Making a Difference: Essays on the Bible and Judaism in Honor of Tamara Cohn Eskenazi

394 Pages·2012·3.145 MB·English

by  David J. A. Clines, Kent Harold Richards, Jacob L. Wright

M D
aking a ifference
Hebrew Bible Monographs, 49
Series Editors
David J.A. Clines, J. Cheryl Exum, Keith W. Whitelam
Editorial Board
A. Graeme Auld, Marc Brettler, David M. Carr, Paul M. Joyce,
Francis Landy, Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer, Stuart D.E. Weeks

M D
aking a ifference
Essays on the Bible and Judaism
in Honor of Tamara Cohn Eskenazi
Edited by
David J.A. Clines, Kent Harold Richards
and Jacob L. Wright
Sheffield Phoenix PreSS
2012
Copyright © 2012 Sheffield Phoenix Press
Published by Sheffield Phoenix Press
Department of Biblical Studies, University of Sheffield
Sheffield S3 7QB
www.sheffieldphoenix.com
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information
storage or retrieval system, without the publisher’s permission in writing.
A CIP catalogue record for this book
is available from the British Library
Typeset by CA Typesetting Ltd
Printed on acid-free paper by Lightning Source UK Ltd, Milton Keynes
ISBN-13 978-1-907534-72-0
Contents
Preface ix
List of Abbreviations xii
List of Contributors xiv
Publications of Tamara Cohn Eskenazi xx
RabbiniC DiRges anD the VoiCes of Women in Lament
Rachel Adler 1
the sWeet Lie of metaphoR:
LeVinas’s RefLeCtions on metaphoR anD theiR impLiCations
foR bibLiCaL heRmeneutiCs
Annette Aronowicz 9
eDuCating JeWish giRLs in meDieVaL musLim
anD ChRistian settings
Judith R. Baskin 19
maDame potiphaR ReVisiteD out of anD in the CLassRoom
Athalya Brenner 38
the poLitiCs of maRRiage in genesis
Mark G. Brett 49
the VoiCe anD the book
Catherine Chalier 60
the faiLuRe of the fLooD
David J.A. Clines 74
miCah Yosef beRDYCzeWski anD the neW JeWish mimesis:
tWo stoRies in honoR of tamaRa C. eskenazi
William Cutter 85
pauL Vis-à-Vis LeVinas
Pamela Eisenbaum 105
vi Making a Difference
a zionist ReaDing of abRaham geigeR anD his
bibLiCaL sChoLaRship
David Ellenson 121
the LaW tRiumphant: anotheR Look at 1 esDRas
Lisbeth S. Fried 132
stanDing again at sinai?
Frederick E. Greenspahn 139
the Composition of ezRa–nehemiah fRom the
peRspeCtiVe of a meDieVaL JeWish CommentatoR
Sara Japhet 148
the samaRitan sChism oR the JuDaization of samaRia?
Reassessing Josephus’s aCCount of the mt geRizim tempLe
Gary N. Knoppers 163
LeVinas on pRopheCY
Francis Landy 179
‘WheRe WeRe You When i founDeD the eaRth?’
poetiC subVeRsions of a human-CenteReD WoRLD in Job
Adriane Leveen 204
making a DiffeRenCe, then anD noW:
the VeRY DiffeRent LiVes anD afteRLiVes of Dinah anD Rizpah
Heather A. McKay 224
bLooD in the post-fLooD WoRLD
David L. Petersen 242
faReWeLL to ‘mR so anD so’ (Ruth 4.1)?
Jack M. Sasson 251
RenDeRing the RenDing of the VeiL:
What DiffeRenCe Does it make?
Jesper Svartvik 257
esChatoLogY in the book of ezekieL
Marvin A. Sweeney 277
Contents vii
DiffeRenCe among the Distaff: a ReaDing of exoDus 1.1–2.10
Phyllis Trible 292
amos anD the CuLt
Gene M. Tucker 307
motiVes behinD bibLiCaL mixeD metaphoRs
Andrea L. Weiss 317
sCRibe anD sCRoLL:
ReVisiting the gReat isaiah sCRoLL fRom QumRan
H.G.M. Williamson 329
betWeen nation anD state in the book of samueL:
the Case of ittai the gittite
Jacob L. Wright 343
Index of References 353
Index of Authors 362

pRefaCe
Tamara Cohn Eskenazi has a special place in contemporary biblical schol-
arship. Among the first to bring a focus of scholarly attention to the period
of ancient Israel’s creativity after the Exile, she has also been a leader in
foregrounding the Jewish tradition within the interpretative discourse of
biblical scholars. And, as a woman scholar, she has advanced the study
of issues in the Hebrew Bible that impinge on the concerns of women
ancient and modern, while as a teacher and friend she has encouraged
and developed the talents of many younger scholars. She has indeed been
‘making a difference’ in the world of scholarship and in the lives of her
wide circle of friends.
Tamara Eskenazi was born in Israel, of Hungarian parents, and emigrated
to the United States as a teenager in 1956. She married young, not begin-
ning a university career until her mid-thirties. But once she began a degree
in philosophy in the University of Denver in 1972 she found herself intel-
lectually captivated. She never lost the excitement of new horizons, new
books, and new conversation partners.
She followed her philosophy degree with a MA in Religious Studies at
Denver, submitting a thesis on ‘Paul and the Dead Sea Scrolls on the Law’.
Thereafter she began her doctoral work at Iliff School of Theology and the
University of Denver, culminating in her dissertation in 1986, under the direc-
tion of Kent Richards. Her dissertation became her first book, In an Age of
Prose: A Literary Approach to Ezra–Nehemiah (Society of Biblical Literature
Monograph Series, 36; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1989). It was something of a
novelty in combining serious historical research with the discipline of biblical
literary criticism as it was taking shape in that decade. Her grand insight was
that the whole of Ezra–Nehemiah, disparate in origin though its parts may be,
formed a true literary unity, with three dynamic elements: potentiality (Ezra
1.1-4), actualization (Ezra 1.5–Neh. 7.72) and success (Neh. 8.1–13.31). Key
to its view of history were the centrality of the community in the postexilic
reconstruction, the broadening out of the concept of the ‘house of God’ to
include the whole city of Jerusalem and not just the temple, and the role of
(even unwritten) texts as the vehicle for divine communication. There was a
strong undercurrent here of a refusal of submission to hierarchy and an open-
ness to valuing the roles of outsiders—foreigners, women, the poor.