This book is concerned with ascertaining the value of having two versions of the same monarchic history of Israel within the Hebrew Bible (focusing on the books of Kings and Chronicles). It is furthermore concerned with how the book of Chronicles is read in relation to the book of Kings as Chronicles is so often considered to be a later rewritten text drawing upon an earlier version of the Masoretic Text of Samuel and Kings. The predominant scholarly approach to reading the book of Chronicles is to read it in light of how the Chronicler emended his source texts (additions, omissions, harmonizations). This approach has yielded great success in our understanding of the Chronicler's theology and rhetoric. However, Cook asserts, it has also failed to consider how the book of Chronicles can be read as an autonomous and coherent document. That is, a diachronic approach to reading Chronicles sometimes misses the theological and rhetorical features of the text in its final form. This book shows the great benefit of reading these narratives as autonomous and coherent by using the Solomon narratives as a case study. These narratives are first read individually, and then together, so as to ascertain their uniqueness vis-a-vis one another. Finally, Cook addresses questions related to the concordance of these narratives as well as their purposes within their respective larger literary contexts.

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 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.

If Zechariah's vision report (Zechariah 1.8-6.8) reflects the seer's visionary experience, how does that impact our understanding of the gradual growth of the text? Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer builds on the work done in her previous book Zechariah and His Visions (Bloomsbury-T&T Clark, 2014), to demonstrate that the visionary material forms the primary textual layer. The oracular texts constitute chronologically later interpretations. Zechariah and/or later authors/editors sought guidance in the earlier vision accounts, and the oracular material reflects these endeavours. Tiemeyer's investigation is guided by the question: what is the latter material doing with the former? Is it enforcing, contradicting, or adding to it? Using a ratio composed of the difference between the intratexts and intertexts of Zech 1-8, Tiemeyer shows how this ratio is higher in the oracular material than in the visionary material. This difference points to the different origin and the different purpose of the two sets of material. While the earlier vision report draws on images found primarily in other biblical vision reports, the later oracular material has the characteristics of scribal interpretation. By drawing on earlier material, it seeks to anchor its proposed interpretations of the various vision accounts within the Israelite textual tradition. It is clear that the divine oracles were added to give, modify, and specify the meaning of the earlier vision report.

Respected Old Testament scholar Craig Bartholomew, coauthor of the well-received "Drama of Scripture," provides a careful exegetical reading of Ecclesiastes in this addition to the Baker Commentary on the Old Testament Wisdom and Psalms series. Along with helpful translation and commentary, "Ecclesiastes" considers the theological implications of the text and its literary, historical, and grammatical dimensions. Footnotes deal with many of the technical matters, allowing readers of varying levels of interest and training to read and profit from the commentary and to engage the biblical text at an appropriate level. Pastors, teachers, and all serious students of the Bible will find here an accessible commentary that will serve as an excellent resource for their study.

Cushites in the Hebrew Bible offers a reassessment of Cushite ethnographic representations in the biblical literature as a counterpoint to misconceptions about Africa and people of African descent which are largely a feature of the modern age. Whereas current interpretations have tended to emphasize unfavourable portraits of the people biblical writers called Cushites, Kevin Burrell illuminates the biblical perspective through a comparative assessment of ancient and modern forms of identity construction. Past and present modes of defining difference betray both similarities and differences to ethnic representations in the Hebrew Bible, providing important contexts for understanding the biblical view. This book contributes to a clearer understanding of the theological, historical, and ethnic dynamics underpinning representations of Cushites in the Hebrew Bible.