The Contribution of Archaeology to the Study of Women in Biblical Times: Two Case Studies

2009 ◽  
Vol 106 (3) ◽  
pp. 383-398
Author(s):  
Jennie R. Ebeling
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Limited Information ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Everyday Activities ◽  
Ancient Israel ◽  
Women's Lives

The Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) provides limited information about women's lives in ancient Israel, but various other sources are available that can be used to reconstruct aspects of women's everyday activities and their roles in important lifecycle events. In this article I present two different case studies—brewing beer and childbirth—in order to show how much we can learn about Israelite women's lives using archaeology, iconography, ethnography, and ancient Near Eastern and Egyptian textual sources along with passages from the Hebrew Bible.

On Agricultural Imagery in Biblical Descriptions of Catastrophes

2012 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 2-14
Author(s):  
Nili Samet
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Mass Killing ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Biblical Literature ◽  
Ancient Israel

This article examines the use of agricultural imagery in biblical literature to embody the destructive force of war and other mass catastrophes. Activities such as vintage, harvest, threshing, and wine-pressing serve as metaphors for the actions of slaughtering, demolition and mass killing. The paper discusses the Ancient Near Eastern origins of the imagery under discussion, and presents the relevant examples from the Hebrew Bible, tracing the development of this absorbing metaphor, and analyzing the different meanings attached to it in different contexts. It shows that the use of destructive agricultural imagery first emerges in ancient Israel as an instance of popular phraseology. In turn, the imagery is employed as a common prophetic motif. The prophetic books examined demonstrate how each prophet appropriates earlier uses of the imagery in prophetic discourse and adapts the agricultural metaphors to suit specific rhetorical needs.

scholarly journals Sidang Ilahi Elohim Dalam Mazmur 82:1

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marthin Steven Lumingkewas ◽  
Firman Panjaitan
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Hebrew Text ◽  
The Other ◽  
Main Method ◽  
Religious System ◽  
Dialectical Theology ◽  
Ancient Israel ◽  
Divine Council ◽  
Religious Systems

In the Old Testament Yahweh is frequently called El. The question is raised whether Yahweh was a form of the god El from the beginning or whether they were separate deities who only became equated later. They whom uphold theory Yahweh and El were conceived as separate deities holds that Yahweh was a southern storm god from Seir and so on, which was brought by the Israelites and conflated with the Jerusalem patriarchal deity.On the other side there are scholars who hold and conceived Yahweh and El as one single deity. These scholars defend this position most commonly on the grounds that no distinction between the two can be clearly found in the Hebrew Bible. The methodology used in this paper is literary – historical and social interpretations, with the main method being the "diachronic and dialectical theology of Hegel". The simple Hegelian method is: A (thesis) versus B (anti-thesis) equals C (synthesis). The author analyzes (thesis) by collecting instruments related to ancient Semitic religions; it includes data on El and Yahweh assembly obtained from Hebrew text sources and extra-biblical manuscripts which are then processed in depth. The antithesis is to analyze El's assembly development in Israel – especially in Psalm 82. While the synthesis appears in the nuances of the El’s assembly believe in ancient Israel. The focus of this paper's research is to prove 2 things: first, is Psalm 82: 1, is an Israeli Psalm that uses the patterns and forms of the Canaanite Psalms; especially regarding religious systems that use the terminology of the divine council. Second, to prove that El and Yahweh in the context of this Psalm are two different gods, of which this view contradicts several ANET experts such as Michael S, Heisser who sets El and Yahweh in this text as identical gods. The results of this study attempt to prove that Israel and the Canaan contextually share the same religious system, and are seen to be separated in the Deuteronomist era with their Yahwistic reforms.

Laws in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samuel Greengus
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Biblical Studies ◽  
Biblical Law ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
The People ◽  
Divine Origin ◽  
The Law ◽  
Criminal Behaviors ◽  
The Many

Biblical laws are found mainly in the Pentateuch (i.e., the first five books of the Hebrew Bible). The laws are linked to the figure of Moses, who is depicted as having received them directly from God in order to transmit them to the people of Israel during the years in the Wilderness after being released from slavery in Egypt. Biblical laws are thus presented as being of divine origin. Their authority was further bolstered by a tradition that they were included in covenants (i.e., formal agreements made between God and the people as recorded in the books of Exodus and Deuteronomy). Similar claims of divine origin were not made for other ancient Near Eastern laws; their authority flowed from kings, who issued the laws, although these kings might also be seen as having been placed on their thrones through the favor of the gods. The biblical law collections are unlike other ancient Near Eastern “codes” in that they include sacral laws (i.e., governing cult, worship, and ritual, as well as secular laws: namely, governing civil, and criminal behaviors). This mingling of sacral and secular categories is the likely reason both for the many terms used to denote the laws, as well as for the unexpected number of formulations in which they are presented. The formulations used in biblical law can be classified as “casuistic” or “non-casuistic.” They are not equally distributed in the books of the Pentateuch nor are they equally used with secular and sacral laws. While there are similarities in content between secular laws found in the Hebrew Bible and laws found in the ancient Near Eastern law “codes,” the latter do not exhibit a comparable variety in the numbers of law terms and formulations. The Hebrew Bible tended to “blur” the differences between the law terms and their formulations, ultimately to the point of subsuming them all under the law term torah (“teaching”) to describe the totality of the divinely given laws in the Pentateuch. Biblical studies in general and Pentateuchal studies in particular are challenged by the fact that manuscripts contemporary with the events described have not survived the ravages the time. Scholars must therefore rely on looking for “clues” within the texts themselves (e.g., the laws cited by the prophets, the reform of Josiah, the teaching of torah by Ezra, and evidence for customs and customary laws found in books of the Hebrew Bible outside of the Pentateuch).

