A NEW ESSAY on the Bible and Interpretation website:

Assyriology and Biblical Studies:
Time for Reassessment?

Biblical scholars since the 1970s have often tended to be ahistorical or anti-historical in approach. This too needs to change. Comparative ancient Near Eastern methods are necessary to bring balance and perspective to biblical studies without being ideologically polemical or apologetic in nature. It is regrettable that some in the past have used comparative methods as a plank in a Christian or Jewish apologetical platform. However, the excesses or aberrations in the past are no excuse for isolation and restrictivism in the present.

Bill T. Arnold
Professor of Old Testament and Semitic Languages
Asbury Theological Seminary
April 2005