the writer''s journey of professional or social formation and serving as a prism or optic for feminist critical analysis. The volume hosts a lively conversation about the nature and significance of biblical interpretation in a global context, focusing on issues at the nexus of operations of power, textual ambiguity, and intersectionality. Engaged here are notions of biblical authority and postures of dissent; women''s agency, discernment, rivalry, and alliance in ancient and contemporary contexts; ideological constructions of sexuality and power; interpretations related to indigeneity, racial identity, interethnic intimacy, and violence in colonial contexts; theologies of the feminine divine and feminist understandings of the sacred; convictions about interdependence and conditions of flourishing for all beings in creation; and ethics of resistance positioned over against dehumanization in political, theological, and hermeneutical praxes. Through their textual and contextual engagements, contributors articulate a broad spectrum of feminist insights into the possibilities for emancipatory visions of community.

Notions of women as found in the Bible have had an incalculable impact on western cultures, influencing perspectives on marriage, kinship, legal practice, political status, and general attitudes. Women and Exilic Identity in the Hebrew Bible is drawn from three separate strands to address and analyse this phenomenon. The first examines how women were conceptualized and represented during the exilic period. The second focuses on methodological possibilities and drawbacks connected to investigating women and exile. The third reviews current prominent literature on the topic, with responses from authors. With chapters from a range of contributors, topics move from an analysis of Ruth as a woman returning to her homeland, and issues concerning the foreign presence who brings foreign family members into the midst of a community, and how this is dealt with, through the intermarriage crisis portrayed in Ezra 9-10, to an analysis of Judean constructions of gender in the exilic and early post-exilic periods. The contributions show an exciting range of the best scholarship on women and foreign identities, with important consequences for how the foreign/known is perceived, and what that has meant for women through the centuries.

A study that offers a canonical reading of the Esau and Edom traditions, examining the portrayal of Esau and Edom in "Genesis", "Deuteronomy", and the prophetic material. It argues that the depiction of Esau and his descendants in "Genesis" and "Deuteronomy" is, on the whole, positive.

The book shows how the "chosen place" has been held captive by scholarly assumptions when being viewed through the optic of the DH hypothesis.

This fascinating collection investigates the inherent spatiality of human existence. The contributors discuss ancient Mediterranean texts and societies from a decidedly spatial perspective, debating over such issues as narratological space, critical spatiality, sociological theories on space, space and identity, space and body. The volume consists of three parts and commences with three studies focusing on theoretical approaches towards spatial analysis and application of the theory to specific Old and New Testament texts. The essays in the second part examine the sacred space and the formation of identity, with particular attention to Jerusalem and the temple seen as sacred space and the lived experience of authors describing this space in various ways. The third part discusses the spatial theory and its application to a variety of texts ranging from the Epic of Gilgamesh to the New Testament.

Presents a test case for diachronic and synchronicapproaches in the book of Joshua - one of the most complex texts in the OldTestament

Bodner argues that literary analysis has value for exploring numerous issues in the Hebrew Bible, including text-critical problems, the Deuteronomistic History, and Chronicles. Essays petition for a heightened awareness of the artistic achievement of the Hebrew Bible and illustrate that literary thinking is necessary for biblical interpretation.