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189 results in Biblical studies - Old testament, Hebrew bible

Page 1 of 10

2 Peter
  • A. Chadwick Thornhill
  • Coming soon
  • Expected online publication date:
    October 2025
    Print publication:
    31 October 2025
  • This commentary on the second epistle of Peter offers a fresh examination of a key New Testament text. Relying on newly available research, A. Chadwick Thornhill brings a multi-pronged approach to his study through his use of a range of methods including narrative theology, and historical, social, cultural, literary, rhetorical, discourse, and linguistic analysis. Thornhill challenges existing paradigms pertaining to the composition of 2 Peter, asks new questions regarding authorship and genre, and revisits the identification of the text as a pseudonymous testament, as it has most recently been understood. His study enables new insights into the letter's message as it would have been understood in its ancient context. Written in an accessible style, Thornhill's commentary concludes by offering reflections on 2 Peter's contributions to the theology of the New Testament and its relevance for the late modern world.

The Theology of the Book of Leviticus
  • Mark W. Scarlata
  • Published online:
    18 July 2025
    Print publication:
    07 August 2025
  • Leviticus is often considered to be one of the most challenging books of the Bible because of its focus on blood sacrifice, infectious diseases, and complicated dietary restrictions. Moreover, scholarly approaches have focused primarily on divisions in the text without considering its overarching theological message. In this volume, Mark W. Scarlata analyses Leviticus' theology, establishing the connection between God's divine presence and Israel's life. Exploring the symbols and rituals of ancient Israel, he traces how Leviticus develops a theology of holiness in space and time, one that weaves together the homes of the Israelites with the home of God. Seen through this theological lens, Leviticus' text demonstrates how to live in the fullness of God's holy presence and in harmony with one another and the land. Its theological vision also offers insights into how we might live today in a re-sacralized world that cherishes human dignity and cares for creation.

Qoheleth and the Philosophy of Value
  • Jesse M. Peterson
  • Published online:
    25 June 2025
    Print publication:
    10 July 2025
  • The book of Ecclesiastes is the Bible's problem child. Its probing doubts, dark ruminations, self- reflexive dialogues, and unflinching observations have simultaneously puzzled and fascinated readers for over two millennia. Some read the book's message as hopelessly pessimistic, while others regard the text as too contradictory to bear any consistent message at all. In this study, Jesse Peterson offers a coherent portrait of the book and its author-the early Jewish sage known as Qoheleth-by examining both through a philosophical lens. Drawing from relevant contemporary philosophical literature on meaning in life, death, well-being, and enjoyment, Peterson outlines a clear and compelling portrait of Qoheleth and his philosophical assumptions about what is good and bad in the human experience. As Peterson argues, Qoheleth's grievances concerning the pursuit of meaning in life are paired with a genuine affirmation of life's value and the possibility of a joy-filled existence.

Luke's Unique Parables
  • Genesis Narratives and Interpretations of Jesus
  • Calum Carmichael
  • Published online:
    28 February 2025
    Print publication:
    06 March 2025
  • Calum Carmichael presents a new perspective on how parables unique to Luke's Gospel were composed. These parables took up moral issues that arose out of conflicts among figures such as Jacob and Esau, Joseph and his brothers, Judah and Tamar as portrayed in Genesis narratives. Providing literary and linguistic analyses, Carmichael demonstrates how Luke, like many of his contemporaries, absorbed the narrative legacy of the Hebrew Bible and used it to express ideas about Jesus. The Joseph story was of particular interest to Luke because Joseph's role during the Egyptian famine resulted in the rescue of his family, thereby giving the Israelite nation a future. Carmichael's radically different approach identifies the influence of ancestral wrongdoing on how Luke portrayed Jesus' moral teaching.

The Evolution of Jewish Monotheism
  • ‘God is One,’ From Antiquity to Modernity
  • David Michael Grossberg
  • Published online:
    20 February 2025
    Print publication:
    27 February 2025
  • In this book, David Michael Grossberg offers a fresh and illuminating perspective on the three-thousand-year evolution of Jewish monotheism by narrating the history of 'God is one' as a religious slogan from the ancient to the modern world. Although 'God is one' has been called Judaism's primary testimony of faith, its meaning has been obscure and contentious from its earliest emergence. From the Bible's acclamatory 'the Lord is one' to Philo of Alexandria's highest Word just secondary to God; from the Talmud's rejection of 'two powers in heaven' to the philosophers' First Existent who is one beyond unity; from the Kabbalists' tenfold Godhead to Spinoza's one substance, this innovative history demonstrates the remarkable diversity encompassed by this deceptively simple Jewish statement of faith. Grossberg shows how this diversity is unified in a continuous striving for knowledge of God that has been at the heart of Judaism from its earliest beginnings.

