Bøger i The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies serien

John Day investigates disputed points of interpretation within Genesis 1-11, expanding on his earlier book From Creation to Babel with 11 stimulating essays. Day considers the texts within their Near Eastern contexts, and pays particular attention to the later history of interpretation and reception history.Topics covered include the meaning of the Bible's first verse and what immediately follows, as well as what it means that humanity is made in the image of God. Further chapters examine the Garden of Eden, the background and role of the serpent and the ambiguous role of Wisdom; the many problems of interpretation in the Cain and Abel story, as well as what gave rise to this story; how the Covenant with Noah and the Noachic commandments, though originally separate, became conflated in some later Jewish thought; and the location of 'Ur of the Chaldaeans', Abraham's alleged place of origin, and how this was later misinterpreted by Jewish, Christian and Islamic sources as referring to a 'fiery furnace of the Chaldaeans'. These chapters, which illuminate the meaning, background and subsequent interpretation of the Book of Genesis, pave the way for Day's forthcoming ICC commentary on Genesis 1-11.

Hospitality in the Hebrew Bible is an investigation of the key hospitality texts and narratives in the Hebrew Bible, such as Abraham's visitors in Mamre in Genesis 18, Lot's visitors in Sodom in Genesis 19, and the partly parallel story of the traveling Levite and his pilegesh in Judges 19. She also includes hospitality scenes with female protagonists, such as Jael in Judges 4, Rahab in Joshua 2, and Lady Wisdom and Lady Folly in Proverbs 9. Gudme applies a historical anthropological approach to these texts as she analyses hospitality in light of classical anthropological themes such as reciprocity, commensality, honor and shame, and patronage structures. The anthropological analysis is supplemented by an intersectional perspective that considers hospitality alongside socio-cultural aspects such as configurations of masculinity, gender roles, and household hierarchies. Gudme offers a critical and systematic overview of hospitality in the Hebrew bible, including the 'dark sides' of hospitality such as deceit, rape, violence, and murder. Her analysis reveals a complex web of socio-cultural values, in which hospitality is sometimes presented as an ultimate and universal value, sometimes merely as nice-to-have and secondary to other socio-cultural concerns. In all instances, however, hospitality is a recognizable type-scene and as such an ideal backdrop for telling tales, both exemplary and horrific, and an ideal literary tool to characterize both people and deities.

The nature of historical and archaeological research is such that biblical and archaeological evidence should both be taken into account so that we can attain a more reliable reconstruction of ancient Israel. This is a study on how to relate written evidence with non-inscriptional archaeological evidence, with reference to pre-exilic Israel.

Presents an investigation into the lexical meanings of Hebrew terms for the human life cycle in the Old Testament. This book studies the terms from the perspective of a specific semantic domain (age) and not in isolation from each other. In addition, it applies other modern linguistic approaches, including syntagmatic and paradigmatic analysis.