Three Bloomsbury books

NEW BOOKS FROM BLOOMSBURY:

Zechariah’s Vision Report and Its Earliest Interpreters
A Redaction-Critical Study of Zechariah 1-8

By: Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer

Published: 01-14-2016
Format: Hardback
Edition: 1st
Extent: 296
ISBN: 9780567665225
Imprint: Bloomsbury T&T Clark
Series: The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies
Volume: 626
Dimensions: 6 1/8" x 9 1/4"
List price: $120.00

About Zechariah’s Vision Report and Its Earliest Interpreters

If Zechariah's vision report (Zechariah 1.8-6.8) reflects the seer's visionary experience, how does that impact our understanding of the gradual growth of the text? Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer builds on the work done in her previous book Zechariah and His Visions (Bloomsbury-T&T Clark, 2014), to demonstrate that the visionary material forms the primary textual layer. The oracular texts constitute chronologically later interpretations. Zechariah and/or later authors/editors sought guidance in the earlier vision accounts, and the oracular material reflects these endeavours. Tiemeyer's investigation is guided by the question: what is the latter material doing with the former? Is it enforcing, contradicting, or adding to it?

Using a ratio composed of the difference between the intratexts and intertexts of Zech 1-8, Tiemeyer shows how this ratio is higher in the oracular material than in the visionary material. This difference points to the different origin and the different purpose of the two sets of material. While the earlier vision report draws on images found primarily in other biblical vision reports, the later oracular material has the characteristics of scribal interpretation. By drawing on earlier material, it seeks to anchor its proposed interpretations of the various vision accounts within the Israelite textual tradition. It is clear that the divine oracles were added to give, modify, and specify the meaning of the earlier vision report.

Worlds that Could Not Be: Utopia in Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah

Editor(s): Frauke Uhlenbruch, Steven J. Schweitzer

Published: 01-28-2016
Format: Hardback
Edition: 1st
Extent: 224
ISBN: 9780567664051
Imprint: Bloomsbury T&T Clark
Series: The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies
Volume: 620
Dimensions: 6 1/8" x 9 1/4"
List price: $112.00

About Worlds that Could Not Be: Utopia in Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah

The idea of Utopia was first made current and popular by Sir Thomas More with the publication of his book by the same name in 1516. The 'no-place' that was created has had a fantastic reception history, which makes its application to the biblical books of Nehemiah, Ezra and Chronicles as vibrant as the current scholarship which is ongoing into the Renaissance term and its implications. The essays in this collection take different approaches to the question: are there proto-utopian elements in the three books from the Hebrew Bible? Methodological considerations are to be found, but each essay also moves beyond the methodological constraint to raise the hypothetical question of 'what if?' in different ways.

The essays evaluate the potential, and pitfalls, of reading Biblical books as (proto-)utopian. Topics include how utopia construct intricate counter-realities, and how to tell whether a proposal diagnosed as 'utopian' from a modern point of view is meant to motivate its audience to political action. Case studies which read aspects of Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah as potential utopian traits include the restoration project of Ezra-Nehemiah and the rejection of foreign wives, utopian concerns in Chronicles, as well as the empire's role in writing a putative utopia, and King Solomon as a utopian fantasy-king.

The Return of the King
Messianic Expectation in Book V of the Psalter

By: Michael K. Snearly

Published: 11-19-2015
Format: Hardback
Edition: 1st
Extent: 248
ISBN: 9780567664334
Imprint: Bloomsbury T&T Clark
Series: The Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies
Volume: 624
Dimensions: 6 1/8" x 9 1/4"
List price: $112.00

About The Return of the King

The clear structure of psalm groups in Psalms 107-150 can be interpreted as signaling a renewed hope in the royal/Davidic promises. Each psalm group of Book V is organized around a theme or key word that is related to the royal/Davidic hope in the earlier sections of the Psalter: Psalms 107-118; Psalm 119; Psalms 120-137; Psalms 138-145; Psalms 146-150. These words and themes figure prominently at the major seam psalms of the Psalter – Psalms 1-2 and 89. Thus, the content and subject matter at the end of the Psalter is integrally related to the content and subject matter at the beginning.

The editorial-critical method used by Snearly is an extension of the method used by David M. Howard, Jr. in The Structure of Psalms 93-100. Snearly also draws from recent insights in the fields of poetics and text-linguistics in order to establish a linguistically based foundation for reading the Psalter as a unified text. The methodology emphasizes parallel features, with special focus on key-word links. This method advances editorial criticism by not only discerning links within a group but also showing that those links do not occur with the same frequency outside of the group.

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