Abram the One from Beyond-the-River, and King Chedorlaomer of Elam (Genesis 14): Persia and the Formation of Judaean Ethnic Identity in a Late Patriarchal Narrative

The perception of Persia in Judaean/Jewish texts from antiquity contributed to the construction of a Judaean/Jewish identity. Genesis 14 gives an example of this; in it, Abra(ha)m wages war with a coalition headed by King Chedorlaomer of Elam. The article argues that Genesis 14 is one of the latest additions to the patriarchal narratives (Genesis 12–36), composed in the Persian or early Hellenistic period. It was conceived and used as an ethnic identity-forming story. The characters in the narrative represented groups and nations in the neighbourhood of the province of Judah. Abra(ha)m was perceived as the ancestor of the Judaeans and the inhabitants of the province Beyond-the-River. The King of Elam represented the Persian Empire. The article uses redaction criticism to argue that Genesis 14 is among the latest additions to the patriarchal narrative in the late Persian or Hellenistic period. Moreover, it uses a combination of philological and historical methods to argue that the description of Abra(ha)m as hāʿibrî (traditionally translated “the Hebrew,” Gen 14: 13) characterises him as a person from the region Eber-nāri (Beyond-the-River). The article uses similar methods to argue that the names of people and places in Genesis 14 referred to political entities in and around Judah. Eventually, the article uses Anthony D. Smith’s theory of ethnic community and elements from postcolonial theory as “reading lenses” and a framework for analysing Genesis 14. Reading this way underscores that Genesis 14 originated and worked as an ethnic identity-forming story.

Concepts and Methods in the Study of the Qur’ān

This paper addresses methodological issues in Qur’anic studies. At first, it intends to explain, through historiographical analysis, why methods proved fruitful in biblical and New Testament studies, such as form criticism and redaction criticism, have been disregarded in Qur’anic studies; secondly, it vindicates the application of such methods to the Qur’anic corpus; thirdly, it tries to exemplify the relevance of redaction criticism through examples. Two main issues are then discussed: the best way to account for the “synoptic problem” (the presence, in the Qur’ān, of variant parallel narratives), through an examination of some aspects of the Adam-Iblīs narratives (more precisely the composition of Q 2:30–38 and the nature of the relations between Q 38:71–85 and Q 15:26–43); and the beginning of Q 55. Two main conclusions are reached: first, the later versions of a parallel story are, in the examples discussed here, rewritings of earlier stories (namely, re-compositions based on a written version); second, sura 55 features the intervention of different authors, with two different profiles.

Überlegungen zu ausgewählten Aspekten der Behandlung des Jeremiabuchs in der Monographie von Benjamin Ziemer „Kritik des Wachstumsmodells“ (2020)

In a massive study, Benjamin Ziemer has launched a scathing stricture of redaction criticism in Old Testament studies. Based on comparative material from an impressive range of Ancient Near Eastern, biblical, early Jewish and early Christian literature, he maintains that diachronic research is unable to deliver meaningful reconstructions that reach more than one stage of textual development behind the present biblical text. Moving beyond that boundary would amount to unfettered speculation. While his appraisal is overwhelmingly negative, there is one biblical book on which he endeavors to devise a redaction-critical hypothesis of his own: the book of Jeremiah. The article evaluates Ziemer’s theory on Jeremiah and draws some general conclusions regarding the validity of his verdict on traditional redaction-critical research.

In Defence of R. H. Lightfoot

A recent NTS article by B. Massey gives a highly critical appraisal of the work of R. H. Lightfoot, questioning Lightfoot's academic integrity and claiming that he borrowed much of his work from others without proper attribution. A study of Lightfoot's writings suggests however that Lightfoot did clearly acknowledge his debt to others and that he did not try to claim the ideas of others as his own. Further, his standing within English-speaking scholarship, as one who publicised the work of German form critics and who anticipated in a significant way the work of later redaction criticism, can remain intact and his work is still valuable today.

