The books of the Hebrew Bible were created by anonymous writers during the first millennium before the Common Era (BCE). Their messages and concerns are the central theme of the book. The writings that make up the Hebrew Bible are expressions of their great creativity, their interpretation of life in their own time and their perception of its meaning. It is easy for readers to get lost in the minutiae of biblical criticism, which has concerned itself for so long with historical reconstruction. This book will encourage them to listen carefully to what the biblical writers are saying to allow the message of the Hebrew Bible to emerge once again.
In a sense, too, the intrinsic value of the Hebrew Bible is now re-emerging, after centuries of Christian interpretation, and its importance - as a literature from which three major religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have developed - is beginning to be understood.
This book is not another history of Israel, nor an introduction to the books of the Hebrew Bible. It is an exploration, an invitation to the reader to set off on an expedition of discovery. It may perplex readers that scholars disagree, often fundamentally, on virtually every issue: Creating the Old Testament raises and discusses issues, so that the reader can observe how hypotheses are formed and how the apparently 'assured results' of scholarship are constantly tested. In following this path, readers are encouraged to develop their skill in evaluating historical data, recognizing textual problems, interpreting symbolic language and understanding the deep concerns of biblical writers. They will investigate different and varied exegetical traditions. They will be stirred to reflect on what the biblical books have to say for life today, whether viewed from a Jewish, Christian, Muslim or secular perspective.

An exploration in the Baha'i Writings of the dual nature of human relationships. (World Religions)

In this original study, noted scholar and theologian David Hartman discusses the relation between Maimonides' halakhic writings and The Guide of the Perplexed--a connection much closer than is generally supposed. Maimonides: Torah and Philosophic Quest demonstrates that Maimonides' total philosophic endeavor was an attempt to show how the free search for truth, established through the study of logic, physics, and metaphysics, can live harmoniously with a way of life defined by the normative traditions of Judaism.

Milton's Earthly Paradise was first published in 1972. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions.This study provides a history of the changing interpretations of the first earthly paradise--the garden of Eden--in Western thought and relates Paradise Lost and other literary works to this paradise tradition. The author traces the beginnings of the tradition as they appear in the Bible and in classical literature and shows how these two strains were joined in early Christian and medieval literature. His emphasis, however, is on the relation of Paradise Lost to Renaissance commentary and to other literary works of the period dealing with the paradise story.Professor Duncan views Paradise Lost as one of many Renaissance works that reveal an untiring effort to understand and explain the first chapters of Genesis. In the rational and humanistic commentary of the Renaissance, he explains, the aim was to provide an interpretation of the literal sense of the Scriptural account that was credible, detailed, and historically valid. He finds that the cumulative influence of the commentary is reflected in Milton's attention to the location of paradise, the emphasis on the natural and the rational in his description of paradise, and in the importance of the typological relationship between the terrestrial and celestial paradises. This illuminating discussion makes it clear that Milton's re-creation of paradise is not only superb poetry but also a penetrating account of the origins of man, involving highly complex and controversial issues.

Moral injury is a profound violation of a human being's core moral identity through experiences of violence or trauma. This is the first book in which scholars from different faith and academic backgrounds consider the concept of moral injury not merely from a pastoral or philosophical point of view but through critical engagement with the sacred texts of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and American Civil Religion. This collection of essays explores the ambiguities of personal culpability among both perpetrators and victims of violence and the suffering involved in accepting personal agency in trauma. Contributors provide fresh and compelling readings of texts from different faith traditions and use their findings to reflect on real-life strategies for recovery from violations of core moral beliefs and their consequences such as shame, depression and addiction. With interpretations of the sacred texts, contributors reflect on the concerns of the morally-injured today and offer particular aspects of healing from their communities as support, making this a groundbreaking contribution to the study of moral injury and trauma.

Faith and History in the Old Testament was first published in 1963. Minnesota Archive Editions uses digital technology to make long-unavailable books once again accessible, and are published unaltered from the original University of Minnesota Press editions. This absorbing and readable account of the religion of ancient Israel is presented against the background of other cultures of the time. Father MacKenzie traces the development of Israel's belief and draws upon modern knowledge of the cultures of the ancient Near East to illuminate the history. But the main stress is on the religious meaning which the Israelites themselves perceived in the events they experienced, a meaning which is accepted and extended in different ways by modern Jews and by Christians. The author explains, in non-technical style, the distinctive features of the faith of the Old Testament as evident in such themes as covenant, creation, retribution, the pursuit of wisdom, and the hope of salvation. At the outset, he defines the study of theology and places the study of Chrisson with that of Israel. He analyzes Israel's concept of God and the character of the covenant between God and the people of Israel, discusses the Israelite literature on the creation of earth and its creatures, and considers the interrelationship between myth and history. He discusses the search for wisdom in Israel, the public prayers, and the concept of a promise from the deity. In conclusion, he presents the interpretation by the Old Testament authors of these distinctive features of Israel's religion. The book is intended for lay people interested in modern Bible interpretation, as well as for priests, ministers, and rabbis who wish a general survey of the Old Testament. It is suitable for use as a text or supplementary reading in religion or theology courses.

