The Two Houses of Israel: State Formation and the Origins of Pan-Israelite Identity
Omer Sergi
Based on a thorough examination of the material remains and settlement patterns in the southern Levant during the Late Bronze Age and the Iron Age and on a review of the relevant historical sources, this book provides a detailed reconstruction of the ways in which Israel and Judah were formed as territorial polities and specifically how the house of David rose to power in Jerusalem and Judah. In light of that, it further situates the stories of Saul and David in their accurate social and historical context in order to illuminate the historical conception of the united monarchy and the pan-Israelite ideology out of which it grew.
Jeremiah’s Egypt: Prophetic Reflections on the Saite Period
Aren M. Wilson-Wright
Jeremiah’s Egypt: Prophetic Reflections on the Saite Period is the first book-length work to highlight the importance of Egypt for understanding the historical context and literary development of the book of Jeremiah. Based on a comprehensive reconstruction of Egyptian-Judahite contact in the late seventh and early sixth centuries BCE, Aren M. Wilson-Wright shows that the numerous references to Egypt in the book of Jeremiah are highly personal reactions to the injustices perpetrated by the Egyptian regime and its self-serving Judahite collaborators, some of which see Babylon as a means of escaping Egyptian domination. Her analysis reveals that the key choice animating the book of Jeremiah is not Judahite autonomy versus Babylonian domination but rather Egyptian domination versus Babylonian domination.
Scribal Memory and Word Selection: Text Criticism of the Hebrew Bible
Raymond. F. Person, Jr.
In
Scribal Memory and Word Selection: Text Criticism of the Hebrew Bible, Raymond F. Person Jr. draws from studies of how words are selected in everyday conversation to illustrate that the same word-selection mechanisms were at work in scribal memory. Using examples from manuscripts of the Hebrew Bible, Person provides new ways of understanding the cognitive-linguistic mechanisms at work when scribes transmitted texts. Person reveals that, while our modern perspective may consider textual variants to be different literary texts, from the perspective of the ancient scribes and their audiences, these variants could still be understood as the same literary text.
Reimagining Apocalypticism: Apocalyptic Literature in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Writings
Lorenzo DiTommaso, Matthew Goff, editors
The Dead Sea Scrolls have expanded the corpus of early Jewish apocalyptic literature and tested scholars’ ideas of what
apocalyptic means. With all of the scrolls now available for study, contributors to this volume engage those texts and many more to reexplore not only definitions of the genre but also the influence of the Dead Sea Scrolls on the study of apocalyptic literature in the Second Temple period and beyond. Part 1 focuses on debates about categories and genre. Part 2 explores ancient Jewish texts from the Second Temple period to the early rabbinic era. Part 3 brings the results of scroll research into dialogue with the New Testament and early Christian writings.
Interpreting 2 Peter through African American Women's Moral Writings
Shively T. J. Smith
Shively T. J. Smith reconsiders what is most distinct, troubling, and potentially thrilling about the often overlooked and dismissed book of 2 Peter. Using the rhetorical strategies of nineteenth-century African American women, including Ida B. Wells, Jarena Lee, Anna Julia Cooper, and others, Smith redefines the use of biblical citations, the language of justice and righteousness, and even the matter of pseudonymity in 2 Peter. She approaches 2 Peter as an instance of Christian cultural rhetoric that forges a particular kind of community identity and behavior. This pioneering study considers how 2 Peter cultivates the kind of human relations and attitudes that speak to the values of moral people seeking justice in the past as well as today.
Biblical Themes in Science Fiction
Nicole L. Tilford, Kelly J. Murphy, editors
Biblical Themes in Science Fiction is a handbook for exploring how biblical themes appear in contemporary science fiction. Contributors examine the relationship between ancient and modern depictions of Adam and Eve, the tower of Babel, Noah’s ark, handmaids, utopian cities, the promised land, the city of Babylon, messiahs, resurrection, and the apocalypse. Essays are supplemented by images and key science fiction sources for diving deeper into how the Bible influenced authors of not only literature but of films and video games as well. An afterword considers the imaginative impulses common to both science fiction and biblical texts.