Download or read book The Emergence of Israel in Ancient Palestine written by Emanuel Pfoh and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-01 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Taking advantage of critical methodology for history-writing and the use of anthropological insights and ethnographic data from the modern Middle East, this study aims at providing new understandings on the emergence of Israel in ancient Palestine and the socio-political dynamics at work in the Levant during antiquity. The book begins with a discussion of matters of historiography and history-writing, both in ancient and modern times, and an evaluation on the incidence of the modern theological discourse in relation to history and history-writing. Chapter 2 evaluates the methodology used by biblical scholars for gaining knowledge on ancient Israelite society. Pfoh argues that such attempts often apply socio-scientific models on biblical narratives without external evidence of the reconstructed past, producing a virtual past reality which cannot be confirmed concretely. Chapter 3 deals with the archaeological remains usually held as clear evidence of Israelite statehood in the tenth century BCE. The main criticism is directed towards archaeological interpretations of the data which are led by the biblical narratives of the books of Judges and Samuel, resulting in a harmonic blend of ancient literature and modern anthropological models on state-formation. Chapter 4 continues with the discussion on how anthropological models should be employed for history-writing. Socio-political concepts, such as chiefdom society or state formation should not be imposed on the contents of ancient literary sources (i.e., the Bible) but used instead to analyse our primary sources (the archaeological and epigraphic records), in order to create a socio-historical account. The final chapter attempts to provide an historical explanation regarding the emergence of Israel in ancient Palestine without relying on the Bible but only on archaeology, epigraphy and anthropological insights. This Israel is not the biblical one. This is the Israel from history, the one that the modern historian aims at recovering from the study of ancient epigraphic and archaeological remains. The arguments presented challenge the idea that the biblical writers were recording historical events as we understand this practice nowadays and that we can use the biblical records for creating critical histories of Israel in ancient Palestine. It also questions the existence of undisputable traces of statehood in the archaeological record from the Iron Age, as the biblical images about a United Monarchy might lead us to believe. Thus, drawing on ethnographic insights, we may gain a better knowledge on how ancient Levantine societies functioned, providing us with a context for understanding the emergence of historical Israel as a major highland patronate, with a socio-political life of almost two centuries. It is during the later periods of ancient Palestines history, the Persian and the Graeco-Roman, that we find the proper context into which biblical Israel is created, beginning a literary life of more than two millennia.

Download or read book A History of Israelite Religion in the Old Testament Period Volume I written by Rainer Albertz and published by Westminster John Knox Press. This book was released on 1994-05-01 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book, the first of two volumes, offers a comprehensive history of Israelite religion. It is a part of the Old Testament Library series. The Old Testament Library provides fresh and authoritative treatments of important aspects of Old Testament study through commentaries and general surveys. The contributors are scholars of international standing.

Download or read book The Early Monarchy in Israel written by Walter Dietrich and published by Society of Biblical Lit. This book was released on 2007 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Hebrew narrative art achieves its highest level in the stories of Saul, David, and Solomon. But beyond that, the description of these all-too-human characters and the dramatic events of the birth of the Israelite state depicts a change of eras that became determinative for half a millennium of Israelite history. In this volume Dietrich introduces readers to the stories of the early Israelite state from a variety of perspectives: literary-critical, historical, and theological. After tracing how biblical and extrabiblical texts describe the period, Dietrich skillfully untangles the knotty questions related to the history of the period and perceptively examines the development of this literary corpus as well as the other biblical material that came to be associated with it. In a concluding chapter Dietrich revisits the stories of Saul, David, and Solomon to explore what they teach about theological issues of enduring significance, what they teach about God, humanity, the state, the use of force, and the relationship between women and men.

Download or read book 1 and 2 Kings written by John M. Monson and published by Zondervan Academic. This book was released on 2016-01-12 with total page 892 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many today find the Old Testament a closed book. The cultural issues seem insurmountable and we are easily baffled by that which seems obscure. Furthermore, without knowledge of the ancient culture we can easily impose our own culture on the text, potentially distorting it. This series invites you to enter the Old Testament with a company of guides, experts that will give new insights into these cherished writings. Features include • Over 2000 photographs, drawings, maps, diagrams and charts provide a visual feast that breathes fresh life into the text. • Passage-by-passage commentary presents archaeological findings, historical explanations, geographic insights, notes on manners and customs, and more. • Analysis into the literature of the ancient Near East will open your eyes to new depths of understanding both familiar and unfamiliar passages. • Written by an international team of 30 specialists, all top scholars in background studies.