A fundamental issue for preachers of the Bible has always been achieving an approach that is both faithful to the textual intention as well as fitting for the listening audience. What is historical and distant (the text) is, in preaching, made contemporary and near (praxis). Particularly pertinent is how this transaction may be conducted with respect to the self-contained and well-defined quantum of the scriptural text that is regularly employed in liturgical contexts-the pericope. This book answers the question: In a sermon intending to proclaim application from a pericope, what is the hermeneutical basis for moving validly from text to praxis, i.e., with authority and relevance? The concept of theology as a bridge between text and praxis has not been specifically researched or rigorously substantiated. Kuruvilla seeks to do both, utilizing as entrees language philosophy, literary criticism, and a thorough understanding of "ordinary" language. Drawing from a variety of hermeneutical resources, he establishes "pericopal theology" as the intermediary between text and praxis. How this theology is discerned from the text and how application may be determined therefrom form the crux of this book. This novel approach lends validity to the movement from text to praxis and promises to be useful for any approach to the biblical text intended to culminate in application. Kuruvilla's approach provides a substantial technical basis for such an operation. Thus the preacher must be a "theologian-homiletician." It is the working out of this nomenclature, especially the "theologian" half of the appellation, that is the essence of this work, uniting as it does in one portfolio the responsibility of negotiating the demands of both hermeneutics and homiletics.

Suppose our knowledge of the Quran began only recently with the discovery of mysterious scrolls in a desert cave. Suppose there was no Islamic history and no Muslim community to help us understand this book. Is it conceivable, then, that we might mistake it for the central text of a long-vanished apocalyptic community whose ideas about the next world, colourful and extraordinary as they appear, nonetheless make perfect sense in the context of the most pervasive literary genre of late antiquity, the epic? How do people understand the Quran to be divine revelation? What is it about this book that inspires such devotion in the reader/believer? Grounding his approach in the universal power of story and myth, Todd Lawson provides a unique appreciation of the unparalleled status and unique charisma of the Quran as a religious text and monument of world literature.

With contributions by: Barns, J. W. B.; Unknown function: Carswell, J.

Known most widely for his role in the civil rights and peace movements of the 1960s, Abraham Joshua Heschel made major scholarly contributions to the fields of biblical studies, rabbinics, medieval Jewish philosophy, Hasidism, and mysticism. Yet, his most ambitious scholarly achievement, his three-volume study of Rabbinic Judaism, is only now appearing in English. Heschel's great insight is that the world of rabbinic thought can be divided into two types or schools, those of Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Ishmael, and that the historic disputes between the two are based on fundamental differences over the nature of revelation and religion. Furthermore, this disagreement constitutes a basic and necessary ongoing polarity within Judaism between immanence and transcendence, mysticism and rationalism, neo-Platonism and Aristotelianism. Heschel then goes on to show how these two fundamental theologies of revelation may be used to interpret a great number of topics central to Judaism.

In Rabbinic Tales of Destruction, Julia Watts Belser examines early Jewish accounts of the Roman conquest of Judea. Faced with stories of sexual violence, enslavement, forced prostitution, disability, and bodily risk, Belser argues, our readings of rabbinic narrative must wrestle with the brutal body costs of Roman imperial domination. She brings disability studies, feminist theory, and new materialist ecological thought to accounts of rabbinic catastrophe, revealing how rabbinic discourses of gender, sexuality, and the body are shaped in the shadow of empire. Focusing on the Babylonian Talmud's longest sustained account of the destruction of the Temple, Belser reveals Bavli Gittin's distinctive sex and gender politics. While Palestinian tales frequently castigate the 'wayward woman' for sexual transgressions that imperil the nation, Bavli Gittin's stories do not portray women's sexuality as a cause of catastrophe. The Bavli's resistance to Rome makes a critical difference. While other rabbinic texts commonly inveigh against women's beauty as the cause of sexual sin, Bavli Gittin's tales express a strikingly egalitarian discourse that laments the vulnerability of the beautiful Jewish body before the conqueror. Bavli Gittin's body politics, Belser maintains, align with a significant theological reorientation. While most early Jewish narratives link the destruction of the Temple to communal sin, Bavli Gittin's account does not explain catastrophe as divine chastisement. Instead of imagining God as the architect of Jewish suffering, it evokes God's empathy with the subjugated Jewish body. As it navigates the ruins of Jerusalem, Bavli Gittin forges a sharp critique of empire. Its critical discourse aims to pierce the power politics of Roman conquest, to protest the brutality of imperial dominance, and to make plain the scar that Roman violence leaves upon Jewish flesh.