Wisdom Traditions and the Writings

2018 ◽  
pp. 83-98
Author(s):  
James L. Crenshaw
Keyword(s):  
Social Status ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Wisdom Literature ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Ancient Israel ◽  
Wisdom Traditions ◽  
Wisdom Of Solomon ◽  
History Of

This chapter explores the wisdom literature and teachings of sages and scribes in ancient Israel, with a special focus on the postexilic and early Roman periods. Definitions of wisdom, sage, and scribe, their social status, their literary identities, and their teachings are discussed. Pertinent comparisons with ancient Near Eastern wisdom literature, Torah and Prophets in the Hebrew Bible, and the history of ancient Israel anchor presentations of Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Sirach, and Wisdom of Solomon. The importance and pertinence of this literature and its teachings for ancient and contemporary seekers of wisdom are argued throughout.

Reading Hebrew Bible Narratives

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Andrew Dearman
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Cultural Analysis ◽  
Western Society ◽  
Multiple Methods ◽  
Marriage And Family ◽  
Samuel 1 ◽  
Ancient Israel ◽  
Historical Dramas

The narrative traditions in the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible are classical and canonical accounts in Western society and can be interpreted as historical dramas, using multiple methods of literary and historical analysis. Chapters in the book include introductory discussions of literary approaches to historical narratives such as plot, theme, characterization, and semantics, as well as historical and cultural analysis of their ancient contexts. Each chapter emphasizes interaction with specific biblical texts, interpreting them in the context of ancient Israel’s national storyline, and encourages readers to approach them dialogically. Narratives for examination are drawn from the books of Genesis, Deuteronomy, Judges, Ruth, 2 Samuel, 1 Kings, Ezra, and Nehemiah. Texts from the books of Genesis and Ruth receive repeated attention, as does the topic of marriage and family in ancient Israel. This attention allows readers to see the same topic in various literary/historical settings and to engage similar texts with multiple methods.

Narratives in the Hebrew Bible

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Andrew Dearman
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Narrative Analysis ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Narrative Style ◽  
Cause And Effect ◽  
Ancient Israel

This chapter introduces readers to the narrative traditions in the Old Testament, their contexts, and basic perspectives in reading them. They exist as separate books and as parts of others books in the OT and they function as explanations for ancient Israel’s identity. Several characteristics of narrative analysis are identified as aids in reading these texts, including plot, character, point of view, and style. And some broad characteristics of Hebrew narrative style are identified, including the preference for speech and the omniscience of the author in presenting cause and effect. The broader historical setting of ancient Israel is sketched as necessary background for interpreting Old Testament narratives.

Violence and Personhood in Ancient Israel and Comparative Contexts

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. M. Lemos
Keyword(s):  
Social Organization ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Human Body ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Western World ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Ancient Israel ◽  
American Society ◽  
The Right

How should the human body be treated? Should bodies be slaughtered, starved, tortured, sold, and shot in the streets? Whose bodies should be treated in these ways and whose protected from harm? Who has the right to seek redress in cases of abuse and who is seen as fit for dehumanization? This book addresses these very questions, examining materials from the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, ancient Near Eastern literature, and contemporary American society. In the first book-length work on personhood in ancient Israel, the author reveals widespread intersections between violence and personhood in both this society and the wider region. Relations of domination and subordination were so important to the culture and social organization of ancient Israel that these relations too often determined the boundaries of personhood itself. Rather than being fixed, personhood was malleable—it could be and was violently erased in many social contexts. The book exposes a violence–personhood–masculinity nexus in which domination allowed those in control to animalize and brutalize the bodies of subordinates. Perhaps even more noteworthy, the author argues that in particular social contexts in the contemporary “Western” world, this same nexus operates, holding devastating consequences for particular social groups. If the violence of Abu Ghraib calls to mind that of Ashurbanipal, this is no accident but is instead because both arise from of a certain construction of personhood that could not exist without violence.

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