Jonah: A Commentary

In the new Hermeneia volume, the Jonah translation and commentary, renowned biblical scholar Susan Niditch encourages the reader to investigate challenging questions about ancient conceptions of personal religious identity.

Jonah's story is treated as a complex reflection upon the heavy matters of life and death, good and evil, and human and divine relations. The narrative probes an individual's relationship with a demanding deity, considers vexing cultural issues of "us versus them," and examines the role of Israel's god in a universal and international context. The author examines the ways in which Jonah prods readers to contemplate these fundamental issues concerning group- and self-definition.

In her technical study of Jonah's language, style, structure, content, and context, Niditch examines the text through the comparative lens of international folklore. The thread of appropriations of Jonah by post-biblical writers and artists is explored, and special attention is paid to rabbinic midrash, medieval Jewish manuscript illuminations, and Christian art of late antiquity. And in the tradition of Hermeneia volumes, the commentary evaluates and incorporates the insights of a long legacy of scholars who have explored this venerable text from varied perspectives.

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Jonah: A Commentary

In the new Hermeneia volume, the Jonah translation and commentary, renowned biblical scholar Susan Niditch encourages the reader to investigate challenging questions about ancient conceptions of personal religious identity.

Jonah's story is treated as a complex reflection upon the heavy matters of life and death, good and evil, and human and divine relations. The narrative probes an individual's relationship with a demanding deity, considers vexing cultural issues of "us versus them," and examines the role of Israel's god in a universal and international context. The author examines the ways in which Jonah prods readers to contemplate these fundamental issues concerning group- and self-definition.

In her technical study of Jonah's language, style, structure, content, and context, Niditch examines the text through the comparative lens of international folklore. The thread of appropriations of Jonah by post-biblical writers and artists is explored, and special attention is paid to rabbinic midrash, medieval Jewish manuscript illuminations, and Christian art of late antiquity. And in the tradition of Hermeneia volumes, the commentary evaluates and incorporates the insights of a long legacy of scholars who have explored this venerable text from varied perspectives.

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Jonah: A Commentary

Jonah: A Commentary

by Susan Niditch
Jonah: A Commentary

Jonah: A Commentary

by Susan Niditch

eBook

$55.99 

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Overview

In the new Hermeneia volume, the Jonah translation and commentary, renowned biblical scholar Susan Niditch encourages the reader to investigate challenging questions about ancient conceptions of personal religious identity.

Jonah's story is treated as a complex reflection upon the heavy matters of life and death, good and evil, and human and divine relations. The narrative probes an individual's relationship with a demanding deity, considers vexing cultural issues of "us versus them," and examines the role of Israel's god in a universal and international context. The author examines the ways in which Jonah prods readers to contemplate these fundamental issues concerning group- and self-definition.

In her technical study of Jonah's language, style, structure, content, and context, Niditch examines the text through the comparative lens of international folklore. The thread of appropriations of Jonah by post-biblical writers and artists is explored, and special attention is paid to rabbinic midrash, medieval Jewish manuscript illuminations, and Christian art of late antiquity. And in the tradition of Hermeneia volumes, the commentary evaluates and incorporates the insights of a long legacy of scholars who have explored this venerable text from varied perspectives.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781506486833
Publisher: Augsburg Fortress, Publishers
Publication date: 01/03/2023
Series: Hermeneia
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 162
File size: 13 MB
Note: This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Susan Niditch is Samuel Green Professor of Religion at Amherst College. Her research and teaching interests include the study of ancient Israelite literature from the perspectives of the comparative and interdisciplinary fields of folklore and oral studies; biblical ethics with special interests in war, gender, and the body; the reception history of the Bible; and study of the rich symbolic media of biblical ritual texts. Recent publications include Judges: A Commentary (2008) and The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Ancient Israel (2016).

Table of Contents

Foreword to Hermeneia ix

Acknowledgments xi

Reference Codes xiii

1 Abbreviations xiii

2 Short Titles xv

Introduction 1

Narrative Structure 2

Text 4

Linguistic Register 5

Jonah and the Twelve 9

Jonah as Holy Man and Narrative Character 12

Matters of Context and Authorship 15

Religion as Lived and Personal 19

Worldview and Genre 20

Commentary

1:1-3 Charge and Avoidance 27

Translation 27

Textual Notes 27

Commentary 27

Overview of Jonah 1:1-3, Comparative Folklore, and Reception 35

1:4-16 Group Punishment and Mollification 38

Translation 38

Textual Notes 39

Commentary 40

Overview of Jonah 1:4-16, Comparative Folklore, and Reception 50

2:1-11 Individual Punishment, Petition, and Forgiveness 53

Translation 53

Textual Notes 53

Commentary 54

Overview of Jonah 2:1-11, Comparative Folklore, and Reception 65

Comparative Folklore 66

Appropriations 69

Artistic Representations 74

Jewish Mosaics of Late Antiquity and Jonah 76

3:1-4 Charge and Fulfillment 86

Translation 86

Textual Notes 86

Commentary 86

Jonah 3:1-4 and Comparative Folklore 89

3:5-10 Repentance and Forgiveness 91

Translation 91

Textual Notes 91

Commentary 92

Overview of Jonah 3:5-10. Rabbinic Reception, and Comparative Folklore 98

Rabbinic Reception 98

Animal Folklore and Jonah 3:5-10 100

4:1-5 Anger, Accusation, and Departure 102

Translation 102

Textual Notes 102

Commentary 102

Overview and Folk Motif 110

4:6-11 Mollification, Destruction, Anger, and Stasis 111

Translation 111

Textual Notes 111

Commentary 112

Overview of Jonah 4:6-11: Message and Meaning in the Narrative of Jonah 118

Jonah beneath the Vine: Appropriation in Late Antiquity 120

Jonah and Judaism: Yom Kippur 122

Back Matter

Bibliography

1 Commentaries 125

2 Text Editions 127

3 General Studies 127

Indexes

1 Passages 147

2 Authors 152

3 Subjects 158

Designer's Notes 161

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