Nocturnal Ciphers

Nocturnal Ciphers

Author: Scott B. Noegel

Publisher:

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 376

ISBN-13:

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Noegel's study deals with the very important phenomena of enigmatic dreams, their interpretation, word-play and punning within the cultural context of the Ancient Near East (i.e., Mesopotamia, Egypt, Canaan and Israel), Greece, and Rabbinic traditions. His basic idea is to demonstrate how dream interpretation was predicated by word-play and punning of dream interpreters.


Nocturnal Ciphers

Nocturnal Ciphers

Author: Scott B. Noegel

Publisher:

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 376

ISBN-13:

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Noegel's study deals with the very important phenomena of enigmatic dreams, their interpretation, word-play and punning within the cultural context of the Ancient Near East (i.e., Mesopotamia, Egypt, Canaan and Israel), Greece, and Rabbinic traditions. His basic idea is to demonstrate how dream interpretation was predicated by word-play and punning of dream interpreters.


Zechariah and His Visions

Zechariah and His Visions

Author: Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2015-02-26

Total Pages: 330

ISBN-13: 0567658546

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Did Zechariah really see visions? This question cannot be definitely answered, so the idea must remain a hypothesis. Here, Tiemeyer shows that this hypothesis is nonetheless reasonable and instrumental in shedding light on matters in Zechariah's vision report that are otherwise unclear. Tracking through each verse of the text, the key exegetical problems are covered, including the topics of the distinction between visions and dreams, dream classification, conflicting sources of evidence for dream experiences, and rhetorical imagery as opposed to dream experience. Further attention is focused on the transmission of the divine message to Zechariah, with the key question raised of whether a visual or oral impression is described. Tiemeyer's study further demonstrates that Zech 1-6 depicts a three-tier reality. This description seeks to convey the seer's visionary experience to his readers. In a trance state, Zechariah communicates with the Interpreting Angel, while also receiving glimpses of a deeper reality known as the 'visionary world.'


The Production of Prophecy

The Production of Prophecy

Author: Diana Vikander Edelman

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-12-18

Total Pages: 273

ISBN-13: 1317490304

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The Persian and Hellenistic periods saw the production and use of a variety of authoritative texts in Israel. 'The Production of Prophecy' brings together a range of influential biblical scholars to examine the construction of prophecy and prophetic books during the Persian period. Drawing on methodological and comparative research and studies of particular biblical texts, the volume explores biblical prophecy as a written phenomenon, examining the prophets of the past, setting this within the general history of Yehud. The relationship between prophetic and other authoritative, written texts is explored, as well as the general social and ideological setting in which the prophetic books emerged.


Joseph

Joseph

Author: Alan T. Levenson

Publisher: U of Nebraska Press

Published: 2016-09

Total Pages: 313

ISBN-13: 082761294X

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The complex and dramatic story of Joseph is the most sustained narrative in Genesis. Many call it a literary masterpiece and a story of great depth that can be read on many levels. In a lucid and engaging style, Alan T. Levenson brings the voices of Philo, Josephus, Midrash, and medieval commentators, as well as a wide range of modern scholars, into dialogue about this complex biblical figure. Levenson explores such questions as: Why did Joseph’s brothers hate him so? What is achieved by Joseph’s ups and downs on the path to extraordinary success? Why didn’t Joseph tell his father he was alive and ruling Egypt? What was Joseph like as a husband and father? Was Joseph just or cruel in testing his brothers’ characters? Levenson deftly shows how an unbroken chain of interpretive traditions, mainly literary but also artistic, have added to the depth of this fascinating and unique character.


Approaches to Literary Readings of Ancient Jewish Writings

Approaches to Literary Readings of Ancient Jewish Writings

Author: Klaas Smelik

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2013-09-26

Total Pages: 293

ISBN-13: 9004258566

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In this volume twelve contributions discuss the relevance, accuracy, potential, and possible alternatives to a literary reading of ancient Jewish writings, especially the Hebrew Bible. Drawing on different academic fields (biblical studies, rabbinic studies, and literary studies) and on various methodologies (literary criticism, rhetorical criticism, cognitive linguistics, historical criticism, and reception history), the essays form a state-of-the-art overview of the current use of the literary approach toward ancient Jewish texts. The volume convincingly shows that the latest approaches to a literary reading can still enhance our understanding of these texts.


Judges 1

Judges 1

Author: Mark S. Smith

Publisher: Fortress Press

Published: 2021-11-23

Total Pages: 924

ISBN-13: 1506480497

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This groundbreaking volume presents a new translation of the text and detailed interpretation of almost every word or phrase in the book of Judges, drawing from archaeology and iconography, textual versions, biblical parallels, and extrabiblical texts, many never noted before. Archaeology also serves to show how a story of the Iron II period employed visible ruins to narrate supposedly early events from the so-called "period of the Judges." The synchronic analysis for each unit sketches its characters and main themes, as well as other literary dynamics. The diachronic, redactional analysis shows the shifting settings of units as well as their development, commonly due to their inner-textual reception and reinterpretation. The result is a remarkably fresh historical-critical treatment of 1:1-10:5.


Nomadic Text

Nomadic Text

Author: Brennan W. Breed

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2014-05-13

Total Pages: 316

ISBN-13: 0253012627

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Brennan W. Breed claims that biblical interpretation should focus on the shifting capacities of the text, viewing it as a dynamic process rather than a static product. Rather than seeking to determine the original text and its meaning, Breed proposes that scholars approach the production, transmission, and interpretation of the biblical text as interwoven elements of its overarching reception history. Grounded in the insights of contemporary literary theory, this approach alters the framing questions of interpretation from "What does this text mean?" to "What can this text do?"


Genesis

Genesis

Author: Bill T. Arnold

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2008-10-06

Total Pages: 529

ISBN-13: 131602556X

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This commentary is an innovative interpretation of one of the most profound texts of world literature: the book of Genesis. The first book of the Bible has been studied, debated, and expounded as much as any text in history, yet because it addresses the weightiest questions of life and faith, it continues to demand our attention. The author of this new commentary combines older critical approaches with the latest rhetorical methodologies to yield fresh interpretations accessible to scholars, clergy, teachers, seminarians, and interested laypeople. It explains important concepts and terms as expressed in the Hebrew original so that both people who know Hebrew and those who do not will be able to follow the discussion. 'Closer Look' sections examine Genesis in the context of cultures of the ancient Near East. 'Bridging the Horizons' sections enable the reader to see the enduring relevance of the book in the twenty-first century.


Imagining the Jewish God

Imagining the Jewish God

Author: Leonard Kaplan

Publisher: Lexington Books

Published: 2016-09-09

Total Pages: 575

ISBN-13: 1498517501

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Jewish art has always been with us, but so has a broader canvas of Jewish imaginings: in thought, in emotion, in text, and in ritual practice. Imagining the Jewish God was there in the beginning, as it were, engraved and embedded in the ways Jews lived and responded to their God.This book attempts to give voice to these diverse imaginings of the Jewish God, and offers these collected essays and poems as a living text meant to provoke a substantive and nourishing dialogue. A responsive, living covenant lies at the heart of this book—a covenantal reciprocity that actively engages the dynamics of Jewish thinking and acting in dialogue with God. The contributors to this volume are committed to this form of textual reasoning, even as they all move us beyond the “text” as foundational for the imagined “people of the book.” That people, we submit, lives and breathes in and beyond the texts of poetry, narrative, sacred literature, film, and graphic mediums. We imagine the Jewish people, and the covenant they respond to, as provocative intimations of the divine. The essays in this volume seek to draw these vocal intimations out so that we can all hear their resonant call.