The Cambridge Companion to Biblical Narrative
  • Edited by Keith Bodner
  • Published online:
    30 January 2025
    Print publication:
    06 February 2025
  • The Cambridge Companion to Biblical Narrative offers an overview and a concise introduction to an exciting field within literary interpretation of the Hebrew Scriptures and New Testament. Analysis of biblical narrative has enjoyed a resurgence in recent decades, and this volume features essays that explore many of the artistic techniques that readers encounter in an array of texts. Specially commissioned for this volume, the chapters analyze various scenes in Genesis, Exodus and the wilderness wanderings, Israel's experience in the land and royal experiment in Kings and Chronicles, along with short stories like Ruth, Jonah, Esther, and Daniel. New Testament essays examine each of the four gospels, the book of Acts, stories from the letters of Paul, and reading for the plot in the book of Revelation. Designed for use in undergraduate and graduate courses, this Companion will serve as an excellent resource for instructors and students interested in understanding and interpreting biblical narrative.

The Bible's First Kings
  • Uncovering the Story of Saul, David, and Solomon
  • Avraham Faust, Zev I. Farber
  • Published online:
    16 January 2025
    Print publication:
    20 February 2025
  • Saul, David, and Solomon are dominant figures in the Hebrew Bible, rulers of an expanding Israelite polity before it dissolved into two separate kingdoms. Saul's paranoid jealousy, David's killing the Philistine champion Goliath with a slingshot, and Solomon's meeting the Queen of Sheba are familiar stories to many people, but what is the truth behind the texts? While scholars long believed these three monarchs to have been historical personalities, over the past three decades many have questioned the historicity of this United Monarchy, some doubting even the existence of its founding fathers. Building on a vast amount of archaeological evidence, this book robustly argues that the Israelite kingdom of the Bible was a real mini-empire, and that Saul, David, and Solomon were kings of consequence – even if the biblical stories reimagine their lives to glorify and vilify them. Combining fresh archaeological evidence with astute readings of key texts, the authors offer a compelling reconstruction of this fascinating ancient polity which, though it lasted less than a hundred years, has bequeathed a remarkable religious and cultural legacy to the western world. Written in a clear and engaging style, this book will be of interest to scholars and general audiences alike.

Wine, Soil, and Salvation in the Hebrew Bible and New Testament
  • Mark Scarlata
  • Published online:
    09 January 2025
    Print publication:
    23 January 2025
  • Biblical authors used wine as a potent symbol and metaphor of material blessing and salvation, as well as a sign of judgement. In this volume, Mark Scarlata provides a biblical theology of wine through exploration of texts in the Hebrew Bible, later Jewish writings, and the New Testament. He shows how, from the beginnings of creation and the story of Noah, wine is intimately connected to soil, humanity, and harmony between humans and the natural world. In the Prophets, wine functions both as a symbol of blessing and judgement through the metaphor of the cup of salvation and the cup of wrath. In other scriptures, wine is associated with wisdom, joy, love, celebration, and the expectations of the coming Messiah. In the New Testament wine becomes a critical sign for the presence of God's kingdom on earth and a symbol of Christian unity and life through the eucharistic cup. Scarlata's study also explores the connections between the biblical and modern worlds regarding ecology and technology, and why wine remains an important sign of salvation for humanity today.

The Feminized Hero in Second Temple Judaism
  • Lawrence M. Wills
  • Published online:
    09 January 2025
    Print publication:
    23 January 2025
  • The turbulent Second Temple period produced searching biblical texts whose protagonists, unlike heroes like Noah, Abraham, and Moses, were more everyday figures who expressed their moral uncertainties more vocally. Reflecting on a new type of Jewish moral agent, these tales depict men who are feminized, and women who are masculinized.  In this volume, Lawrence M. Wills offers a deep interrogation of these stories, uncovering the psychological aspects of Jewish identity, moral life, and decisions that they explore. Often written as novellas, the stories investigate emotions, psychological interiorizing, the self, agency, and character. Recent insights from gender and postcolonial theory inform Wills' study, as he shows how one can study and compare modern and ancient gender constructs. Wills also reconstructs the social fabric of the Second Temple period and demonstrates how a focus on emotions, the self, and moral psychology, often associated with both ancient Greek and modern literature, are present in biblical texts, albeit in a subtle, unassuming manner.

