Lexicography, together with grammatical studies and textual criticism, forms the basis of biblical exegesis. Recent decades have seen much progress in this field, yet increasing specialization also tends to have the paradoxical effect of turning exegesis into an independent discipline, while leaving lexicography to the experts. The present volume seeks to renew and intensify the exchange between the study of words and the study of texts. This is done in reference to both the Hebrew source text and the earliest Greek translation, the Septuagint. Questions addressed in the contributions to this volume are how linguistic meaning is effected, how it relates to words, and how words may be translated into another language, in Antiquity and today. Etymology, semantic fields, syntagmatic relations, word history, neologisms and other subthemes are discussed. The main current and prospective projects of biblical lexicology or lexicography are presented, thus giving an idea of the state of the art. Some of the papers also open up wider perspectives of interpretation.

As the ancient Greek version of the Old Testament the Septuagint is probably the first great translation project of Greco-Roman antiquity. Together with the Septuagint text the religion and culture of ancient Judaism came to the fore of a Greek speaking audience, which did not have any access to the holy scriptures of the Jews in Hebrew. That translation project also manifested a transfer of religious, social, and anthropological categories and concepts of Semitic origin to another cultural world of language and science that itself was shaped by Hellenism.Over the last years the Septuagint has gradually edged closer into the interest of Biblical scholars and into the centre of historical and philological research. In the course of this main attention has not only been paid to further particulars of its origination in Alexandria but also on various linguistic specifics and distinctive features with regards to content of the Greek Bible. The question, however, which has hardly been studied so far, is to what extent the Greek translation of the Bible consists of stylistic and rhetorical elements that are not present in the Hebrew source text. Did the translators made use of their rhetoric and stylistic skills to give their translations a distinctive ornatus? Can we, according to Augustine, rightly claim that not only the authors of the Biblical texts but also the translators knew to formulate et eloquenter et sapienter, i.e. in an eloquent and wise manner? This issue, neglected in current research, is taken up in this collected volume. Seven scholars investigate into stylistic and rhetorical elements present in various books of the Bible (e.g., Psalms, Amos, and Solomon's Book of Wisdom) and establish a field of work that deserves to receive more attention in the future.Contributors are Eberhard Bons, Jennifer M. Dines, Katrin Hauspie, Jan Joosten, Thomas J. Kraus, A. LA (c)onas, and K. Usener.

Im Mittelpunkt der neun BeitrAge aus Deutschland und Frankreich stehen Modelle von Konstruktionen individueller, personaler und kollektiver IdentitAt im alten Israel, in der griechischen Antike, im frA"hen Judentum sowie im frA"hen Christentum. Deutlich wird in dieser Zusammenstellung, dass die einzelnen IdentitAtskonstruktionen nicht nur von religiAs-kulturellen Voraussetzungen geprAgt, sondern auch von bestimmten Interessen der hinter den Texten stehenden Autoren bzw. Autorengruppen bestimmt sind. Dies erklArt die Unterschiedlichkeit in zentralen Punkten, beispielsweise wie viel IndividualitAt dem Einzelnen als Mitglied einer Gemeinschaft zugestanden wird, welche Rolle "Fremde" in einer Gesellschaft spielen dA"rfen, und wie Menschen auAerhalb einer Gemeinschaft bewertet werden. Mit BeitrAgen von Karin Finsterbusch, Denis Fricker, Daniel Gerber, Norbert Jacoby, Bernd Janowski, Pierre Keith, Thierry Legrand, Nathalie Siffer und FranAois Vinel.

This volume discusses problems related to the vocabulary of the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. The background of the words in Greek literature, their use in the translation, and their later reception in Jewish and Christian writings, including the New Testament, are studied on the basis of concrete examples. The discussion shows how religion and theology can affect the meaning and usage of words and how, conversely, the use of specific words can have an impact on the understanding and interpretation of Scripture.