Post-Exilic Judaism

This volume of updated and revised essays consolidates the work that I have done on religious experience in ancient Judaism and Christianity. Building on the text-centered work that characterizes much of Second Temple studies, these essays reintegrate ancient Jewish and Christian texts with various aspects of the flesh-and-blood experience of religion. In these essays, I aim to overcome the mind-body dualism that dominates the study of ancient texts by offering ways to imagine the phenomenological experience of these texts by ancient peoples. Available now at Peeters Press

Biblical scholars today recognize the long Persian period (550-332 BCE) as the time when an early form of the biblical text approached canonical status. Yhwh religion-at least in its elite form-evolved from a tradition largely based on temple and kingship into one framed by control of a sacred text. While the title of this essay could imply that only Yehud (Judea) is of relevance to Yhwh religion and the historical books of the Bible, this period should be understood in international terms. New textual evidence for previously unknown Yahwist communities in Babylonia and Idumea are a case in point. Elites in Yh wh-worshiping communities situated across the Persian Empire from Egypt to Persia, and not just in Yehud or Shomron (Samaria), communicated with each other. The biblical books written or set in the Persian period developed within this international context, one that included debate over claims to be the true "Israel."

ABSTRACT The canonization of the Pentateuch has preoccupied scholars from different disciplines from antiquity to the present. However, two major questions still require an explanation: when did it happen and why did it happen? In this two-part article an attempt has been made to clarify these issues. Based on an interdisciplinary approach, where the insights of redaction criticism are merged with archaeologically-supported historical analysis, we suggest that the inception of the Torah-canonization should be viewed within the framework of the geopolitical transformation that characterized the first half of the fourth century BCE, when, following a major Egyptian rebellion, Egypt was no longer a part of the Persian Empire, while southern Palestine became the empire’s frontier for the first time in more than a century of Achaemenid rule. The canonization of the essentially anti-Egyptian version of the Torah in the early fourth century BCE should be considered as a conscious response of Jerusalem’s priestly circles to this new reality, signaling to the imperial authorities that they are dealing
with loyal subjects that consider Egypt as a world of chaos, an antithesis to the world of cosmicorder, so central to Persian imperial self-understanding.

This article examines the attitude seen in the Book of Chronicles
towards mixed marriages between Israelites and gentiles in an attempt to understand the difference in this matter between the Chronicler and the author of Ezra-Nehemiah. Of the 14 cases of mixed marriages mentioned in Chronicles, 9 are discussed, some of which have parallels in other biblical books, and some of which are unique to Chronicles. Our conclusion is that in general the Chronicler did not consider such marriages to be problematic for the continued existence of the people of Israel or of the Yehud community in his own time. In this he represents an attitude that is very different than that reflected in Ezra-
Nehemiah.

Zoroastrianism has been known as "the world oldest monotheism." The Critical Perspective of the Hebrew Bible  places its composition written under heavy Zoroastrian influence. In this paper, I study ancient Achaemenid Religion and challenge the belief that Zoroastrianism in modern times is the same Zoroastrian religion that exists during the Persian Empire. I argue that a thematic approach is not substantial enough evidence to prove that the OT writers appropriated themes and typologies from the state religion of Achaemenid Persian Empire.

Though the Hasmonean domination of Judea was relatively short lived the family’s century long rule saw a number of women attain positions of prominence within the state.  A survey of Josephus’s writings reveals four named female members of the Hasmonean dynasty. This total is in addition to four women alluded to only as wife or daughter and one woman (Seline Alexandra) whose distinct identity is questioned. This thesis examines the role these women played within the realm and analyses the extent to which their ability to wield power was influenced by royal norms in the wider Hellenistic world.

Though the Hasmonean domination of Judea was relatively short lived the family’s century long rule saw a number of women attain positions of prominence within the state. A survey of Josephus’s writings reveals four named female members of the Hasmonean dynasty. This total is in addition to four women alluded to only as wife or daughter and one woman (Seline Alexandra) whose distinct identity is questioned. This thesis examines the role these women played within the realm and analyses the extent to which their ability to wield power was influenced by royal norms in the wider Hellenistic world.

A história do livro de Rute pode ser dividida em quatro atos delineados pelos respectivos capítulos. Dentro do segundo capítulo, uma análise intertextual apresenta três temas principais: (1) o papel das leis da Torá, incluindo a lei de recolher espigas, do resgatador da família e o tratamento dos filhos de Moabe; (2) a misericórdia (הסד - ḥeseḏ) de Deus para com aqueles que o servem; e (3) o empoderamento feminino. Naomi e Rute se tornam protagonistas da história a partir da morte de seus maridos e a história agora apresenta como as duas mulheres (uma israelita e outra estrangeira) conseguem sair do status mais baixo da sociedade e serem redimidas pelo seu resgatador da família e assim continuarem a linhagem de seu esposo e fazer parte da genealogia do rei Davi.