Focusing on the phenomenon of prophecy in the ancient Near East, this study offers a comparison between parts of First Isaiah and the Assyrian prophecies. In the first part, the material from First Isaiah and from seventh-century Assyria is investigated in its own right. The second part is a comparison of the Isaiah tradition in its earliest shape with the prophetic material from seventh-century Assyria. The topics dealt with in the comparison are the interrelation of prophetic oracles and historical events, the functions of the prophets, and the literary development of prophecy. The study shows that ancient Israelite prophecy, of which the historical Isaiah was an exponent, was much in conformity with ancient Near Eastern prophecy in general.

Scepticism has been the driving force in the development of Greco-Roman culture in the past, and the impetus for far-reaching scientific achievements and philosophical investigation. Early Jewish culture, in contrast, avoided creating consistent representations of its philosophical doctrines. Sceptical notions can nevertheless be found in some early Jewish literature such as the Book of Ecclesiastes. One encounters there expressions of doubt with respect to Divine justice or even Divine involvement in earthly affairs. During the first centuries of the common era, however, Jewish thought, as reflected in rabbinic works, was engaged in persistent intellectual activity devoted to the laws, norms, regulations, exegesis and other traditional areas of Jewish religious knowledge. An effort to detect sceptical ideas in ancient Judaism, therefore, requires a closer analysis of this literary heritage and its cultural context. This volume of collected essays seeks to tackle the question of scepticism in an Early Jewish context, including Ecclesiastes and other Jewish Second Temple works, rabbinic midrashic and talmudic literature, and reflections of Jewish thought in early Christian and patristic writings. Contributors are: Tali Artman, Geoffrey Herman, Reuven Kiperwasser, Serge Ruzer, Cana Werman, and Carsten Wilke.

Recent nation-wide surveys of the Jews of France yielded a detailed picture of this community, one of the largest Jewish Diaspora populations, with a long and rich history. This book presents results and analyses of this survey for the first time in English. Key issues explored include demographics, representations of Jewish identity, expressions of community solidarity, social issues, and values. Data was analyzed using multi-dimensional techniques, revealing underlying structural relationships and an axiological typology. The translation of the French edition was expanded for accessibility to an English-speaking audience, including a background on history, socio-political climate and related philosophical works. The cumulative result is the most up-to-date and comprehensive look at the Jews of France at the turn of the third millennium. "...the empirical centerpiece of Cohen's study is sound, invaluable, and often highly illuminating. In the short space provided this reviewer could not fully do justice to the wealth of information presented there..." Ethan Katz, University of Cincinnati

The Ma'ase-Ester, "Esther's affairs", is a 14th-century Judeo-Provencal poem on the story of Esther, intended for a recital during the banquet for Purim. The short poem - recently discovered in the single manuscript that preserves it - is a new precious document that enriches a small corpus of medieval Judeo-Provencal texts. This book offers the first critical edition of the complete text accompanied by a detailed study of the sources and the language. It guides us in understanding why the story of Esther became such a popular theme in 14th-century Provence, and in what way the Avignon Papacy and the studies on Moses Maimonides influenced this literary novelty.

As the pioneering work in its field, Jewish Serials of the World brings together a diverse body of literature essential to the study of the Jewish press from 1674 to the present. It identifies pertinent primary source materials and provides comprehensive coverage of the secondary literature in a field where no bibliographical control has ever existed. Arranged for the most part geographically, the citations include descriptions of significant publications of books, pamphlets, theses and articles, as well as jubilee issues of Jewish newspapers and magazines. In addition to internal cross-references, the work also contains subject and author indexes.

This book takes readers on a philosophical discovery of a forgotten treasure, one born in the 14th century but which appears to belong to the 21st. It presents a critical, up-to-date analysis of Santob de Carrion, also known as Sem Tob, a writer and thinker whose philosophy arose in the Spain of the three great cultures: Jews, Christians, and Muslims, who then coexisted in peace. The author first presents a historical and cultural introduction that provides biographical detail as well as context for a greater understand of Santob's philosophy. Next, the book offers a dialogue with the work itself, which looks at politics, sociology, anthropology, psychology, ethics, aesthetics, metaphysics, and theodicy. The aim is not to provide an exhaustive analysis, or to comment on each and every verse, but rather to deal only with the most relevant for today's world. Readers will discover how Santob believed knowledge must be dynamic, and tolerance fundamental, fleeing from dogma, since one cannot avoid a significant dose of moral and aesthetic relativism. Subjectivity, within its own codes, must seek a profound ethics, not puritanical but which serves to escape from general ill will. Santob offers a criticism of wealth and power that does not serve the people which appears to be totally relevant today. In spite of the fame he achieved in his own time, Santob has largely remained a vestige of the past. By the end of this book, readers will come to see why this important figure deserves to be more widely studied. Indeed, not only has this medieval Spanish philosopher searched for truth in an unstable, confused world of contradictions, but he has done so in a way that can still help us today.

