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in Prophets and Prophecy in Ancient Israelite Historiography
Deus ex Machina and Plot Construction in Ezra 1–62013 •
Encyclopedia Judaica
Ezra and Nehemiah, Books of2007 •
BOOKS OF, two books in the Hagiographa (i.e., the Book of Ezra and the Book of Nehemiah), which were originally a single work. The Masoretic tradition regarded the books of Ezra and Nehemiah as one book and referred to it as the Book of Ezra. This was also the Greek tradition, and the same Greek name, Esdras, was given to both books (see below). The division into separate books does not occur until the time of Origen (fourth century C.E.) and this division was transferred into the Vulgate where the books are called I Esdras (Ezra) and II Esdras (Nehemiah). It was not until the 15 th century that Hebrew manuscripts, and subsequently all modern printed Hebrew editions, followed this practice of dividing the books. However, there are good reasons (linguistic, literary, and thematic) for the argument that the two books were originally separate works (Kraemer), which were brought together by a later compiler, and are now to be read as a single unit (Grabbe).
2018 •
“Taking as his starting point the separation from foreignness in Neh 13:30, Benedikt Hensel finds the focus on separation to be a leading motif in the Ezra-story in Ezra 1– 10 and in Neh 8 – 10. Hensel addresses the particular notion of foreignness in the two books against the background of our present knowledge of the constitution of the population in the area. In so doing, he discovers an enigma, namely that there were not many foreigners to dissociate from. So what would have been the purpose of the injunction to separate from almost non-existent aliens? An answer to this question can be found by paying attention to the use of the term “Israel” in these books, a designation reserved for the returnees from exile. As “Israel” was a self-designation also of the emerging community around the Gerizim sanctuary, this usage in Ezra-Nehemiah attempts to redefine the relevant power relationships in the period, pro-Jerusalem and anti-Samaritan. Readers will be struck by a number of Hensel’s proposals, including the suggestion that the designation of the “foreigner” functions in the text as a cipher for a particular conflict, by which the “Israelite” authors of Ezra demarcate themselves from other post-exilic Yahwisms, specifically the Samarian YHWH worshipers. Hensel’s study thus revives suggestions of anti-Samaritan polemics in Ezra-Nehemiah, but with new material from Mount Gerizim and Delos as the impulse for a renewed attempt to understand the theological thrust of the book.” (Kartveit/Knoppers, Qumran, Mount Gerizim, and the Books of Moses, 12f).
Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 15 (2015) Article 3.
Journal of Hebrew Scriptures
Revisiting the Composition of Ezra-Nehemiah: In Conversation with Jacob Wright’s Rebuilding Identity: The Nehemiah Memoir and its Earliest Readers (BZAW, 348; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2004)2009 •
Persian emperors are mentioned in Ezra-Nehemiah in close to the right order, though the three Dariuses and two Artaxerxes are not distinguished. Taking the order and chronology to be true, the return of Ezra and Nehemiah is in the reign of Artaxerxes II. The problem is that Nehemiah could hardly have been as late as the twentieth year of Artaxerxes II and fit in with Elephantine papyri about thirty years earlier that already look to an established temple in Jerusalem. The king was Darius II. Persians gave the Jews the concept that this tiny country could become a great nation if its people were obedient and righteous. The Jewish David is a mythologized Darius II. The Maccabees, once they had set up the Jewish free state, embellished the myth of Darius II as the founder of the Jewish state, into the myth of David, the founder of a Jewish empire! Ezra, called both priest and scribe, obviously working in a senior capacity, leads Levites in teaching the law. He reads to the colonists and the Am ha Eretz a covenant, an enforceable treaty. The law read out was a law that had to be kept. Ezra imposed it firmly under threat, and the people wept! Some say they wept in joy, but the response was grief—they were commanded not to mourn! It was the law of Mazas, Ahuramazda, called Mazas by the Assyrians and Moses by the Jews. Or perhaps Misa (Mica), the name of Mithras in the Persian dialect. Jewish sages think of Ezra as the second Moses. He was the