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Critically tests Mowinckel''s hypothesis about the ''enthronement festival of Yahweh'' and asks whether this theory finds any support in the epic literature of Ugarit. Petersen tests Sigmund Mowinckel''s classical hypothesis about the enthronement festival of Yahweh and especially whether this theory, as urged by the followers of Mowinckel, finds any support in the epic literature of Ugarit. A careful study of the two corpora of texts, the Old Testament Psalms and the Ugaritic Baal-cycle, together with a discussion of the methodology of the cultic interpretation, shows the weaknesses of the hypothesis. In the history of scholarship, the idea of an enthronement festival of Marduk has been arbitrarily transferred from Babylon to Jerusalem and hence to Ugarit with little basis in the relevant texts. In fact, the method of ''cultic interpretation'' is to be rejected, since its circularity of argumentation determines the result of the analysis beforehand.

The fifteen articles in this volume, arising from work in the Chronicles-Ezra-Nehemiah Section of the Society of Biblical Literature, engage with the author''s thought and message through analysis of certain critical texts or by identifying and tracing larger themes through the work. The collection follows The Chronicler as Historian and The Chronicler as Author. Like these previous volumes, this book also endeavours to show the diverse approaches employed in Chronicles scholarship. Contributors: Robert H. Smith, Allen W. Mueller, Gary N. Knoppers, Gerrie F. Snyman, Ehud Ben Zvi, Philip Abadie, Mark A. Throntveit, Leslie C. Allen, Christopher T. Begg, Roddy L. Braun, John C. Endres, Isaac Kalimi, Brian E. Kelly, William M. Schniedewind and John W. Wright.

According to Fields, biblical narrative is didactic socio-religious commentary on human experience, reflected in ''history'', and that such ''history'' is a way of describing the conceptual universe of the ancient authors. Biblical narrative is strikingly free of abstract formulations but encapsulates abstract reflections, within recurring literary motifs, and by the reporting of ''historical information''. This perception of biblical narrative is strikingly illustrated by an analysis of the story of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19). The motifs of the Sodom tradition are compared with those in the stories about the concubine in Gibeah (Judges 19) and about the destruction of Jericho (Joshua 2).

This volume draws together essays by fourteen international scholars in the field of Aramaic and Syriac studies. It is published to pay fitting honour to Professor Martin McNamara, who has contributed so much to Targumic studies for almost forty years. The contributions in this collection reflect his interests in the study of the Targums, the development of the Aramaic language and early Jewish and Christian literature. Many of the contributors to this volume have worked with Professor McNamara in preparing volumes for the Aramaic Bible series, to which he has devoted so much time and energy.

Often working under severely restricted academic and social conditions, the Latvian scholar Joel Weinberg has made a unique and important contribution to biblical studies. Influenced by Soviet work in ancient Near Eastern history, Weinberg''s distinctive approach is in dialogue with scholarship in both Eastern and Western European traditions. This translation brings together seven essays originally published in Russian, then translated and expanded by Weinberg into German. The essays form the basis of what was originally Weinberg''s dissertation. Publication of these essays in English will not only allow students and scholars easier access to Weinberg''s thought, but will allow scholars to evaluate the studies together, and thus facilitate the current dialogue on the Babylonian exile, and the postexilic period.

To mark the retirement of John F. A. Sawyer, Professor of Religious Studies in the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, colleagues and former students from around the world have contributed studies on his areas of interest: the study of Hebrew, the books of the Jewish Bible, and the culture and traditions of Judaism. The essayists consider not simply the origin of the meaning of word and text, but also the many and strange ways in which word and text become transposed, re-oriented and often enough traduced by later interests and purposes. The roll call of scholars reads: Philip Alexander, Francis Andersen, Graeme Auld, Calvin Carmichael, Robert Carroll, David Clines, Richard Coggins, Jon Davies, Philip Davies, James Dunn, John Elwolde, John Gibson, Graham Harvey, Peter Hayman, Dermot Killingley, Jonathan Magonet, Robert Morgan, Takamitsu Muraoka, Christopher Rowland, Deborah Sawyer, Clyde Curry Smith, Max Sussman, William Telford, Marc Vervenne, Wilfred Watson, Keith Whitelam and Isabel Wollaston.

The themes of this volume encompass the lifelong interests of one of the most eminent and learned Jewish scholars of our time: Qumran, Hellenism, Rabbinics and chronography. The contributors, leading scholars in these fields, have produced what is a benchmark of modern scholarship of Judaism in the Graeco-Roman period.

