Evangelisch-theologische Fakultät

The European Union identified peacebuilding as one of the priorities of its foreign and security policy. Since 2003, when the EU launched its first three Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP)2 missions and operations, the prospects for the EU to pursue an individual policy on peacebuilding have increased. The involvement of the EU in post-conflict peacebuilding has become one of the major elements of CSDP missions and operations. The paper investigates the link between the concept of peacebuilding and the practice of CSDP operations and missions. It asks how the EU understands peacebuilding activities carried out in CSDP missions and operations. To examine these questions, the research resorts to an institutional analysis of the evolution of peacebuilding practices in the CSDP. The paper examines the decisionand policy-making structures responsible for the planning and development of peacebuilding activities in CSDP missions and operations. It explores how the EU institutions an...

This paper explores how Christian migrants of European background live their faith within their religious communities in Dublin. Immigrant congregations provide a place for the accommodation of religious and cultural packages that migrants take with them from their homelands. At the same time, immigrant congregations create opportunities for migrants to enter into new discourses and interactions with the host society. European migrants in Ireland are confronted with a two-fold reality: 1) the notion of loyalty to ethnic and cultural traditions, which urges on migrants’ conscience so that their ethnic and national identity is further strengthened, and 2) an opportunity to engage in intercultural interactions, which encourages migrants’ sense of belonging to the society in which they live. With the use of an ethnographic approach, this paper explores how the religious congregations of Polish, Slovak and German migrants in Dublin move from an ethnic-enclave experience to one that is en...

The use of ראשׁית elsewhere in P and the analogy of Prov 8,22 and Job 40,19 indicate that its meaning in Gen 1,1 is «first work”. The preposition beth can likewise by analogy with other occurrences in P (Gen 1,26; Ex 6,3) be understood as a beth essentiae. As ראשׁית is inherently determined and so does not form part of a construct relationship, Gen 1,1 should be translated as a heading: »As his first work God created heaven and earth«.

Conformément à sa signification ailleurs dans P, et selon Prov 8,22 et Job 40,19, ראשׁית signifie «prémices» en Gen 1,1. La préposition bèth peut être comprise, comme en d’autres occurrences chez P (Gen 1,26; Ex 6,3) comme bèth essentiae, au sens de «prémices» (de son oeuvre). Comme ראשׁית est déterminé de manière interne, et qu’il n’y a donc pas d’état construit, Gen 1,1 doit être compris comme épigraphe, au sens de: «En tant que prémices, Dieu a créé les cieux et la terre».

The narrative Is 7 unfolds a particular scenario in which only the initial verse 7:1 refers to the historical situation of the so-called Syriac-Ephraimitic war. What follows exhibits a complete different state of threat bearing a lot of similarities to Is 36–37. Several elements of the narrative Is 7 (the way of the fuller’s field, Shear-Yashub, the almah, Immanuel) only make sense within the context of Is 36–37 and other parts of the book of Isaiah. Is 7 is a highly intertextual entity that uses older texts to advocate its message of trustfulness in the God of Israel.

The exodus narrative (Ex 1–14*) is an originally independent work, which utilizes the tradition of the exodus of Israel from Egypt in order to solve an aporia of the ancient near eastern international law. The subject of this narrative is not the migration of Israelite prisoners of war, but rather the legitimacy of the rescission of the vassal status by Israel. According to the traditional view only the suzerain is entitled to release a vassal from his duty of loyality and paying tribute. Contrary to that, the exodus narrative provides a model how a relation of dependency may be annuled from the side of the vassal. In order to achieve this goal the God of Israel is introduced, who in the course of the plague narrative proves himself to be superior to the Pharaoh. Israel obtains her freedom by changing from the dominion of the Pharaoh to the dominion of Yahweh, the God of Israel. Comparable legal constructs are frequently attested in ancient near eastern sources: Cities or peoples are released from their duties toward the king in favour of their god or his temple respectively. Another legal procedure which stands in the background of the exodus narrative is the so-called sacred manumission. Here, a slave who is about to be manumitted comes in possession of a god or his temple respectively by being sold or transfered in some other way. The involvement of the divine lord ensures that the freedman cannot be enslaved again. The exodus narrative picks up these legal models and thereby advocates its claim for Isreal’s release from dependency.

