Book Reviews

By Armin Lange, Gerhard Langer, and Günter Stemberger

After Qumran: Old and Modern Editions of the Biblical Texts – The Historical Books (eds. H. Ausloos, B. Lemmelijn, and E. Tov; BETL 246; Leuven: Peeters, 2012. Pp. xiv + 319. Paperback. € 84.00. ISBN 978-90-429-2573-1.)

This volume publishes the proceedings of a conference held in 2010 at the University of Alcalá. Both the conference and its proceedings reevaluate the textual history of the historical books of the Hebrew Bible in light of the biblical Dead Sea Scroll. E. Tov, “Theolog- ical Tendencies in the Masoretic Text of Samuel,” 3–20; J. Joosten, “Textual Developments and Historical Linguistics,” 21–31; Z. Talshir, “Textual Criticism at the Service of Literary Criticism and the Question of an Eclectic Edition of the Hebrew Bible,” 33–60; E. Ulrich, “David, the Plague, and the Angel: 2 Samuel 24 Revisited,” 63–79; A.Aejmelaeus, “What Rahlfs Could Not Know: 1 Sam 14,4–5 in the Old Greek,” 81–93; P. Hugo, “The King’s Re- turn (2 Sam 19,10–16): Contrasting Characterizations of David, Israel and Juda in the Old Editions” 95–118; K. De Troyer, “Bathsheba and Nathan: A Closer Look at Their Charac- terizations in MT, Kaige and the Antiochian Text,” 119–42; F. García Martínez, “Light on the Joshua Books from the Dead Sea Scrolls,” 145–59; N. Fernández Marcos, “The B-Text of Judges: Kaige Revision and Beyond,” 161–69; H. Ausloos and B. Lemmelijn, “Characterizing the LXX Translation of Judges on the Basis of Content-Related Criteria: The Greek Rendering of Hebrew Absolute Hapax Legomena in Judges 3,12–30,” 171–92; P. Torijano Morales, “Textual Criticism and the Text-Critical Edition of IV Regnorum: The Case of 17,2–6,” 195–211; J. Trebolle Barrera, “Textual Pluralism and Composition of the Books of Kings: 2 Kings 17,2–23: MT, LXXB, LXXL, OL,” 213–26; A. Piquer Otero, “What Text to Edit? The Oxford Hebrew Bible Edition of 2 Kings 17,1–23,” 227–43; T. M. Law, “Do ‘the Three’ Reveal Anything about the Textual History of the Books of Kings? The Hebrew Text Behind the Later Greek Jewish Versions in 1 Kings,” 245–63; J. Lust, “Solo- mon’s Temple According to 1 Kings 6,3–14 in Hebrew and in Greek,” 265–74; A. Schenker, “What Do Scribes, and What Do Editors Do? The Hebrew Text of the Masoretes, the Old Greek Bible and the Alexandrian Philological Ekdoseis of the 4th and 3rd Centuries B. C., Illustrated by the Example of 2 Kings 1,” 275–93.

E. S. Alexander, Gender and Timebound Commandments in Judaism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Pp. 296. Hardcover. £ 60.00/$ 99.00. ISBN 978-1-107- 03556-0).

Against the widespread perception that beginning with the Mishnah (m. Qidd. 1:7) the exemption of women from timebound positive commandments was understood as prescriptive and based on a certain conception of the social position of women, Alexander argues that originally it was a descriptive statement, not determining common practice,

Journal of Ancient Judaism, 4. Jg., 262–296, ISSN 1869-3296 © 2013 Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen Book Reviews 263 and had no impact on gender roles. As it is first documented in the Mekhilta, it was rather derived from biblical exegesis, mainly with regard to tefillin and more generally to Torah study, and had little to do with actual practice. Only the Bavli in its latest stratum, in its effort to create overarching halakhic systems, turned it into a prescriptive general rule within which the question of tefillin no longer was central. The general application of this rule to actual practice and the search for the basis of this rule in the role of women in Jewish society date to even later in the medieval period. This historical reconstruc- tion is based on a very careful step-by-step, and somewhat repetitive, analysis of the relevant rabbinic and medieval sources. Alexander sometimes perhaps over-interprets her sources and may not convince everybody in all details; but her overall thesis is well argued and an important contribution to the history of Jewish law and changing aspects of gender consciousness in Jewish history. At the same time, it may also contribute to modern discussions of the role of women in Jewish society. Such present-day discussions were at the start of her inquiry, but they never prejudice her analysis of the rabbinic sources. Her results are all the more convincing.

Y. Amit, In Praise of Editing in the Hebrew Bible: Collected Essays in Retrospect (trans. B. Sigler Rozen; Hebrew Bible Monographs 39; Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix Press, 2012. Pp. Hardcover £ 75.00/$ 120.00/€ 90.00. ISBN 978-1-907534-36-2)

This volumes publishes 19 articles by Yairah Amit which were previously available only in modern Hebrew. Each article begins with a retrospective preface, and the unit of preface and previously published article is renamed (the original name is given in parenthesis below). “Who Decided to Open the Torah with the Creation of the Sab- bath?” (“Creation and the Calendar of Holiness”) 1–23; “The Garden of Eden as Utopia” (“Biblical Utopianism”), 24–32; “Why Were They Barren?” (“Why Were the Matriarchs Barren?”), 33–44; “The Lost Honor of Dina, Daughter of Jacob,” (“Implicit Reduction and Latent Polemic in the Story of the Rape of Dinah”), 45–69; “Repetition as Poetic Principle” (“Repeated Situation – A Poetic Principle in the Modeling of Joseph Nar- rative”), 70–83; “Who Is Afraid of Multiple Voices?” (“‘But with us, the Living, Every One of Us Here Today’: On Multiple Voices in Biblical Texts”), 84–92; “‘For the Lord Fought for Israel’” (“‘And Joshua Stretched out the Javelin That Was in His Hand …’ (Joshua 8.18, 26”), 93–104; “Dual Causality” (Dual Causality – An Additional Aspect”), 105–21; “Terms Have Meaning” (“The ‘Men of Israel’ and Gideon’s Refusal to Reign”), 122–30; “The Nazirism Motif and Editorial Work” (“Lifelong Nazirism – The Evolution of a Motif”), 131–46; “Editorial Considerations Regarding Ending” (“The Ending of the Book of Judges”), 147–58; “Who Knows the ‘One’? The Editor” (“‘There Was a Certain Man …, Whose Name Was …’: Variation of Editing and its Purpose”), 159–71; “Who Is Lent to the Lord? Ask the Editor” (“‘He Is Lent to the Lord’ – Connecting Hint: A Liter- ary Tool”), 172–79; “When Was Prophetic Thought Dominant?” (“The Story of Samuel’s Dedication to Prophecy in Light of Prophetic Thought”), 180–88; “Did Saul Die Three Times?” (“Three Variations of the Death of Saul: Studies in the Fashioning of the World, in Reliability and in the Tendentiousness of Biblical Narrative”), 189–202; “To Include or Not to Include? Editorial Considerations Regarding the Whole” (“The Story of Amnon and Tamar: Reservoir of Sympathy for Absalom”), 203–19; “Chronicles and its Unique Poetics” (“Studies in the Poetic of Chronicles”), 220–30; “Why Denigrate Saul?” (“Saul