An Introduction to Ancient Israel and the Hebrew Bible: A Diachronic Approach pairs biblical material with primary source texts from the Middle Bronze Age to the Hellenistic Period. It places emphasis on archaeological and historical data that help to illuminate the Hebrew Bible in its ancient Near Eastern context. The opening chapter focuses on the Middle Bronze Age, including information on societal development, innovations, material culture, Abraham and the Amorite Migration, Joseph in Egypt, Genesis, and more. Characteristics of the Late Bronze Age, the Exodus Narrative, Leviticus, and Numbers are addressed in Chapter 2. The Iron Age is covered in Chapters 3 and 4, speaking to the emergence of Israel, Deuteronomy, the archaeology of the period, Samuel and Kings, Excursus, and latter Prophets. The final chapter addresses the end of the kingdom of Judah, the rise of the Medes and Persians, Psalms, the Book of Ruth, Proverbs, Job, wisdom literature, and more. An Introduction to Ancient Israel and the Hebrew Bible is an ideal text for introductory courses in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament.

This study of the book of Daniel examines the ideology of divine and human rule in Daniel's historical resumes or reviews found in chaps 2, 7, 8, 9, 10-12. It seeks to uncover the concerns that motivate the resumes and the strategies the resumes use to resolve cognitive and experiential dissonance. Willis argues that the source of dissonance in Daniel stems not from failed prophecies (as has been commonly argued), nor do the visions function as symbolic theodicies to address a contradiction between divine power and divine goodness in the face evil. The study proposes, instead, that the historical resumes address profound contradictions concerning divine power and presence in the face of Hellenistic/Seleucid rule. These contradictions reach a crisis point in Daniel 8's depiction of the desecration of the temple (typically Daniel 8 is seen as a poor replica of the triumphant vision of divine power found in Daniel 7). This crisis of divine absence is addressed both within the vision of chap 8 itself and then in the following visions of chaps 9, and 10-12, through the use of narrative (both mythological narrative and historical narrative).

Meredith G. Kline is famous in the Reformed community for his teaching and writings in biblical and covenant theology. Many of Kline's former students, as well as many pastors and laypeople in the Reformed community, consider his work to have had a transformative effect on their faith and thinking. His teaching and writings (he wrote seven books and more than seventy articles) were filled with fresh, insightful interpretations. Meredith Kline's posthumously published Genesis: A New Commentary which distills his mature views on the book of Genesis and, indeed, on Scripture as a whole-will appeal greatly to those who already admire his work, and make his thinking accessible to a broader audience.

This book anchors its account of the beauty of Jesus Christ to a scheme found in St Augustine of Hippo's Expositions of the Psalms. There Augustine recognized the beauty of Christ at every stage-from his pre-existence ('beautiful in heaven'), through his incarnation, the public ministry ('beautiful in his miracles, beautiful in calling to life'), passion, crucifixion, burial, resurrection ('beautiful in taking up his life again'), and glorious life 'in heaven'. Augustine never filled out this laconic summary by writing a work on Christ and his beauty. The Beauty of Jesus Christ seems to be the first attempt in Christian history to write a comprehensive account of the beauty of Christ in the light of Augustine's list. The work begins by offering a working description of what it understands by beauty as being perfect, harmonious, and radiant. Beauty, above all the divine beauty, enjoys inexhaustible meaning and overlaps with 'the holy' or the awesome and fascinating mystery of God. Loving beauty opens the way to truth and helps us grasp and practise virtue. The books needs to add some items to Augustine's list by recognizing Christ's beauty in his baptism, transfiguration, and post-resurrection sending of the Holy Spirit. It also goes beyond Augustine by showing how the imagery and language Jesus prepared in his hidden life and then used in his ministry witness to the beautiful sensibility that developed during his years at home in Nazareth. Throughout, this book draws on the Scriptures to illustrate and justify Augustine's brief claims about the beauty revealed in the whole story of Christ, from his pre-existence to his risen 'post-existence'. Where appropriate, it also cites the witness to Christ's beauty that has come from artists, composers of sacred music, the creators of icons, and writers.

Evangelicals are no strangers to the debate over creation and evolution. Now the battle has spread from the contents of the creation account into Genesis 2-3 and the historicity of Adam and therefore the Fall. What, then, is at stake? Is this merely an ivory-tower debate or can it actually impact the Christian life? The faculty of The Master's College have here come together to contend that the second and third chapters of Genesis are indeed historical, that there are excellent reasons for believing so, and that it is an essential issue within Christian thought and life. The contents of these chapters become the history of how everything in the world came to be what it is today, its reflection in an account in our everyday lives. This Scripture--Chapter 3 especially--explains what we observe in the legal system, literature, gender roles, education, psychology, and science. Therefore the issue of the theology and historicity is not irrelevant, but something critical to our everyday lives. What Happened in the Garden? includes new research, scientific, literary, business, educational, and legal perspectives. This multi-disciplinary approach strengthens the conclusion of the contributors that to change our understanding of the Fall is to change the way we understand reality, and a shift in the Christian worldview and the faith itself.

The origin and integrity of the Biblical text are described with gematria and equidistant letter spacing requiring Divine inspiration. There should therefore be no conflict between the Bible and established Science. Key conflicts perceived by the secular world are evaluated in detail. The fine tuning of the Earth and Universe enabling humankind to survive and flourish are summarised, and the supreme perfections of design in humanity, in nature and Universe described. General Relativity since the Big Bank is used to resolve a timescale matching the events of the Six Days of Genesis terminating in the recent special creation of humankind.

This book is designed to serve as a textbook for intermediate Hebrew students and above. Sung Jin Park presents the fundamental features of the Tiberian Hebrew accents, focusing on their divisions and exegetical roles. Providing innovative methods for diagramming biblical texts, the volume explores the two major rules (hierarchy and dichotomy) of disjunctive accents. Students will also attain biblical insights from the exegetical application of the biblical texts that Hebrew syntax alone does not provide. Park's volume shows how the new perspectives on Hebrew accents enhance our understanding of biblical texts.

This volume presents the first study, critical edition, and translation of one of the earliest works by Richard Rolle (c. 1300-1349), a hermit and mystic whose works were widely read in England and on the European continent into the early modern period. Rolle's explication of the Old Testament Book of Lamentations gives us a glimpse of how the biblical commentary tradition informed what would become his signature mystical, doctrinal, and reformist preoccupations throughout his career. Rolle's English and explicitly mystical writings have been widely accessible for decades. Recent attention has turned again to his Latin commentaries, many of which have never been critically edited or thoroughly studied. This attention promises to give us a fuller sense of Rolle's intellectual, devotional, and reformist development, and of the interplay between his Latin and English writings. Richard Rolle: On Lamentations places Rolle's early commentary within a tradition of explication of the Lamentations of Jeremiah and in the context of his own career. The edition collates all known witnesses to the text, from Dublin, Oxford, Prague, and Cologne. A source apparatus as well as textual and explanatory notes accompany the edition.

Together with my story of travelling through the tough circumstances of a brain tumour diagnosis; 'Embracing the Father' takes us on a journey through some of the well known stories from the Old Testament, and some less well known ones, in order to grasp a fuller understanding of the true nature of God, and how we react to those difficult situations we come across. Is he a mean and self centred being or is he kind and generous? Is the Old Testament God relevant to us today? Does he become in the New Testament a much more approachable God, or maybe a different God altogether? I explore our relationship with God as a Father, and how that has developed in my own journey, in both serious and humorous ways.