Download or read book Ancient Israel What Do We Know and How Do We Know It written by Lester L. Grabbe and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2017-02-23 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Ancient Israel Lester L. Grabbe sets out to summarize what we know through a survey of sources and how we know it by a discussion of methodology and by evaluating the evidence. The most basic question about the history of ancient Israel, how do we know what we know, leads to the fundamental questions of Grabbe's work: what are the sources for the history of Israel and how do we evaluate them? How do we make them 'speak' to us through the fog of centuries? Grabbe focuses on original sources, including inscriptions, papyri, and archaeology. He examines the problems involved in historical methodology and deals with the major issues surrounding the use of the biblical text when writing a history of this period. Ancient Israel provides an enlightening overview and critique of current scholarly debate. It can therefore serve as a 'handbook' or reference-point for those wanting a catalogue of original sources, scholarship, and secondary studies. Grabbe's clarity of style makes this book eminently accessible not only to students of biblical studies and ancient history but also to the interested lay reader. For this new edition the entire text has been reworked to take account of new archaeological discoveries and theories. There is a major expansion to include a comprehensive coverage of David and Solomon and more detailed information on specific kings of Israel throughout. Grabbe has also added material on the historicity of the Exodus, and provided a thorough update of the material on the later bronze age.

Download or read book Revealing the History of Ancient Palestine written by Keith W. Whitelam and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-07-06 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume is part of the Changing Perspectives sub-series, which is constituted by anthologies of articles by world-renowned biblical scholars and historians that have made an impact on the field and changed its course during the last decades. This volume offers a collection of seminal essays by Keith Whitelam on the early history of ancient Palestine and the origins and emergence of Israel. Collected together in one volume for the first time, and featuring one unpublished article, this volume will be of interest to biblical and ancient Near Eastern scholars interested in the politics of historical representation but also on critical ways of constructing the history of ancient Palestine.

Download or read book Palace and Temple written by Clifford Mark McCormick and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2012-10-24 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is a critical study of the role played by architecture and texts in promoting political and religious ideologies in the ancient world. It explains a palace as an element in royal propaganda seeking to influence social concepts about kingship, and a text about a temple as influencing social concepts about the relationship between God and human beings. Applying the methods of analysis developed in built environment studies, the author interprets the palace and temple building programs of Sennacherib, King of Assyria, and Solomon, King of Israel. The physical evidence for the palace and the verbal evidence for the temple are explained as presenting communicative icons intended to influence contemporary political and religious concepts. The volume concludes with innovative interpretations of the contributions of architectural and verbal icons to religious and political reform.

Download or read book David Solomon and Egypt written by Paul S. Ash and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 1999-11-01 with total page 159 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ash re-examines the question of the relationship between Egypt and Palestine during the time of David and Solomon. By analysing all the available evidence-epigraphical sources from Egypt, archaeological data from Palestine and the pertinent biblical texts-he concludes that relations and contacts between Egypt and the peoples inhabiting ancient Palestine at the time of David and Solomon were minimal. Any reconstructions of the history of relations and contacts between Egypt and Palestine, including ancient Israel, must take this study into consideration.

Download or read book Neo Assyrian Historical Inscriptions and Syria Palestine written by Jeffrey Kah-Jin Kuan and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2016-02-19 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dissertation investigates the political and commercial relations among Israel/Judea, Aram-Damascus, and Tyre/Sidon in the ninth and eighth centuries BCE. The work focuses primarily on Assyrian historical inscriptions from the period, while non-Assyrian sources, including biblical material, is treated where it supplements the Assyrian sources.

Download or read book The Archaeology of Israel written by Neil Asher Silberman and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 1997-03-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This challenging volume offers a timely and extensive overview of the current state of archaeology in Israel. Contributed by leading scholars, the essays focus on current problems and cutting-edge issues, ranging from reviews of ongoing excavations to new analytical approaches. Of interest not only to archaeologists, but to social historians as well, the topics include archaeology and social history, archaeology and ethnicity, as well as the overarching issue of how texts and archaeological knowledge are to be combined in the reconstruction of ancient Israel.

Download or read book Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament written by G. Johannes Botterweck and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 1974 with total page 822 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This multivolume work is still proving to be as fundamental to Old Testament studies as its companion set, the Kittel-Friedrich Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, has been to New Testament studies. Beginning with father, and continuing through the alphabet, the TDOT volumes present in-depth discussions of the key Hebrew and Aramaic words in the Old Testament. Leading scholars of various religious traditions (including Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Reformed, Anglican, Greek Orthodox, and Jewish) and from many parts of the world (Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Israel, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States) have been carefully selected for each article by editors Botterweck, Ringgren, and Fabry and their consultants, George W. Anderson, Henri Cazelles, David Noel Freedman, Shemaryahu Talmon, and Gerhard Wallis. The intention of the writers is to concentrate on meaning, starting from the more general, everyday senses and building to an understanding of theologically significant concepts. To avoid artificially restricting the focus of the articles, TDOT considers under each keyword the larger groups of words that are related linguistically or semantically. The lexical work includes detailed surveys of a word s occurrences, not only in biblical material but also in other ancient Near Eastern writings. Sumerian, Akkadian, Egyptian, Ethiopic, Ugaritic, and Northwest Semitic sources are surveyed, among others, as well as the Qumran texts and the Septuagint; and in cultures where no cognate word exists, the authors often consider cognate ideas. TDOT s emphasis, though, is on Hebrew terminology and on biblical usage. The contributors employ philology as well as form-critical and traditio-historical methods, with the aim of understanding the religious statements in the Old Testament. Extensive bibliographical information adds to the value of this reference work. This English edition attempts to serve the needs of Old Testament students without the linguistic background of more advanced scholars; it does so, however, without sacrificing the needs of the latter. Ancient scripts (Hebrew, Greek, etc.) are regularly transliterated in a readable way, and meanings of foreign words are given in many cases where the meanings might be obvious to advanced scholars. Where the Hebrew text versification differs from that of English Bibles, the English verse appears in parentheses. Such features will help all earnest students of the Bible to avail themselves of the manifold theological insights contained in this monumental work.