This is the fifth volume of the hard-copy edition of a journal that has been published online (www.macdiv.ca/jgrchj) since 2000. Volume 1 was for 2000, Volume 2 was for 2001-2005, Volume 3 was for 2006, Volume 4 was for 2007 and Volume 5 is for 2008. As they appear, the hardcopy editions will replace the online materials.The scope of JGRChJ is the texts, language and cultures of the Graeco-Roman world of early Christianity and Judaism.The papers published in JGRChJ are designed to pay special attention to the 'larger picture' of politics, culture, religion and language,engaging as well with modern theoretical approaches.

Judaism is a religion and a way of life that combines beliefs as well as practical commandments and traditions, encompassing all spheres of life. Some of the numerous precepts emerge directly from the Torah (the Law of Moses). Others are commanded by Oral Law, rulings of illustrious Jewish legal scholars throughout the generations, and rabbinic responsa composed over hundreds of years and still being written today. Like other religions, Judaism has also developed unique symbols that have become virtually exclusive to it, such as the Star of David and the seven-branched menorah. This book argues that Judaism impacts human geography in significant ways: it shapes the environment and space of its believers, thus creating a unique "Jewish geography.

This bibliography documents and annotates the various articles and books devoted to Jewish ethics. It is divided into two sections. The first is an essay exploring philosophical questions and the way in which Jewish thinkers wrestle with them. The second part is an annotated bibliography with author, subject, and title indexes that brings together widely scattered or relatively unknown works. Representing the broad spectrum of Jewish thought, it includes articles from journals published by Reform, Orthodox, Conservative, and Reconstructionist Jewish institutions, scholarly articles and books published in the United States and Europe, traditional collections of Hebrew ethical writings, both contemporary and classical, and anthologies. The bibliographical survey is divided into five major sections: general works and anthologies, the history of Jewish ethics, issues in Jewish ethics, themes in Jewish ethics, and Jewish ethics and non-Jewish ethical theories.

"Re-Biographing and Deviance" examines the Jewish Midrashic model for self-renewal through time. In this important new study, author Rotenberg questions how traditional Judaism, with its contradictory notions of teshuvah (repentance) and of remembrance of the past, allows for the contemporary Jew to maintain a healthy cognitive dialogue between past failures and future aspirations. The author illustrates how the Midrashic narrative philosophy entails a psychotherapeutic system for reinterpretation of past sins into positive future-oriented biographies--which in turn provide fuel for Jewish vitality and its continuity between past, present and future.

This is the eighth volume of the hard-copy edition of a journal that has been published online (www.jgrchj.net) since 2000. Volume 1 was for 2000, Volume 2 was for 2001-2005, Volume 3 was for 2006, Volume 4 was for 2007, Volume 5 was for 2008, Volume 6 was for 2009, Volume 7 was for 2010 and Volume 8 is for 2011-2012. As they appear, the hardcopy editions will replace the online materials. The scope of JGRChJ is the texts, language and cultures of the Graeco-Roman world of early Christianity and Judaism. The papers published in JGRChJ are designed to pay special attention to the 'larger picture' of politics, culture, religion and language, engaging as well with modern theoretical approaches.

'Content analysis'-which is a computer-assisted form of textual analysis-is used to examine divine activity in six prophetic texts, comparing God's activity to that of humans. In this methodologically innovative study, the author concludes, in the light of quantitative data, that God is harsher to non-Israelites than to Israelites in all the texts, and much kinder to Israelites in Joel than in the typical prophet. God and humans are involved in much the same kinds of physical and mental processes, but to considerably different degrees. Griffin argues persuasively that the God of the prophets is not the 'wholly other' of some theologies, but neither do his actions follow exactly the human pattern.

In this ground-breaking work on the Ottoman town of Manastir (Bitola), Robert Mihajlovski, provides a detailed account of the development of Islamic, Christian and Sephardic religious architecture and culture as it manifested in the town and precincts. Originally a town on the edge of the Via Egnatia, this small provincial town gradually developed into a significant administrative, military, religious, cultural and intellectual centre for the Balkans; a vibrant place, nurturing progressive multi-cultural and multi-confessional values with considerable influence on the formation of modern Balkan identities. The present work is the culmination of thirty years of research using primary source material from archives and chronicles and the monuments themselves for the purpose of both preserving and extending the boundaries of current knowledge. It offers a comprehensive biography of a great cultural knot in the Balkans and offers a rich source for further use by scholars, students and non-technical readership alike.

