Chronicles
BOXES
What Is a More on Method Box?
These boxes give a brief introduction to methods used to interpret the Hebrew Bible. They detail the sorts of questions that each method attempts to answer, give an example of how the method has been applied, and include a reference to an article or book with more information about the method under discussion.
Textual Criticism
Tradition History and Transmission History
African American Biblical Interpretation
Afrocentric and Womanist Interpretation
Source and Redaction Criticism
Feminist Criticism and History of Interpretation/Reception
The Joseph Story and Literary Approaches
Postcolonial Criticism
Trauma Studies and the Bible
Insights from History of Religions
Ecological Biblical Criticism
Form Criticism and Genre
African American Biblical Interpretation and the New Testament
Gender Criticism and Masculinity Studies
Cultural Criticism of the Bible
What Is in Special Topics Boxes?
These boxes offer extra information relevant to the broader discussion. Some pull together relevant dates for a period, while others show parallels between texts, or summarize information on a theme or question that relates to the topic at hand. This information is not optional or superfluous. Instead, these boxes highlight topics that are worth focused attention.
Contents of the Hebrew Bible/Tanakh/Old Testament
The Origins of Chapters and Verses11
AD, BC, BCE, and CE
Visualizing (the Possible Ancestors of) Ancient Israelites
The Name of Israel’s God: Yahweh/the LORD
The Name “Israel”
Archaeology and Problems of History Surrounding David, Solomon, and the Beginning of the Israelite Monarchy
Labels (e.g. “Psalm of David”): What They (Don’t) Tell Us
A View from the Assyrian Imperial Court: The Annals of Sennacherib
Hosea and the “Book of the Twelve Prophets”
Isaiah 6 and the “Call Narrative”
Overview: The Covenant Code and Deuteronomy
The Books of the Former and Latter Prophets
The Conquest and Ancient Holy War
Forced Labor for Exiles Under Nebuchadnezzar
The Divine Council
Traditions That Moses Wrote the Pentateuch
The Story of Jacob at Bethel as an Example of the Addition of Promise to an Older Story
More Information: The Gap Between Ancestors and Moses
J (the “Yahwistic source”), E (the “Elohistic source”), and the Documentary Hypothesis
Alternative Perspectives on Foreigners
The Emergence of “Judaism”
The Book of Judith (as an Example of a Hasmonean Text)
The Dead Sea Scrolls
The Infancy Gospel of Thomas: The Boy Jesus and His Superpowers
More on the Historical Jesus Search
Eschatology Versus Apocalypticism
The Structure of Paul’s Letters
Paul and Slavery
The Question of Circumcision
Changing Perspectives on Paul
Markan Priority
An Exorcism of Rome?
More on Messianic Secret
Jesus the “Son of Man”
Intercalation or the Markan “Sandwich”
A Glimpse of Life Under Roman Occupation
More About the Q Document
Gender and Matthew’s Genealogy (Matt 1:1–17)
Who Were the Pharisees?
Possessions and the Poor: A Lukan Puzzle
The Priene Calendar Inscription
Was There a Johannine Community?
Tacitus’s Account of Nero’s Persecution of Christians in Rome
PREFACE
This book introduces students to the books of the Bible as shaped in the crucible of the history of Israel and the early church. A prominent theme throughout is the way the books of the Bible reflect quite different sorts of interaction with empires that dominated the ancient Near East and Mediterranean. At first some students and professors may find this approach unusual, since we do not begin with Genesis and do not proceed through biblical books in order. The group of texts introduced early on in this textbook is quite different from the Bible they now know. So why have we chosen this approach? There are many advantages. On the basis of our experience with using this approach we have seen that the picture of the Bible’s development comes into focus as the narrative of its formation unfolds. By the end, students should find meaning in aspects of the Bible that they once overlooked, even as they also understand that much of the power of the Bible has been its capability to transcend the original contexts in which it was written. Moreover, through discussion of the history of Jewish and Christian interpretation of focus texts toward the end of many chapters, students will gain a taste of how faith communities have used the Bible in creative, inspired, and sometimes death-dealing ways to guide and make sense of their lives. Given the already large scope of this Introduction, we have focused on texts included in the Old and New Testaments, with a particular emphasis – in the case of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament – on books included in the scriptures of Judaism and various forms of Christianity. This meant that we could not give sustained attention to apocryphal/deutero-canonical books of the Old Testament, or to the range of non-canonical early Christian works that did not end up being included in the Christian Bible.
The date framework given in this textbook follows that of Anson Rainey and Steven Notley’s The Sacred Bridge: Carta’s Atlas of the Biblical World (Jerusalem: Carta, 2005). In many cases specific dates are uncertain, but Rainey and Notley provide a recent, solid framework to start from on an introductory level. Unless otherwise indicated,