Download or read book 2 Samuel written by Craig E. Morrison and published by Liturgical Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: King David ranks among the most intriguing persons in the Hebrew Bible. The Second Book of Samuel tells the story of David's kingship-his public successes and his private foibles. The narrator's rehearsal of this story, as questioning as it is vivid, glimpses the secrets of David's heart. In this commentary, Craig E. Morrison focuses on the aesthetics of the "art of the telling": how does the narrator succeed in breathing life into his portrait of David? How does he draw the reader into his story? This commentary is intended to accompany the reader's encounter with this ancient masterpiece so that one might cheer with David as he dances before the ark of God and weep with him as he grieves the death of his rebel son Absalom. Morrison's careful reading of 2 Samuel brings the reader face-to-face with David, whose multifaceted character eludes facile labels.

Download or read book Solomon written by Walter Brueggemann and published by Augsburg Fortress Publishers. This book was released on 2024-07-16 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through Solomon and his place in the larger consciousness of Israel, Walter Brueggemann considers what narratives reveal about the ideals of the ancient Israelite people. Paying attention to nuances of the biblical text, he exposes the competing voices that claim to offer a reliable rendering of Solomon and invites critique of accepted beliefs.

Download or read book One and Two Kings written by Volkmar Fritz and published by Fortress Press. This book was released on 2003 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume provides a readable introduction to the narrative books of 1 and 2 Kings appropriate for the student, pastor, and scholar. Fritz combines historical, literary, and archaeological approaches in an engaging synthesis. While he addresses issues of the deuteronomic redaction, the author does not become bogged down in technical discussions or allow this to overshadow the holistic interpretation of the text.

Download or read book Ebla written by Paolo Matthiae and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-09-21 with total page 730 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Ebla , Paolo Matthiae presents the results of 47 years of excavations at this fascinating site, providing a detailed account of Ebla’s history and archaeology. Ebla grew from a small Early Bronze Age settlement into an important trading and political centre, which endured until its final destruction in c. 1600 BC . The destruction of its royal palace c. 2300 BC was particularly significant as it preserved the city’s rich archives, offering a wealth of information on its history, economy, religion, administration, and daily life. The discovery of Ebla is a pivotal moment in the history of archaeological investigations of the twentieth century, and this book is the result of all the excavation campaigns at Tell Mardikh- Ebla from 1964 until 2010, when field operations stopped due to the war in Syria. Available for the first time in English, Ebla offers a complete account of one of the largest pre-classical urban centres by its discoverer, making it an essential resource for students of Ancient Near Eastern archaeology and history.

Download or read book The Age of Solomon written by Lowell K Handy and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2023-08-14 with total page 560 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The figure of King Solomon is central to our understanding of the history of Israel and Judah. This volume of collected articles brings the reader up-to-date with the latest scholarship in the field. The work consists of twenty-four chapters and provides important studies in the historical approach to Solomon and to 10th century B.C.E. Judah and Israel with archaeological surveys of the neighboring regions, sociological surveys, and literary readings of the biblical texts. With suggestions for further research and indexes.

Download or read book The Origin of Israelite Zion Theology written by Antti Laato and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2018-08-23 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this examination of Zion theology and how it arises in the book of Psalms Antti Laato's starting-point is that the Hebrew Bible is the product of the exilic and postexilic times, which nonetheless contains older traditions that have played a significant role in the development of the text. Laato seeks out these older mythical traditions related to Zion using a comparative methodology and looking at Biblical traditions alongside Ugaritic texts and other ancient Near Eastern material. As such Laato provides a historical background for Zion theology which he can apply more broadly to the Psalms. In addition, Laato argues that Zion-related theology in the Psalms is closely related to two events recounted in the Hebrew Bible. First, the architectural details of the Temple of Solomon (1 Kings 6-7), which can be compared with older mythical Zion-related traditions. Second, the religious traditions related to the reigns of David and Solomon such as the Ark Narrative, which ends with David's transfer of the Ark to Jerusalem (2 Sam 6). From this Laato builds an argument for a possible setting in Jerusalem at the time of David and Solomon for the Zion theology that emerges in the Psalms.