T&T Clark Studies in the Hebrew Bible: The Torah (6 vols.)

by Joseph Blenkinsopp; John Day; Matthew A. Thomas; David Janzen

and

2 more

Publishers:

T&T Clark; Bloomsbury

, 2011–2013

Overview

These volumes from T&T Clark offer the latest research on the Torah in the Hebrew Bible and interpretation of key texts, figures, and themes. Several volumes analyze the Torah as a whole, offering an understanding of the Pentateuch’s overarching structure and themes. Matthew A. Thomas offers an analysis of the toledot formula as an organizing feature with implications for Genesis and the entire Pentateuch. Several volumes examine Genesis 1–11 in detail and offer new insights to its structure and meaning. Other volumes present in-depth treatments of Cain and Moses in the Torah. From the overarching structure and themes to significant passages and figures, this collection of academic monographs allows you to study the Torah with the best in the field.

With the Logos editions, these valuable volumes are enhanced by amazing functionality and features. Scripture and ancient-text citations link directly to English translations and original-language texts, and important terms link to dictionaries, encyclopedias, and a wealth of other resources in your digital library. Perform powerful searches with the Topic Guide to instantly gather relevant biblical texts and resources together, enabling you to jump into the conversation with the foremost scholars on the Torah. Tablet and mobile apps let you take the discussion with you. With Logos Bible Software, the most efficient and comprehensive research tools are in one place so you get the most out of your study.

Key Features

• Includes structural examination of Genesis and the Pentateuch
• Provides intertextual analysis of the Torah in the Psalms and the prophets
• Contains in-depth commentary of Genesis 1–11
• Offers a study of Moses from an ancient Near Eastern perspective

Contributors

• Joseph Blenkinsopp
• John Day
• Dirk J. Human

Product Details

• Title: T&T Clark Studies in the Hebrew Bible The Torah
• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Volumes: 6
• Pages: 1,352

Creation, Un-creation, Re-creation: A Discursive Commentary on Genesis 1-11

• Author: Joseph Blenkinsopp
• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Publication Date: 2011
• Pages: 232

Sample Pages: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

Joseph Blenkinsopp provides a new commentary on Genesis 1–11, the so-called “primeval history” in which the account of creation is given. Blenkinsopp argues that, from a biblical point of view, creation cannot be restricted to a single event, nor to two versions of an event, as depicted in Genesis 1–3. Rather, it must take in the whole period of creation arranged in the sequence of creation, uncreation, and recreation as see in Genesis 1–11.

Through the course of the commentary, presented in continuous discussion rather than in a rigid verse-by-verse form, Blenkinsopp takes into account premodern interpretations of the texts, especially in the Jewish interpretative tradition, as well as modern, historical-critical interpretations. While Blenkinsopp takes into account reconstructions of the text’s sources, he analyzes its canonical form, enabling him to focus upon the literary structure and theological message of this section of Scripture as a whole.

Blenkinsopp has poured a career’s worth of scholarship into nearly 200 pages, writing with erudition and insight into the key difficulties—textual, hermeneutical, and theological—that accompany Gen 1–11 . . . Blenkinsopp has adeptly raised the profile of creation in the biblical text and joins a vibrant and robust conversation currently going on within scholarship that shows creation is not a marginal idea but one of fundamental and generative importance.

—Review of Biblical Literature

Blenkinsopp brings his vast learning to the much studied chapters of Genesis 1–11. His particular interest and competence is to show the many ways in which these chapters are situated in a rich world of texts including antecedent Mesopotamian texts and belated Jewish and Christian texts. His focus, however, is on the question, ‘How did things go wrong?’ He traces the way in which the narrative probes the deep reality of evil in God’s good creation. Blenkinsopp sets a bountiful table from which his readers will be able to continue the hard, urgent work of theological interpretation. We still live in a world where ‘things have gone wrong.’ This book suggests the connections between ‘then’ and ‘now.’

—Walter Brueggemann, professor emeritus of Old Testament, Columbia Theological Seminary

Blenkinsopp writes with great erudition and also with great lucidity. He is distilling the insights gained from a lifetime in scholarship. This book will be useful as a supplementary textbook in Old Testament courses.

—John J. Collins, Holmes Professor of Old Testament, Yale Divinity School

This stimulating commentary, based on a lifetime’s study and reflection, makes a major contribution to unraveling the myriad problems of interpretation in Genesis 1–11. The author’s great erudition ensures that scholars and students will learn much from it, whilst its clear presentation makes it accessible to the lay reader. This wide ranging volume is packed full of valuable theological insights and makes impressive use of other biblical, ancient Near Eastern, classical, and later Jewish sources to illumine the text.

—John Day, professor of Old Testament studies, Oxford University

Joseph Blenkinsopp is professor emeritus of biblical studies at the University of Notre Dame and the author of several books.

From Creation to Babel: Studies in Genesis 1–11

• Author: John Day
• Series: Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies (LHBOTS/JSOTS)
• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Publication Date: 2013
• Pages: 208

The stories of Genesis 1–11 constitute one of the better known parts of the Old Testament, but their precise meaning and background still provide many debated questions for the modern interpreter. In this stimulating, learned, and readable collection of essays, which paves the way for his forthcoming ICC volume on these chapters, John Day attempts to provide definitive solutions to some of these questions. The topics he addresses include the background and interpretation of the seven-day priestly creation narrative, problems in the interpretation of the Garden of Eden story, the relation of Cain and the Kenites, the strange stories of the sons of God and daughters of men and of Noah’s drunkenness and the curse of Canaan, the precise ancient Near Eastern background of the flood story and the preceding genealogies, and the meaning and background of the story of the tower and city of Babel. Throughout this volume, John Day seeks to determine the original meaning of these stories in the light of their ancient Near Eastern background, and to determine how far this original meaning has been obscured by later interpretations.

