Does "authorship" still have a place in the study of the Hebrew Bible? Historical criticism has long sought to uncover the human authors behind the biblical texts. But how might the "death of the author," so forcefully declared by Roland Barthes over fifty years ago, change the contours of this search? This volume brings together leading experts in the Hebrew Bible, the Dead Sea Scrolls, cuneiform texts and cognate literature to reimagine the literary and discursive functions of "authorship" in ancient Israel. Bridging the gap between theoretical reflection and exegetical practice, the volume...

Human leadership is a multifaceted topic in the Hebrew Bible from a synchronic as well as diachronic perspective. A large range of distributions emerges from the successive sharpening or modification of different aspects of leadership. While some of them are combined to a complex figuration of leadership, others remain reserved for certain individuals. Furthermore, it can be considered a consensus within scholarly debate, that concepts of leadership have a certain connection to the history of ancient Israel which is, though, hard to ascertain. Following a previous volume that focused on the...