The Wilderness Narratives in the Hebrew Bible
  • Religion, Politics, and Biblical Interpretation
  • Angela Roskop Erisman
  • Published online:
    12 December 2024
    Print publication:
    19 December 2024
  • In this volume, Angela Erisman offers a new way to think about the Pentateuch/Torah and its relationship to history. She returns to the seventeenth-century origins of modern biblical scholarship and charts a new course – not through Julius Wellhausen and the Documentary Hypothesis, but through Herrman Gunkel. Erisman reimagines his vision of a literary history grounded in communal experience as a history of responses to political threat before, during, and after the demise of Judah in 586 BCE. She explores creative transformations of genre and offers groundbreaking new readings of key episodes in the wilderness narratives. Offering new answers to old questions about the nature of the exodus, the identity of Moses, and his death in the wilderness, Erisman's study draws from literary and historical criticism. Her synthesis of approaches enables us to situate the wilderness narratives historically, and to understand how and why they continue to be meaningful for readers today.

The Cambridge Companion to the Book of Isaiah
  • Edited by Christopher B. Hays
  • Published online:
    08 November 2024
    Print publication:
    21 November 2024
  • Few writings have shaped the world as much as the Book of Isaiah. Its lyricism, imagery, theology, and ethics are all deeply ingrained into us, and into Judeo-Christian culture more generally. It has been a cultural touchstone from the time when it was formed, and it influenced later Biblical authors as well. The Book of Isaiah is also a complex work of literature, dense with poetry, rhetoric, and theology, and richly intertwined with ancient history. For all these reasons, it is a challenge to read well. The Cambridge Companion to Isaiah serves as an up-to-date and reliable guide to this biblical book. Including diverse perspectives from leading scholars all over the world, it approaches Isaiah from a wide range of methodological approaches. It also introduces the worlds in which the book was produced, the way it was formed, and the impacts it has had on contemporary and later audiences in an accessible way.

The Theology of the Books of Ezra and Nehemiah
  • Roger S. Nam
  • Published online:
    31 October 2024
    Print publication:
    21 November 2024
  • In the opening verses of the Book of Ezra-Nehemiah, King Cyrus exhorts the exiled Judeans to return to Jerusalem to restore worship in Jerusalem. It then narrates this restoration through the construction of the temple, the repair of the city walls, and the commitment to the written Torah. In this volume, Roger Nam offers a new and compelling argument regarding the theology of Ezra-Nehemiah:  that the Judeans' return migration, which extended over several generations, had a totalizing effect on the people. Repatriation was not a single event, but rather a multi-generational process that oscillated between assimilation and preservation of culture. Consequently, Ezra-Nehemiah presents a unique theological perspective. Nam explores the book's prominent theological themes, including trauma, power, identity, community, worship, divine presence, justice, hope, and others – all of which take on a nuanced expression in diaspora.  He also shows how and why Ezra-Nehemiah naturally found a rich reception among emerging early Christian and Jewish interpretive communities.

The Old Testament in Medieval Icelandic Texts

The Theology of the Book of Samuel
  • John Goldingay
  • Published online:
    08 May 2024
    Print publication:
    09 May 2024
  • The Old Testament book of Samuel is an intriguing narrative that offers an account of the origin of the monarchy in Israel. It also deals at length with the fascinating stories of Saul and David. In this volume, John Goldingay works through the book, exploring the main theological ideas as they emerge in the narratives about Samuel, Saul, and David, as well as in the stories of characters such as Hannah, Michal, Bathsheba, and Tamar. Goldingay brings out the key ideas about God and God's involvement in the lives of people, and their involvement with him through prayer and worship. He also delves into the mystery and complexity of human persons and their roles in events. Goldingay's study traces how God pursues his purpose for Israel and, ultimately, for the world in these narratives. It shows how this pursuit is interwoven with the realities of family, monarchy, war, love, ambition, loss, failure, and politics.

Isaiah 40–66
  • Katie Heffelfinger
  • Published online:
    04 May 2024
    Print publication:
    09 May 2024
  • The texts in Isaiah 40–66 are widely admired for their poetic brilliance. Situating Isaiah within its historic context, Katie Heffelfinger here explores its literary aspects through a lyrically informed approach that emphasizes key features of the poetry and explains how they create meaning. Her detailed analysis of the text's passages demonstrates how powerful poetic devices, such as paradox, allusion, juxtaposition, as well as word and sound play, are used to great effect via the divine speaking voice, as well as the personified figures of the Servant and Zion. Heffelfinger's commentary includes a glossary of poetic terminology that provides definitions of key terms in non-technical language. It features additional resources, notably, 'Closer Look' sections, which explore important issues in detail; as well as 'Bridging the Horizons' sections that connect Isaiah's poetry to contemporary issues, including migration, fear, and divided society.

