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Author: Thomas L. Thompson Publisher: ISBN: 0465006493 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 438
Book Description
A major new synthesis and interpretation of findings over the past twenty-five years in biblical archaeology. Thompson's conclusions are sure to spark intense debate.
Author: Thomas L Thompson Publisher: Basic Books ISBN: 0786725176 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 438
Book Description
The Jewish people's historical claims to a small area of land bordering the eastern Mediterranean are not only the foundation for the modern state of Israel, they are also at the very heart of Judeo-Christian belief. Yet in The Mythic Past, Thomas Thompson argues that such claims are grounded in literary myth, not history. Among the author's startling conclusions are these: There never was a "united monarch" of Israel in biblical times -- We can no longer talk about a time of the Patriarchs -- The entire notion of "Israel" and its history is a literary fiction. The Mythic Past provides refreshing new ways to read the Old Testament as the great literature it was meant to be. At the same time, its controversial conclusions about Jewish history are sure to prove incendiary in a worldwide debate about one of the world's seminal texts, and one of its most bitterly contested regions.
Author: Niels Peter Lemche Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press ISBN: 9780664227272 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 264
Book Description
Niels Peter Lemche focuses on the way Israelites understood themselves at different points in history--before, within, and after the monarchy. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding Israel's rich history. Volumes in the Library of Ancient Israel draw on multiple disciplines--such as archaeology, anthropology, sociology, linguistics, and literary criticism--to illuminate the everyday realities and social subtleties these ancient cultures experienced. This series employs sophisticated methods resulting in original contributions that depict the reality of the people behind the Hebrew Bible and interprets these insights for a wide variety of readers.
Author: Thomas L. Thompson Publisher: ISBN: 0786739118 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 433
Book Description
Since the eighteenth century, scholars and historians studying the texts of the Bible have attempted to distill historical facts and biography from the mythology and miracles described there. That trend continues into the present day, as scholars such as those of the "Jesus Seminar" dissect the Gospels and other early Christian writings to separate the "Jesus of history" from the "Christ of faith." But with The Messiah Myth, noted Biblical scholar Thomas L. Thompson argues that the quest for the historical Jesus is beside the point, since the Jesus of the Gospels never existed.Like King David before him, says Thompson, the Jesus of the Bible is an amalgamation of themes from Near Eastern mythology and traditions of kingship and divinity. The theme of a messiah-a divinely appointed king who restores the world to perfection-is typical of Egyptian and Babylonian royal ideology dating back to the Bronze Age. In Thompson's view, the contemporary audience for whom the Old and New Testament were written would naturally have interpreted David and Jesus not as historical figures, but as metaphors embodying long-established messianic traditions. Challenging widely held assumptions about the sources of the Bible and the quest for the historical Jesus, The Messiah Myth is sure to spark interest and heated debate.
Author: Nadia Abu El-Haj Publisher: University of Chicago Press ISBN: 0226002152 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 368
Book Description
Archaeology in Israel is truly a national obsession, a practice through which national identity—and national rights—have long been asserted. But how and why did archaeology emerge as such a pervasive force there? How can the practices of archaeology help answer those questions? In this stirring book, Nadia Abu El-Haj addresses these questions and specifies for the first time the relationship between national ideology, colonial settlement, and the production of historical knowledge. She analyzes particular instances of history, artifacts, and landscapes in the making to show how archaeology helped not only to legitimize cultural and political visions but, far more powerfully, to reshape them. Moreover, she places Israeli archaeology in the context of the broader discipline to determine what unites the field across its disparate local traditions and locations. Boldly uncovering an Israel in which science and politics are mutually constituted, this book shows the ongoing role that archaeology plays in defining the past, present, and future of Palestine and Israel.
Author: John Van Seters Publisher: ISBN: 9781626549104 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 350
Book Description
"An important work which cannot be ignored." -Journal of Biblical Literature "The author has undertaken an objective evaluation of the more serious scholarly attempts at reconstructing the early Patriarchal Period during the past half century of archaeologically oriented research. . . . He presents a wealth of extra biblical material, in conjunction with the biblical, to determine how much of the data dealing with Abraham (and in part with Isaac) are historical and how the data in general are to be handled. . . . The study provides a badly needed whiff of fresh air in a period whose scholarly atmosphere has become stale. Three useful indexes . . . bring this volume to a close." -Harry Orlinsky, JWB Circle "Old Testament Scholars have learned to expect critical precision and provocative insight from the pen of John Van Seters. His book on the Abraham traditions meets those expectations in detail not previously available in print and this must be welcomed by all involved in Pentateuchal research." -George W. Coats, Interpretation Abraham in History and Tradition evaluates previous scholarly insight on the early patriarchal period while challenging many dominant views in Biblical Studies and providing criticism on tradition history and documentary hypothesis. Upon its initial publication in 1975, this landmark work provided fresh insight in the fields of Near Eastern Studies and Biblical Archaeology. Well-researched and cogent, Van Seter's groundbreaking analysis remains relevant and continues to inspire new research in the present. John Van Seters is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
Author: William G. Dever Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing ISBN: 9780802844163 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 286
Book Description
A respected archaeologist's engaging, revealing take on ancient Israel. A thorough yet readable examination of a much-debated subject -- of relevance also to the current Israeli-Palestinian situation -- this book is sure to reinvigorate discussion of the origins of ancient Israel.
Author: Israel Finkelstein Publisher: Simon and Schuster ISBN: 1416556885 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 353
Book Description
The exciting field of biblical archaeology has revolutionized our understanding of the Bible -- and no one has done more to popularise this vast store of knowledge than Israel Finkelstein and Neil Silberman, who revealed what we now know about when and why the Bible was first written in The Bible Unearthed. Now, with David and Solomon, they do nothing less than help us to understand the sacred kings and founding fathers of western civilization. David and his son Solomon are famous in the Bible for their warrior prowess, legendary loves, wisdom, poetry, conquests, and ambitious building programmes. Yet thanks to archaeology's astonishing finds, we now know that most of these stories are myths. Finkelstein and Silberman show us that the historical David was a bandit leader in a tiny back-water called Jerusalem, and how -- through wars, conquests and epic tragedies like the exile of the Jews in the centuries before Christ and the later Roman conquest -- David and his successor were reshaped into mighty kings and even messiahs, symbols of hope to Jews and Christians alike in times of strife and despair and models for the great kings of Europe. A landmark work of research and lucid scholarship by two brilliant luminaries, David and Solomon recasts the very genesis of western history in a whole new light.
Author: Richard S. Hess Publisher: Baker Academic ISBN: 0801027179 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 432
Book Description
Helps readers consider the importance of contemporary archaeological discoveries and juxtapose them with the biblical narrative to understand ancient Israelite religions.
Author: Thomas L. Thompson
Author: Thomas L Thompson
Author: Thomas L. Thompson
Author: Niels Peter Lemche
Author: Thomas L. Thompson
Author: Gary Greenberg
Author: Nadia Abu El-Haj
Author: John Van Seters
Author: William G. Dever
Author: Israel Finkelstein
Author: Richard S. Hess