*Þórðar saga kakala hin mikla: Reconstructing the lost original of a saga from the Sturlunga compilation

Scholars of pre-Modern literature are becoming increasingly aware of the necessity to include the study of lost texts within literary histories (Matthews 2020, 230). The study of lost literary works (eclipsaphilology) can make use of techniques belonging to the field of textual criticism such as stemmatics, but is able to go beyond them in reconstructing the contents, and not necessarily form, when – for example – disentangling remnants of source texts from compilations. This mode of study has long been practiced in Bible Studies, for example by the proponents of the documentary hypothesis. In this article, I attempt to lay out the contents of the lost original of a component text of the fourteenth-century Sturlunga saga, namely: Þórðar saga kakala (*Þórðar saga kakala hin mikla). The approach taken to reconstructing the content of the lost original of Þórðar saga kakala in this article is an inversion of redaction criticism. It seeks after the contents of the source text, *Þórðar saga kakala hin mikla, by taking the contents of Þórðar saga kakala in the extant manuscripts and reversing the compilational and editorial processes in play throughout its transmission history. This critique makes use of the categories of evidence used in textual criticism (external and internal evidence), but is not interested in the production of an edition of the lost original.

Exegesis of the Book of Isaiah 61:1–11: Redaction Criticism and Inquiry into the Identity of the Prophet Known as Trito-Isaiah

The exegesis of Isa 61 demonstrated that the chapter is a separate composition, which comprises a framing device in vv. 1–3.10.11, and a middle section in vv. 4–9. This section did not have to originate as a single fragment. From the literary-critical standpoint, the suspect element is v. 3aa, which currently serves to connect Isa 61 with the adjacent chapters 60, and 62. However, it is best to interpret the pericope as a single whole, with the speaker being the prophetic “I,” stylised after the servant-prophet from the Deutero-Isaiah’s Songs of the Servant of the Lord. Behind this “I,” there are probably the tradents of Deutero-Isaiah’s traditions, updating his promises and adding new ones. In that case, the prophet Trito-Isaiah, who was to be reminiscent of the earlier prophets, speaking before the people, never existed. That, however, does not alter the fact that the tradents did consider themselves to be the servant of the Lord, and regarded their mission to be a prophetic one.

Understanding Compassion in the Gospel of Matthew (Matthew 14:13–21)

The compassionate-love Jesus feels moves him to solve the problems of the suffering. Hence, everything Jesus thought, said, or did in his mission to salvage humankind was motivated by compassionate love. Jesus demonstrated that his mission-mandate should be done on the platform of genuine compassionate love. That is why, in the gospels, he was described as always being moved by compassion. Jesus demonstrated that his followers are to carry on the mission-mandate of the church in compassionate love. But in this era, the church has undergone a paradigm shift from this model of Jesus’ compassion. The problem of the church being less compassionate is hindering the contemporary church from achieving mission-desired goals. Consequently, this article studies the concept of compassion as an underlying theme in the gospel of Matthew and its implications for the mission-mandate of the church in Nigeria. Through the application of the redaction-criticism method of doing biblical exegesis, the study found that the church in Nigeria lacks the model of compassion which Jesus exemplified.

READING THE NEW TESTAMENT STEREOSCOPICALLY

This article investigates how the reading of the Bible in the segregated spheres of church, society and academy has been institutionalised in the way Biblical Studies is taught at most state universities and seminaries in South Africa. It proposes that the way students are trained for ministry should be restructured so that they are encouraged to intentionally use the hermeneutical insights they have obtained in their biblical studies to create stereoscopic readings of the Bible for use in ecclesiological settings. A stereoscopic reading of the Bible directly challenges the clear distinction that is often made between the way in which the Bible is read in the sphere of the church in contrast to that of the academic sphere. Students must not only be taught the theory of source criticism, redaction criticism, tradition criticism, narrative criticism and other approaches to the study the Bible; they must also be taught how to create material with which to help others gain a deeper understanding of the biblical text by reflecting on its inter- and intra-texts, as well as the various pre-texts, final-texts and post-texts that all form part of what the church considers to be scripture.