Three new books

FROM MOHR SIEBECK:

Saul

Israels König in Tradition, Redaktion und früher Rezeption
[Saul. Israel's King in Tradition, Redaction and Early Reception.]

Published in German.

In this study, Hannes Bezzel examines King Saul and the diachronic genesis of this literary character. The starting point is the "early reception history" up to the end of the 1st century C.E., and more precisely, the Saul-images of Ben Sira's laus patrum, the Qumran document 4Q252, the Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum , and of Josephus' Antiquitates Judaicae . Based on these studies, the author further pursues the phenomenon of "rewritten Bible /scripture" , first into the Books of Chronicles, then into the redaction history of the Books of Samuel. Here, his analysis finds an older Saul tradition in I Sam 9-10*; 11*; 14,47-51*. Within the scope of an enhanced Samuel-Saul-circle (I Sam 1*; 4*; 9-10*; 13-14*; 29*; 31*) the topic of the Philistines was introduced by means of the literary figure Samuel. Only in a third step was this narrative circle connected with the David tradition in the context of a "History of David's Rise."


Das Gottesbild in der Offenbarung des Johannes

Hrsg. v. Martin Stowasser

[The Image of God in the Book of Revelation.]

Published in German.

The Book of Revelation presents a manifold and very complex picture of God. The approaches used to illustrate this in the current volume of collected essays range from the history of religion to theology. The authors consider the perspective of intertextuality with the Old Testament, as well as elements received from contemporary Greco-Roman culture that shape the image of God. They also highlight the elements of political and social critique it is associated with in Revelation. The issue of monotheism is taken up when the question of a functional or essential dimension of the image of Christ and the transfer of divine epitheta to the Lamb are discussed. Finally common features and differences with the Gospel of John when speaking of God are addressed as well as the reception of God's portrait in the Book of Revelation in modern literature.


Covenant and Election in Exilic and Post-Exilic Judaism

Studies of the Sofja Kovalevskaja Research Group on Early Jewish Monotheism. Vol. V
Ed. by Nathan MacDonald

Covenant and election are two theological concepts that dominate the landscape of the Hebrew Bible. If they became the main structuring concepts of the Hebrew Bible, they were not so from the beginning. Their centrality was the result of their utilization by exilic and post-exilic scribes and tradents to focus Israel's traditions into a coherent structure as fitted the revelation of one God. The essays in this collection examine covenant and election across the biblical literature, from the priestly document through Deuteronomy to Jeremiah and the book of Chronicles. They show how the ideas were shaped and refined under the conditions of national disaster and rebuilding.