Four Approaches To The Book Of Psalms

Uriel Simon describes the fascinating controversy that raged from the tenth to the twelfth centuries regarding the theological status and literary genre of the Psalms. Saadiah Gaon, who initiated the controversy, claimed that the Psalter was a second Torah—the Lord's word to David—and by no means man's prayer to God. Salmon ben Yerucham and Yefet ben Ali insisted on the Karaite view that the Book of Psalms was the prophetic common prayerbook of Israel. Totally opposing both of these concepts, Rabbi Moses Ibn Giqatilah regarded the Psalms as non-prophetic prayers authored by different poets, beginning with David and ending with the captive Levites in the Babylonian exile. Finally, Rabbi Abraham Ibn Ezra reverted to the belief held by the Talmudic sages—that the Psalms were Israel's divinely inspired and most sacred poetry. The book also includes the full text of a previously unknown introduction to Ibn Ezra's lost commentary on the Psalms, which is much more elaborate and revealing than the introduction to his familiar classical commentary.

An accessible point of entry into the rich medieval religious landscape of Jewish biblical exegesis s Medieval Judeo-Arabic translations of the Hebrew Bible and their commentaries provide a rich source for understanding a formative period in the intellectual, literary, and cultural history and heritage of Jews in Islamic lands. The carefully selected texts in this volume offer intriguing insight into Arabic translations and commentaries by Rabbanite and Karaite Jewish exegetes from the tenth to the twelfth centuries CE, arranged according to the three divisions of the Torah, the Former and Latter Prophets, and the Writings. Each text is embedded within an essay discussing its exegetical context, reception, and contribution. Features: Focus on underrepresented medieval Jewish commentators of the Eastern world A list of additional resources, including major Judeo-Arabic commentators in the medieval period Previously unpublished texts from the Cairo Geniza

The powerful poetry of the Hebrew Psalms articulates a unique range of experience, even in translation. They explore the deepest concerns of individuals and communities. They are central to the performance of religion for both Jews and Christians. New discoveries, such as the famous Dead Sea Scrolls, have transformed our view of their role in Judaism, as has modern re-evaluation of the complicated relationship between Judaism and Christianity. Here a group of leading scholars sheds fresh light on the uses of the Psalms in post-biblical Jewish life in a multi-cultural world.

This book re-thinks the relationship between the world of the traditional Jewish study hall (the Beit Midrash) and the academy: Can these two institutions overcome their vast differences? Should they attempt to do so? If not, what could two methods of study seen as diametrically opposed possibly learn from one another? How might they help each other reconceive their interrelationship, themselves, and the broader study of Jews and Judaism? This book begins with three distinct approaches to these challenges. The chapters then follow the approaches through an interdisciplinary series of pioneering case studies that reassess a range of topics including religion and pluralism in Jewish education; pain, sexual consent, and ethics in the Talmud; the place of reason and devotion among Jewish thinkers as diverse as Moses Mendelssohn, Jacob Taubes, Sarah Schenirer, Ibn Chiquitilla, Yair Ḥayim Bacharach, and the Rav Shagar; and Jewish law as a response to the post-Holocaust landscape. The authors are scholars of rabbinics, history, linguistics, philosophy, law, and education, many of whom also have traditional religious training or ordination. The result is a book designed for learned scholars, non-specialists, and students of varying backgrounds, and one that is sure to spark debate in the university, the Beit Midrash, and far beyond.

The opening sections of some exegetical Midrashim deal with the same type of material that is found in introductions to medieval rabbinic Bible commentaries. The application of Goldberg’s form analysis to these sections reveals the new form “Inner-Midrashic Introduction” (IMI) as a thematic discourse on introductory issues to biblical books. By its very nature the IMI is embedded within the comments on the first biblical verse (1:1). Further analysis of medieval rabbinic Bible commentary introductions in terms of their formal, thematic, and material characteristics, reveals that a high degree of continuity exists between them and the IMIs, including another newly discovered form, the “Inner-Commentary Introduction”. These new discoveries challenge the current view that traces the origin of Bible introduction in Judaism exclusively to non-Jewish models. They also point to another important link between the Midrashim and the commentaries, i.e., the decomposition of the functional form midrash in the new discoursive context of the commentaries. Finally, the form analysis demonstrates how larger discourses are formed in the exegetical Midrashim.

Editors David Firth and Philip Johnston help academic readers understand current approaches and issues in study of the Psalms, while also giving them a deeper appreciation for these poetic texts.

A new and innovative way to approach the Psalter that moves beyond form and cult-functional criticism Drawing inspiration from Gerald H. Wilson’s The Editing of the Hebrew Psalter, this volume explores questions of the formation of the Psalter from the perspective of canonical criticism. Though called “canonical criticism,” the study actually employs a number of historically traditional and nontraditional approaches to reading the text including form criticism, historical criticism of individual psalms as well as of the whole Psalter, and redaction criticism. Features: Exploration of collections of psalms, theological viewpoints, sovereignty, and the shape and shaping of Psalms Examination of the impact of canonical criticism on the study of the Psalter Sixteen essays from the Book of Psalms Consultation group and invited scholars