John Day is professor of Old Testament studies at the University of Oxford and Fellow and Tutor of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. He has written or edited numerous books and articles, and was appointed president of the Society for Old Testament Study for 2014.

These are the Generations: Identity, Covenant, and the ‘Toledot’ Formula

• Author: Matthew A. Thomas
• Series: Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies (LHBOTS/JSOTS)
• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Publication Date: 2011
• Pages: 176

Sample Pages: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

Using a combination of form-critical and linguistic methods, Matthew A. Thomas seeks to understand the role of the toledot formula—these are the generations of—in shaping the book of Genesis and the Pentateuch as a whole. An examination of the formula uncovers that it functions primarily as a heading to major sections of text and draws readers’ attention to focus on an ever narrower range of characters.

Through his analysis of this organizing structure in Genesis and the Pentateuch, Thomas offers resolutions to a number of tensions within the text and provides insights into a number of other questions surrounding the toledot formula and structural issues in the books of Moses.

This is a well-produced, well-researched volume, in the great tradition of the JSOTSup series. It gives careful attention to a feature of Genesis and the Pentateuch that has received more use than rigorous analysis in the past. Thomas’s work deserves the attention of everyone working on the book of Genesis.

—Review of Biblical Literature

Matthew Thomas points to a new dimension in reading the final form of the Pentateuch. By pointing to the significance of the toledot formulae as a structuring device in the Pentateuch—including the reference to the ‘generations’ of Aaron and Moses in Numbers 3:1—he prompts interpreters to recognize that the final form of the Pentateuch presents a history of humankind in general and Israel in particular that culminates in the institution of the Levitical priesthood.

—Marvin A. Sweeney, Claremont School of Theology and Claremont Graduate University

The function of the toledot formula to relate humanity, while also focusing the reader on an ever-narrowing story, is crucial for interpreting the Pentateuch. This form-critical study provides helpful insight in the important role of the toledot in structuring the present form of the text to develop the theme of covenant through the narrowing of divine-human relationships.

—Thomas B. Dozeman, professor of Hebrew Bible, United Theological Seminary, Dayton, OH

Matthew A. Thomas (PhD in Hebrew Bible, Claremont Graduate University) has served as a member of the adjunct faculty at Fuller Theological Seminary and at Azusa Pacific University.

Outside of Eden: Cain in the Ancient Versions of Genesis 4:1–16

• Author: M. W. Scarlata
• Series: Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies (LHBOTS/JSOTS)
• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Publication Date: 2012
• Pages: 256

This study is an examination of the principal ancient translations of Genesis 4:1–16 in the Hebrew Bible. The goal is to understand the translation techniques adopted by the translators, to what extent external influences may have affected their work, and how each version communicates its message through its literary form. In addition to the versional renderings of the Hebrew text, this inquiry also takes into account various ancient Jewish and Christian interpretations of the Cain narrative. The primary focus of the work is on the diverse exegetical tendencies of Hebrew Bible translation in the ancient world and on how these interpretations were transmitted in particular cultural milieus.

Mark W. Scarlata earned his PhD in Old Testament from Cambridge University and is currently lecturer in Old Testament at St. Mellitus College in London.

Royal Motifs in the Pentateuchal Portrayal of Moses

• Author: Danny Mathews
• Series: Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies (LHBOTS/JSOTS)
• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Publication Date: 2012
• Pages: 192

Sample Pages: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

Scholars have often recognized that Moses is portrayed in the Bible through the use of royal motifs, such as his abandonment at birth, flight from Pharaoh and portrayal as a shepherd, semi-divine figure, temple builder, military general, and lawgiver. Danny Matthews notes that these well-known motifs have been typically used to depict four famous rulers in the ancient Near East—Hammurabi, Esarhaddon, Nabonidus, and Cyrus. He then argues that the motifs have been adapted by the authors of the Pentateuch to affirm Moses as a more ancient leader, whose work has resulted in the constitution of the community of Israel. As a result, Israel’s identity and enduring existence rest upon the authority and legacy of Moses.

Danny Mathews received his PhD from Union Theological Seminary and is the assistant professor of religion at Pepperdine University.

The Violent Gift: Trauma’s Subversion of the Deuteronomistic History’s Narrative

• Author: David Janzen
• Series: Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies (LHBOTS/JSOTS)
• Publisher: T&T Clark
• Publication Date: 2012
• Pages: 288

The Violent Gift argues for an exilic source of the Deuteronomistic History which sought to provide an explanation for the trauma that the Judean community suffered in Babylon. As David Janzen follows this explanation through the history, he also employs categories and concepts of trauma theory. He argues that we can trace a single, coherent narrative throughout the Deuteronomistic History that is an attempt to explain to its original readers why the exile occurred. The narrative offers two reasons for the exile that form the two main themes of Deuteronomy’s narrative: the people failed in their covenantal loyalty to God; and their leadership also failed to enforce this loyalty. These themes can be traced consistently through all of the component books of the history.

Book by book, Janzen argues that the main—and expected—narrative line is disrupted by stories and evaluations in tension with it. What emerges is a fresh and thought-provoking reading of each of the books, with many a striking observation.

—Graeme Auld, professor of Hebrew Bible, University of Edinburgh

David Janzen is assistant professor of religious studies at North Central College in Illinois.