Norman Gottwald's monumental The Tribes of Yahweh caused an immediate sensation when first published in 1979, and its influence has continued to be felt, both in the area of biblical politics and in the application of sociological methods to the Hebrew Bible. This book reflects on the impact and the implications of the work after twenty years. The distinguished contributors are David Jobling, Frank Frick, Charles Carter, Carol Meyers, Jacques Berlinerblau, Itumeleng Mosala, Gerald West, Roland Boer and, in a response to contributors as well as an interview with the editor, Norman Gottwald...

These studies by an academic who is also a former practising lawyer seek to establish the principles of biblical law as represented in the Sinai traditions. Specific topics covered include adultery, family law, slavery, animals and wealth; respect for life and the general biblical moral tradition are also discussed. The collection also deals with wider issues of prophecy and law, the relationship of torah and mishpat (especially in relation to Second Isaiah), and laws in the book of Ruth, and includes a discussion of the place of biblical law in contemporary society.

The essays in this volume address the interface between biblical studies, archaeology, sociology and cultural anthropology, celebrating the pioneering work of James Flanagan. In particular, this collection explores various ways in which the real ancient world is constructed by the modern critical reader with the aid of various theoretical and practical tools.The contributors to this volume have all been involved with Flanagan and his projects during his academic career and the essays carry forward the important interdisciplinary agendas he has encouraged. Part One deals with his recent...

This book examines the dialogic structure of biblical psalms of lament. Observations about voicing are developed out of the work of Mikhail Bakhtin, and are utilized to reevaluate the theological expression of lament psalms as well as components of Israel's rhetorical relationship with its deity. What emerges is a theology that gives voice to the tension that existed between faith in a god who practices flawless "hesed," or covenantal loyalty, and the experience of God's failure to uphold his side of the bargain.

A fascinating and highly original new look at the Joseph-narrative which relies a good deal on syntactic and semantic analyses. Pirson shows that there are many elements in this story that provoke a significantly different reading of the story of Joseph and his brothers, especially when these are combined with some textual aspects previously unnoticed or neglected. Special attention is given to the meaning of Joseph's dreams, to the question of who actually sold Joseph, and to the brothers' role in the narrative. Pirson also asks why Joseph did not call home after his release from prison,...

This book explores the references to Egypt in the Pentateuch--twice as dense as in the rest of the Hebrew Bible--in the context of the production of the text's final form during the Persian period. Here, as Greifenhagen shows, Egypt functions ideologically as the primary "other" over against which Israel's identity is constructed, while its role in Israel's formation appears as subsidiary and as a superseded stage in a master narrative which locates Israel's ethnic roots in Mesopotamia. But the presentation of this powerful neighbour is equivocal: a dominant anti-Egyptian stance coexists...

Archaeological discoveries have increasingly brought to light evidence of women's involvement in the royal houses of the ancient Near East, yet such evidence has not fundamentally altered the perception of monarchy as an exclusively male-gendered theological, political, and social institution. Solvang's study assembles the evidence in search of an integrated view of royal women's position and power in critical functions of monarchy, challenging customary assumptions about women's place in the royal harem. The historical information serves as a backdrop for a literary reading of biblical...

What makes one crime more serious than another, and why? This book investigates the problem of "seriousness of offence" in English law from the comparative perspective of biblical law. Burnside takes a semiotic approach to show how biblical conceptions of seriousness are synthesised and communicated through various descriptive and performative registers. Seven case studies show that biblical law discriminates between the seriousness of different offences and between the relative seriousness of the same offence when committed by different people or when performed in different ways....

This book marries the several elements: a given text (1 Samuel), a focal character (King Saul), a spacious and creative theorist (Mikhail Bakhtin), a historical context (the collapse of monarchic Israel and the moment for return. The dilemma for the exile community is to return with royal leadership or without it); a reading challenge is: can a character be a cipher for a corporate experience (Saul represent the whole monarchic experience)? The author argues that the narrative of 1 Samuel may be read as a riddle propounding the complex story of Israel/Judah's experience with kings as an...

This book is about both the fear of gender reversal and its expression in the prophet Ezekiel's reworking of the marital metaphor. Kamionkowski argues that the abomination of "wife Jerusalem" is that she is attempting to pass for a male, thereby crossing gender boundaries and upsetting the world order. This story is therefore one of confused gender scripts, ensuing chaos and a re-ordering through the reinforcement of these strictly defined prescriptions of gendered behaviour.Using socio-historical evidence and the existence of the literary motif of "men turning into women" as a framework,...