The Cambridge Companion to Law in the Hebrew Bible
  • Edited by Bruce Wells
  • Published online:
    11 April 2024
    Print publication:
    18 April 2024
  • This Companion offers a comprehensive overview of the history, nature, and legacy of biblical law.  Examining the debates that swirl around the nature of biblical law, it explores its historical context, the significance of its rules, and its influence on early Judaism and Christianity. The volume also interrogates key questions: Were the rules intended to function as ancient Israel's statutory law? Is there evidence to indicate that they served a different purpose? What is the relationship between this legal material and other parts of the Hebrew Bible? Most importantly, the book provides an in-depth look at the content of the Torah's laws, with individual essays on substantive, procedural, and ritual law. With contributions from an international team of experts, written specially for this volume, The Cambridge Companion to Law in the Hebrew Bible provides an up-to-date look at scholarship on biblical law and outlines themes and topics for future research.

The Theology of the Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah
  • Daniel C. Timmer
  • Published online:
    28 March 2024
    Print publication:
    04 April 2024
  • The books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah address problems in and around ancient Judah in ways that are as incisive and critical as they are optimistic and constructive. Daniel C. Timmer's The Theology of the Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah situates these books in their social and political contexts, examining the unique theology of each as it engages thorny problems in Judah and beyond. In dialogue with recent scholarship, this study focuses on these books' analysis and evaluation of the world as it is, focusing on both human beings and their actions, and God's commitment to purify, restore, and perfect the world. Timmer also surveys these books' later theological use and cultural reception. His study brings their theology into dialogue with concerns as varied as ecology, nationalism, and widespread injustice. It highlights the enduring significance of divine justice and grace for solid hope and effective service in our world.

The Theology of the Book of Proverbs
  • Katharine J. Dell
  • Published online:
    10 January 2024
    Print publication:
    31 August 2023
  • In this volume, Katharine Dell offers a guide to the nature and character of the Book of Proverbs. She explores its key messages and major theological themes, notably God as creator and Wisdom as mediator, standing at the center of a profound theological relationship between God and humanity. Dell provides an overview of scholarly evaluations of these writings, which explore its literary forms, subdivisions, content, purpose, and social contexts. Summarizing important modern debates, she also examines the intertextual and canonical relationship of Proverbs to other biblical books, the afterlife of Proverbs in wisdom material from the Apocrypha, Qumran, and the New Testament, and the place of Proverbs in the history of interpretation. Her book will help readers to understand the nature and character of the book of Proverbs. It also enables them to assess its key messages and to see its wider context within the canon of scripture and its relevance within the history of interpretation.

Stories of Origins in the Bible and Ancient Mediterranean Literature
  • Guy Darshan
  • Published online:
    23 December 2023
    Print publication:
    07 December 2023
  • In this book, Guy Darshan explores stories of origins that lie at the heart of Pentateuchal sources in the context of literature created in neighboring societies of the ancient Mediterranean world. A comparative study, his volume analyses the parallels between Biblical origin stories – the narrative traditions arranged in geneaological sequence that recount the beginnings of humanity and origins of peoples -- in tandem with ancient Greek genealogical writings from the 7–5th centuries BCE onwards. He also considers Phoenician and Anatolian sources from the first millennium, several of which have only been published in recent years. This is the first scholarly study to trace the origins of this genre of narrative and the circumstances that led to appearances in the Hebrew Bible and ancient Mediterranean literature. It sheds new light on our knowledge of the history of literature, as well as the interconnections and interrelations between civilizations of the pre-Hellenistic eastern Mediterranean and Near East.

The Pastoral Epistles
  • Scot McKnight
  • Published online:
    21 December 2023
    Print publication:
    09 November 2023
  • In the church tradition three letters, now known as the Pastoral Epistles, are attributed to the apostle Paul. They are unlike any other letters by Paul. They are written to two of his closest companions, Timothy and Titus, and they instruct those two leaders how to lead gathered Christians in Ephesus and in Crete. The letters contain plenty of instruction for how church leaders at that time, and in those places, were to function. In this commentary, Scot McKnight seeks to explain the major themes of the Pastoral Epistles - church order, false teaching, and failing Christians - and their foundational vision for how Christians could make a good impression in public life. These three brief letters express a view of how Christians were to live in the Roman empire in a way that does not offend public sensibilities. They prescribe a way of public behavior best translated as 'civilized religion.'

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