An illuminating examination of the emergence of deuteronomic theology in pre-exilic Judah. Judaean deuteronomism grew as a response to the social unrest of the Assyrian period, channelling popular discontent away from the Davidic monarchy and towards foreign imperialism. The author brings together different strands of current scholarship, studying the economy of monarchical Judah and Israel, and examining the commanding social role of the Davidic monarchy. Lowery also discusses Ahaz and the economic and religious impact of Assyrian imperialism, and concludes with a discussion of the Manasseh narrative in Kings as a systematic rejection of the pre-deuteronomic First Temple status quo.

In the last two decades, there has been a resurgence of interest in the value of the Old Testament for modern ethical questions. John Rogerson is a scholar who has dedicated much of his academic life to probing the possibility of the abiding significance of the Old Testament for moral issues today. This volume brings together for the first time many of his contributions-both published and unpublished-to Old Testament social ethics. This volume can serve both as a general reference work as well as a textbook for classes in Old Testament ethics at seminaries and theological colleges.

The first chapter of this unusual and instructive work shows how the study of sound patterns in Old Testament Hebrew poetry is integral to the investigation of bublical poetry. Then several chapters describe and systematize the sound patterns, beginning with simpler examples of assonance and alliteration. The analysis gradually moves on to more complex configurations which link words and phrases, emphasize key words, mark off syntactical and semantic units, and highlight word repetition and word play. A relationship between sound pattern and meaning in each proverb is shown throughout.

An intriguing and subtle study of five Genesis dreams: Abimelech''s (20.1-18), Jacob''s (28.10-22; 31.10-13), Laban''s (31.24) and Abraham''s (15.1-21). Like many of their ancient Near Eastern counterparts, all occur at times of uncertainty, concern status, and emphasize divine involvement in human affairs. At a deeper level, they also address doubts arising from God''s promise of land, descendants and a unique role for Israel among the nations. Their particular treatment of relations between Israelites and non-Israelites and of Israel''s absence from the land points to the Babylonian Exile as the background against which the patriarchal dream texts achieved their present form. Revisions of the Night shows how dreams combine the highly personal with the ardently political in an inspired response to national crisis.

A vigorous imagination is the principal source for many of the abnormalities of fictional characters. Many of the motifs also bear some relation to the rituals and religious symbols embraced by the people among whom they are or were at one time, current. Another important source can be found in symbolism of a religious or social kind. This motif-index is the first to present and analyse this material in biblical narrative and post-biblical literature down to the twelfth century CE; it lists all possible abnormalities, deformities and disabilities, arranged according to the parts of the body affected and the type of deformity, sums up the narrative and gives the explicit or implicit reason for its appearance.

The volume contains the contributions to a symposium in which specialists in different fields worked together in the attempt to throw by their cooperation more light on the conditions - theological convictions and worldview, political climate, influence of state officials, educational institutions and churches - which were influential in the development of biblical studies in the second half of the 19th century. The discussion originated with a special problem: the thesis of William Farmer, one of the co-editors of the volume, that the appointment of Heinrich Julius Holtzmann, who defended the priority of the gospel of Mark as the oldest synoptic gospel, to the New Testament professorship in Strasbourg in 1872 was the result of a direct intervention of the emperial chancellor Bismarck in the context of the kulturkampf, who wished thereby to weaken the Roman Catholic position defending the supremacy of the chair of St Peter by the authority of the gospel of St Matthew (Mt 16,18). The question belongs in the broader context of the presuppositions of Bible exegesis in the second half of the 19th century. As both editors agreed that the matter is not yet finally settled, it seemed to be essential for coming to deeper insights into the conditions under which biblical exegesis was enacted in the 19th century to broaden the scenery and to include other aspects that might throw more light on a period widely unknown to many scholars belonging to the present generation. Therefore specialists of different fields joined a symposium in order to elucidate from their respective viewpoints and interests basic themes and methods of biblical exegesis, scientific theology and the relations between state and university in the 19th centruy, especially during the period of the second Reich. But the themes were not restricted to this special area. They included also a wider outlook into the first half of the century and across the borders of Germany into other European countries. So the volume contains a collection of essays which have in common that all of them contribute to a better knowledge of the inner and outer conditions which formed climate and results of Biblical interpretation in the period.

This is the first comprehensive study of Herder''s preoccupation with the Song of Songs, Baildam considers the importance of this poetry in his thinking, and examines his commentaries and translations of 1776 and 1778. Despite Herder''s claims to the contrary, his own cultural position is revealed in his translations, and in his unique interpretation of the work as the voice of pure, paradisal love. Starting with Herder''s interest in the Song of Songs between 1765 and 1778, this book sets his reflections in the wider context of his relativistic views on the nature of poetry, contemporary German culture, and the importance of primitive poetry in general and the poetry of the Bible in particular. Then Baildam looks at current literary critical theories with implications for Herder''s translations of these ''Lieder der Liebe'', and discusses Herder''s theories of language and translation in comparison with German translation theories. Herder''s reading of the Song as the most primitive, natural and sublime example of Hebrew poetry is placed in the context of earlier and contemporary interpretations, his opinion of which is examined. In the last part of the book, there is an appraisal first of Herder''s commentaries themselves, analysing how the details reflect his overall concept of the work, and then of his translations, comparing them with each other, with the Lutheran text to which Herder ultimately directed his readership, and with the Hebrew text. A concluding chapter reviews the reception of Herder''s work, and three appendices offer a parallel presentation of Herder''s translations of 1776 and 1778, Luther''s translation of 1545, and Goethe''s translation of 1775.