Is faith belief in something without proof? And if so is there never to be any proof or discovery? If so what is the need of intellect? If faith is trust in something that is real is that reality historical, literal or metaphorical or philosophical? If knowledge is an essential element in faith why should there by so much emphasis on believing and not on understanding in the modern practice of religion? This volume is a compilation of essays related to the nature of religious faith in the context of its inception in human history as well as its meaning for religious practice and relations between religions in modern times. Faith has come to be regarded as a virtuous goal in life. However, many people have asked how can it be that an endeavor that is supposed to be dedicated to spiritual upliftment has led to more conflict in human history than any other social factor? Faith-based religion has emerged in modern times as a powerful and dynamic form of social process that affects every human being as well as life in general, the animals, plants and the earth's elements. It relates to the survival of cultures as well as the survival of life itself. Thus it is important to understand what faith is and how it operates in the mind and the process that has ensued to form the world we see today. Therefore, this volume is dedicated to the exploration of history, politics, theology and philosophy in order to comprehend and effectively realize the effects of faith and discover the means to purify faith so as to direct ourselves towards harmony, peace and prosperity for all humanity.

This is a study of an anonymous ancient work, originally composed in Greek, titled Joseph and Aseneth. Although relatively unknown outside of scholarly circles, the story is remarkable because of its focus on a female character and its absence of overt misogyny. It has traditionally been viewed as an early 2nd-century C.E. conversion story of Jewish provenance. Kraemer, through her detailed examination of the texts, arrives at conclusions that disagree with previous findings with respect not only to questions of date, provenance, identity, geographic origin and textual relationships, but also to many matters of interpretation.

In this volume, Lawrence Schiffman and Michael Swartz assemble a collection of Jewish incantation texts which were copied in the Middle Ages and preserved in the Cairo Genizah. Many of these texts, now held in Cambridge University Library, are published here for the first time. All the texts are translated and supplemented by detailed philological and historical commentary, tracing the praxis and beliefs of the Jewish magical tradition of Late Antiquity. Their relation to Jewish legal and mystical teachings is also explored. 'A major contribution to this area of inquiry. Fourteen incantation texts are made accessible here. They are framed with all the desired apparatus: clear facsimiles, transcriptions, translations, commentary, substantial bibliography and three indexes. The lengthy introduction, in particular, is valuable, providing a mise au point for future study of Genizah magical texts.' s teven m. wasserstorm, ajs review Lawrence H. Schiffman is the Ethel and Irvin A. Edelman Professor in Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University, USA. He is a member of the Enoch seminar and of the Advisory Board of The Journal Henoch. Michael D.Swartz is Professor of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at Ohio State University, USA.

When we encounter a text, whether ancient or modern, we typically start at the beginning and work our way toward the end. In Tracking the Master Scribe, Sara J. Milstein demonstrates that for biblical and Mesopotamian literature, this habit can yield misleading results. In the ancient Near East, "master scribes"-those who had the authority to produce and revise literature-regularly modified their texts in the course of transmission. One of the most effective techniques for change was to add something to the front-what Milstein calls "revision through introduction." This method allowed scribes to preserve their received material while simultaneously recasting it. As a result, numerous biblical and Mesopotamian texts manifest multiple and even competing viewpoints. Due to the primary position of these additions, such reworked texts are often read solely through the lens of their final contributions. This is true not only for biblical and cuneiform texts in their final forms, but also for Mesopotamian texts that are known from multiple versions: first impressions carry weight. Rather than "nail down every piece of the puzzle," Tracking the Master Scribe demonstrates what is to be gained when engaging questions of textual transmission with attention to how scribes actually worked. Working from the two earliest corpora that allow us to track large-scale change, the book provides broad overviews of evidence available for revision through introduction, as well as a set of detailed case studies that offer fresh insight into well-known biblical and Mesopotamian literary texts. The result is the first comprehensive and comparative profile of this key scribal method: one that was not only ubiquitous in the ancient Near East but also epitomizes the attitudes of the master scribes toward the literature that they produced.

In The Verbal System of the Dead Sea Scrolls Ken M. Penner determines whether Qumran Hebrew finite verbs are primarily temporal, aspectual, or modal. Standard grammars claim Hebrew was aspect-prominent in the Bible, and tense-prominent in the Mishnah. But the semantic value of the verb forms in the intervening period in which the Dead Sea Scrolls were written has remained controversial. Penner answers the question of Qumran Hebrew verb form semantics using an empirical method: a database calculating the correlation between each form and each function, establishing that the ancient author's selection of verb form is determined not by aspect, but by tense or modality. Penner then applies these findings to controversial interpretations of three Qumran texts.