The prohibition of foreign marriages in the HB disqualifies both, wives and their offspring. Similar laws from Greek cities suggest that membership in the popular assembly was the problem behind, since sons of citizens gained citizenship rights when of age. By contracting several wives rich people were able to enhance their stance. The parallel development suggests that Persian period Israel was organized like Greek cities: as an association of persons. Such polities need to control membership.

The comparison between Moses and Jeremiah traditionally aims at motifs like the fourty-year service or at the relation between a supposed dtr layer in the book of Jeremiah and the dtr depiction of Moses. This paper takes a different approach by investigating two scenes in which these two key figures of the Hebrew Bible assume a similar role. In Exod 18:20 Jethro advises Moses: „… and make them know the way in which they must walk and the deeds they are to do.“ In Jer 42:3 the people of Judah ask Jeremiah: „… and Jhwh your God may show us the way in which we must walk and the thing we are to do.“
Both, Jeremiah and Moses, act as prophets because they mediate between God and the people, but the instructions concerning „the way to walk on and the thing/deeds to do“ reach well beyond the usual scope of authority of a prophet. Moses’ and Jeremiah’s role is the overall guidance of the people. While Jeremiah is the royal prophet (Jer 1) who takes over a leadership role in Jer 39–42, Moses is the kinglike leader of Israel who brings the divine laws to the people. Both figures combine aspects of prophecy and rulership.
It can be assumed that both characterizations were not developed independently from each other, but came from the same background: the Babylonian province Judah after the downfall of the Judaean monarchy.

1 Introduction
The prophet Nathan is one of the minor figures in the book of Samuel and in the book ofKings. He appears in three chapters of these books and has roughly two appearances in each of these chapters. In 2Sam 7 king David approaches Nathan with the concern of building a temple for Yahweh to which Nathan acquiesces. In the following night Yahweh appears to Nathan and gives hirn a different instruction: David is not to build a house for Yahweh ( i.e. a temple), rather Yahweh builds a house for hirn ( i.e. a dynasty). In 2Sam 12, Nathan reproaches king David with the murder of his officer Uriah and the occupation of his wife Bathsheba. Later, after the untimely death of the illegitimate child and the birth Of a second, Nathan announces this son to be peculiarly beloved by Yahweh. In 1 Kgs 1 Nathan initiates the enthronement of Solomon as successor to David and subsequently takes part in the anointment of the new king. ...

The relation between narrative and law in the Pentateuch has been a longstanding challenge to scholarship. The Documentary Hypothesis and other models for the genesis of the Pentateuch usually assume that law and narrative have a different origin and were only combined at a later stage in the literary history of the Pentateuch. However, an investigation of Ex 18–24 shows that the theophany at the Mountain of God has no goal without the promulgation of the law, while at the same time the law lacks legitimation without the narrative.
The basic literary strand of Ex 18–24 relates the installation of the judicial system in Israel (c. 18), continues with the proclamation of the Decalogue and the so-called Covenant Code and finishes with the resolution of the people in 24:3. The approval by the people, alone its participation in the process of lawgiving is exceptional – if not revolutionary, since in the Ancient Near East they play no role whatsoever in this respect. Although unfamiliar in the Ancient Near East, the role of the people in Ex 24:3 is best known from the Greek sources. In absence of a monarch, the laws of the polis are always ratified by the assembly of the citizens or by the demos respectively.
Conclusively, Ex 18–24 is the legitimation narrative of the post-monarchic Judean citizen-state with the collection of laws and regulations 20:24–23:19 („Covenant Code“) as its constitution.

The Hebrew Bible is a collection of books, which are themselves compositions made up of shorter works and Fortschreibungen. With the exception of the book of Ruth and the Song of Songs each biblical book contains references of some kind to war, or battle, or fighting. And as diverse as the biblical literature is, so diverse are these references.

The problem of foreign marriages occurs in several places in the Hebrew Bible and these occurrences show both differences and commonalities.1 In this paper I will not engage in a detailed exege- sis of any of these references; rather, I am aiming at identifying the underlying political concepts that may have induced the respective texts, namely the concept of citizenship, and in connection with that, the notion of membership in the popular assembly, and the question of inheritance of membership. A comparison with texts from ancient Greece which also deal with the problem of foreign marriages will prove to be helpful in this investigation.