The main methodological thesis of this study is that the book of Job, more than any other book in the Bible, should be treated as an artistic work in which form and content cannot be separated. Hence, a good acquaintance with the literary aspects of the book, including its relations with other ancient Near Eastern texts, is a precondition to the understanding of its theology. The deep structure of the book is that of a catalogue-which is a key to understanding its approach to the problem of theodicy. The difficult language of Job is scrutinized, and is proved to be an original and immanent characteristic of the book. A synthesis of the literary, linguistic and theological characteristics of Job leads to its paradoxical-not absurd-definition as ''a blemished perfection''.

This ''close reading'' of Exodus 19-40 focuses on the repetition of the ''encounter on the mountain''. This double encounter is expressed in a narrative structure of preparatory episodes climaxed by the theophany. The tension of the narrative is linked to ''the people'' as the unlikely heroes of encounter and solved by the divine descent from the divine mountain to the man-made tent. The new situation of permanent encounter is foregrounded by the juxtaposed stories of pre- and post- Sinai journey, and the theme of the ''substitution of Moses'' underlines a radical reinterpretation of traditional concepts, inviting the reader to embark on a process of identification.

Glazov demonstrates that the interlinked themes of bridling the tongue and opening the mouth, well-known components of wisdom teaching, are also crucial to understanding much in the prophets, as well as later Jewish and Christian writings, especially liturgical texts. His comprehensive survey and analysis of the theme contribute to both a literary and a historical perspective on the prophetic literature of the Bible.

This monograph explores the structure and rhetoric of the book of Isaiah. Its thesis is twofold. First, the book of Isaiah best manifests its structural unity, thematic choherence and rhetorical emphasis when read as an exemplar of prophetic covenant disputation. Second, the principal arrangement of the book comprises seven asymmetrical concentric sections, each made up of complex (triadic and quadratic) framing patterns. They are: an exordium (1.1, 2-5), two threats of judgment (2.6-21; 3.1-4.1), two programmes for the punishment and restoration of Zion and the nations (4.2-11.16; 13.1-39.8), an exoneration of Yahweh (40.1-54.17), and an appeal for covenant reconciliation (55.1-66.24).

This two-part commentary argues that Chronicles, placed as it is among the ''historical books'' in the traditional Old Testament of the Christian church, is much misunderstood. Restored to its proper position as the final book in the canon as arranged in the order of the Hebrew Bible, it is rather to be understood as a work of theology essentially directed towards the future. The Chronicler begins his work with the problem facing the whole human race in Adam-the forfeiture of the ideal of perfect oneness with God''s purpose. He explores the possibility of the restoration of that ideal through Israel''s place at the centre of the world of the nations. This portrayal reaches its climax in an idealized presentation of the reign of Solomon, in which all the rulers of the earth, including most famously the Queen of Sheba, bring their tribute in acknowledgment of Israel''s status (Volume 1). As subsequent history only too clearly shows, however, the Chronicler argues (Volume 2), that Israel itself, through unfaithfulness to Torah, has forfeited its right to possession of its land and is cast adrift among these same nations of the world. But the Chronicler''s message is one of hope. By a radical transformation of the chronology of Israel''s past into theological terms, the generation whom the Chronicler addresses becomes the fiftieth since Adam. It is the generation to whom the jubilee of return to the land through a perfectly enabled obedience to Torah, and thus the restoration of the primal ideal of the human race, is announced.

Assesses the multivocal quality of 2 Samuel 14 as a result of the many historical and social processes that formed the Hebrew Bible as a whole.

This study examines the significance of implied law in the Abraham narrative. It analyzes legal and juridical terminology in the text and provides a close reading of legal referents found in Genesis 18.16-20.18.

This collection of essays focuses on the book of Job, exploring the complex interplay of methodology and hermeneutics. There are two major parts: approaches that are primarily historical, recovering what the text "meant"; and those that are contextual, taking seriously the context of reading.

The papers here deal with the history, chronology, geography, archaeology and epigraphy of ancient Israel and its setting in the Levant, and range from broad methodological discussions of historiography to focused analyses of individual texts or historical issues.