In Rabbinic Tales of Destruction, Julia Watts Belser examines early Jewish accounts of the Roman conquest of Judea from the perspective of the wounded body and the scarred land. Faced with stories saturated with sexual violence, enslavement, forced prostitution, disability, and bodily risk, Belser argues, our readings of rabbinic narrative must wrestle with the brutal body costs of Roman imperial domination. She brings disability studies, feminist theory, and new materialist ecological thought to accounts of rabbinic catastrophe, revealing how rabbinic discourses of gender, sexuality, and the body are shaped in the shadow of empire. Focusing on the Babylonian Talmud's longest sustained account of the destruction of the Temple, Belser reveals Bavli Gittin's distinctive sex and gender politics. While Palestinian tales frequently castigate the 'wayward woman' for sexual transgressions that imperil the nation, Bavli Gittin's stories resist portraying women's sexuality as a cause of catastrophe. The Bavli's resistance to Rome makes a critical difference. While other rabbinic texts commonly inveigh against women's beauty as the cause of sexual sin, Bavli Gittin's tales express a strikingly egalitarian discourse that laments the vulnerability of the beautiful Jewish body before the conqueror. Bavli Gittin's body politics, Belser maintains, align with a significant theological reorientation. While most early Jewish narratives link the destruction of the Temple to communal sin, Bavli Gittin's account does not explain catastrophe as divine chastisement. Instead of imagining God as the architect of Jewish suffering, it evokes God's empathy with the subjugated Jewish body. As it navigates the ruins of Jerusalem, Bavli Gittin forges a sharp critique of empire. Its critical discourse aims to pierce the power politics of Roman conquest, to protest the brutality of imperial dominance, and to make plain the scar that Roman violence leaves upon Jewish flesh.

"This is a very significant, original, and daring book. It illuminates an important era in the history of the Jewish people as well as the background of Christianity, making full use of the new Qumran material."--Professor Emanuel Tov, Editor-in-Chief, Dead Sea Scrolls Publication Project

"The importance of this thesis for the understanding and interpretation of the historical Jesus is something of which all students of Christian Origins should take careful note. The book places a square challenge before those persuaded by a less apocalyptic/messianc view of the man and his times. I am convinced this book will become a pioneering classic in terms of the slot it fills in the field."--James D. Tabor, author of "Why Waco?

"This is a work of very high quality. . . . Knohl convincingly points out the historical event of a Messiah who predated the more famous one, Jesus Christ. . . . This is one of the most fascinating findings regarding the history of Jewish Messianism and the understanding of the emergence of Christianity. . . I am confident that it will mark a new phase in research of ancient Judaism."--Moshe Idel, author of "Messianic Mystics

"This tiny book will turn many heads. Israel Knohl sifts through a vast range of ancient texts in order to weave together a new chapter in the story of Jewish Messianism."--Gary A. Anderson, Professor of Hebrew Bible, Harvard University

"Israel Knohl established himself as a first-rate scholar with his first book, "The Sanctuary of Silence, on a classic problem of Pentateuchal studies. Here he ventures into entirely different territory and displays impressive erudition not only in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Talmud but also in classicalantiquity. His bold and provocative theories are sure to elicit a storm of controversy."--John J. Collins, author of "Between Athens and Jerusalem: Jewish Identity in the Hellenistic Diaspora and Jewish Wisdom in Helleniatic Age

"Fascinating. . . .Knohl's book is an original piece of research that defies some of the most solid beliefs of our time."--Avraham Burg, Chairman of the Keneset (Israeli Parliament).

The Psalms have long brought comfort to those who mourn and have helped us find the spiritual in everyday life. This edition presents a translation based on the original Hebrew text, as well as the entire range of Psalms interpretation and modern linguistic scholarship.

One of the world's foremost experts on the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Qumran community that produced them provides an authoritative new English translation of the two hundred longest and most important nonbiblical Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran, along with an introduction to the history of the discovery and publication of each manuscript and the background necessary for placing each manuscript in its actual historical context.

Secrets of oriental sexuology are recorded in the book and one can not fail to be intrigued by a number of headings throughout the volume with titles such as "The Lady and the Barber", "The Bath-Keeper Who Lent His Wife", "Passion Gone Mad", "Forth-Eight Erotic Postures"...The writing of this treatise is a credit to Jalal Addin Al-Siyuti and the book was translated from the Arabic at the beginning of the century by an English Bohemian. It was originally published in France as a limited edition of only 300 copies. An imaginative translation has been accomplished in a fascinating style which will attract many new readers. Some interesting poems are contained in the book and the introductory lines of just one entitled "The Squire" written by the Earl of Harrington are quoted. "Last night, when to your bed I came, You were a novice at the game, I've taught you now a little skill But I have more to teach you still,...(page 152)

By employing the same basic methodologies used to establish the currently accepted chronology, it has been possible for a group of young archaeologists, including David Rohl, to create a New Chronology which resolves many of the problems permeating ancient world studies. In particular, one model has been developed which has major implications for Old Testament research. Through the revision of the master chronology of ancient Egypt they have unlocked the key to biblical history - the epic events of the Bible really did happen as recorded in the Books of Genesis, Exodus, Judges, Samuel, Kings and Chronicles - the problem was that we had previously been looking for them in completely the wrong place in time.

Many of the conundrums of the past are explained, and legendary figures such as Joseph, Moses, David and Solomon find their true political setting. Exodus and Conquest will be restored to history and the magic of legend will begin to make its great comeback.