An interesting feature in the lament psalms is the sudden change of mood. Unfortunately, as the term that has come to be associated with the subject indicates - 'Certainty of a Hearing' - the change of mood is understood only in terms of a movement from lament to praise. This has led to a redefinition of lament in terms of petition and an overemphasis on praise. The present book seeks to redress this one-sided emphasis by drawing attention to the other movements in the Psalter - the reverse movement from praise to lament, return to lament after praise and the alternation between the two. We...

The book offers a syntactic and narrative analysis of the divine charactera (TM)s appearances in the Pentateucha "his speeches and their interpretations, his actions, perceptions, and emotionsa "in order to reveal the stance of the text towards its representations of divinity.

This study deals with the question of happiness in the book of Qoheleth, starting with the contemporary debate among modern writers concerning the status of various encouraging statements that emerge out of a general context in which "all is vanity." The first part of this study describes the current position of research, examining the debated questions. The second part proposes an exegetical and contextual inquiry of the words for happiness, drawn up by these authors. The third part suggests a way of resolving the enigma of happiness, based upon an additional formula of happiness, located at...

Commentators traditionally use a textual-critical methodology in examining Hebrew and Greek manuscripts to establish an 'original' reading, frequently attributing other variants to scribal error. This book proposes a complementary-textual comparative methodology that treats each Hebrew and/or Greek manuscript with equal value, listening to each voice as a possible interpretive trajectory. This methodology is applied to the restoration of Israel in Ezekiel 36-39, initially on a micro level examining each verse for intra-linguistic and trans-linguistic variants, frequently finding exegetical...

This second volume of the commentary on the "Baal Cycle", the most important Canaanite religious text from Ugarit, in Syria, analyzes KTU/CAT 1.3 and 1.4, the tablets that contain the long episode about how Baal secured permission from El to build his royal palace and how the palace was built. It includes a new edition of the tablets, supplemented by a DVD-ROM with 92 images and superimposable drawings, a comprehensive introduction, new translation and vocalized text, and detailed commentary. The authors develop an interpretation of the episode which places it into the larger context of the...

This collection contains essays prepared for the newly established Association for the Study of the Septuagint in South Africa. It includes contributions on the Old Greek text, the reception of the LXX and a number of related themes.

The invasion of Sennacherib in 701 BCE is a classic issue for both biblical scholars and historians alike. Extant Assyrian, Biblical and even Greek texts all refer to Sennacherib and many different theories have been put forward in attempts to understand the relationship between these various accounts. Despite the rise of new literary-rhetorical criticism in biblical studies, studies tackling the problem of Sennacherib's invasion have been dominated by historical-critical work on the issue and have virtually ignored rhetorical methodology. Against this trend, this book employs both...

This work is a comparison of the Septuagint of Amos with its Hebrew Vorlage for the purpose of analyzing the translation technique and theology of the translator.

This book evaluates the methods often used for finding the origin of the Samaritans, assesses well known and new material, and suggests that the decisive event was the construction of the temple on Mount Gerizim in the first part of the fourth century b.c.e.