first Moses, unless Ahuramazda or Mithras is considered the first. It looks more than a coincidence that his brother is Aaron, in Hebrew letter equivalents, Ahrwn. Besides the final " nun " the word looks to be a mishearing of Ahura (Aura, Oura), and the " nun " is from its assimilation into Hebrew as meaning " his brother ". Ezra the scribe attended the ceremony of dedicating the walls, together with Nehemiah. If this happened in a second period of office of Nehemiah beginning about 430 BC, it could have been in the reign of Darius II. The compiler, unable to distinguish between the Persian kings thought " year seven of Darius " meant Darius I. It was impossible, so he rejected it in favour of Artaxerxes, who had already been mentioned in the context of Nehemiah, because the two men were together at the dedication. Ezra really came in year seven of Darius II specially to dedicate the walls and to introduce the new law. Ezra was never a " returner " and could not appear in lists of them, and was never a High Priest of the Jerusalem temple. He was the senior priest in the Persian empire. If Moses had not preceded him, Ezra would have been worthy to bring Torah into the world. Ezra and Nehemiah: Bringing Judaism from Persia
Journal of Biblical Literature
The Authorship of Ezra and Nehemiah in Light of Differences in Their Ideological Background2018 •
The books of Ezra and Nehemiah differ in their definition of the repatriates from Babylon, the boundaries of the in-group, the appellations of God, the celebration of the Sukkot festival, the status of the priests, the prestige bestowed on Ezra, and the attitude toward the foreign Yahwistic singers (Ezrahites) who took part in musical worship at the Jerusalem temple. The intersection of all these differences reveals the contrasting ideological backgrounds of these two books. In Ezra, the returnees from Babylon and their religious elite (priests, Levites, and prophets) constitute the nucleus preserved by YHWH from destruction from which Israel as a whole is expected to regenerate. Both this view of the repatriates as the sole legitimate remnant and its ideological consequences are challenged in Nehemiah. These differences are perceptible not only when the first-person narrative sections in Ezra and Nehemiah are compared (the so-called Ezra and Nehemiah memoirs) but also in the third-person narration segments. These positions are consistent throughout Ezra and Nehemiah, leading to the conclusion that the two books were composed and/or edited by two distinct authors who expressed contrasting views on the theological importance of the Babylonian exile.
This paper is an attempt to provide a fresh look in time element of the kingdom of God. It's not only "already" and "not yet" it could be seen beyond.
2020 •
HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies
The dissolving of marriages in Ezra 9–10 and Nehemiah 13 revisitedJames E. Bowley, ed., Living Traditions of the Bible: Scripture in Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Practice (St. Louis: Chalice Press, 1999), 63-84
Scriptural Authority in Early Judaism1999 •
Journal of Hebrew scriptures
Remembering Three Nehemiahs in Late Second Temple Times: Patterns and Trajectories in Memory ShapingThe Journal of the Historical Society
The Reconstruction of Jewish Communities during the Persian Empire2004 •
in Johannes Unsok Ro (ed.), From Judah to Judaea: Socio-economic Structures and Processes in the Persian Period, Sheffield, Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012, 4-53.
Judea, Samaria and Idumea: Three Models of Ethnicity and Administration in the Persian Period2012 •
2015 •
Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, 51 (2008): 513–22
A Chronological Note: The Return of the Exiles under Sheshbazzar and Zerubbabel (Ezra 1-2)in : József Zsengellér (ed.), Samaria, Samarians, Samaritans. Studies on Bible, History and Linguistics, Berlin, W. de Gruyter, 2013, p. 121-172
Israelites, Samaritans, Temples, JewsThe Oxford Handbook of the Historical Books of the Hebrew Bible Edited by Brad E. Kelle and Brent A. Strawn
New Perspectives on the Return from Exile and Persian-Period Yehud2020 •
Journal for the Study of the Old Testament
The Function of a Conjunction: Inclusivist or Exclusivist Strategies In Ezra 6.19-21 and Nehemiah 10.29-30?2009 •
Canon and Modern Bible Translation in Interconfessional Perspective (edited by Lénart de Regt)
Canon and Modern Bible Translation in Interconfessional Perspective (edited by Lénart de Regt)2006 •
2021 •
2011 •