Windows to the Ancient World of the Hebrew Bible: Essays in Honor of Samuel Greengus

286 Pages·2014·13.94 MB·English

by  Bill T. Arnold

Windows to the Ancient World
of the Hebrew Bible

Windows to the Ancient World
of the Hebrew Bible
Essays in Honor of Samuel Greengus
edited by
Bill T. Arnold, Nancy L. Erickson, and John H. Walton
Winona Lake, Indiana
Eisenbrauns
2014
© Copyright 2014 Eisenbrauns
All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.
www.eisenbrauns.com
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Windows to the ancient world of the Hebrew Bible : essays in honor of Samuel
Greengus / edited by Bill Arnold, Nancy L. Erickson, and John Walton.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-57506-302-7 (hardback : alk. paper)
1. Bible. Old Testament—Criticism, interpretation, etc. 2. Middle
East—Civilization—To 622. I. Arnold, Bill, editor. II. Erickson, Nancy L.,
editor III. Walton, John, editor. IV. Greengus, Samuel, honoree.
BS1178.H4W45 2014
221.6—dc23
2013048122
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American
National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1984. ♾™
Contents
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
A Colleague’s Appreciation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . viii
Nili S. Fox
A Student’s Appreciation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . viii
Richard S. Hess
Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Publications by Dr. Samuel Greengus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
Law, Economy, Academia, and Divination in Bronze Age Canaan:
The Value of the Cuneiform Tablets Discovered at Tel Hazor . . . 1
Stephen J. Andrews
The Holiness Redaction of the Flood Narrative (Gen 6:9–9:29) . . . . 13
Bill T. Arnold
Isaiah 47 and 54: An Investigation into a Case of Intertextuality . . . . 41
Bryan E. Beyer
The Tenth Commandment and the Concept of “Inward Liability”. . . 51
Aurelian Botica
The Book of Giants and the Greek Gilgamesh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Jeffrey L. Cooley
Donning the Right Garb: The Egyptian Ritual of “Opening
the Mouth” and the Biblical Regulations in Exodus 28–29 . . . . . 81
Nancy L. Erickson
Mythologizing Exile: Life, Law, and Justice after the Flood . . . . . . . 95
Angela Roskop Erisman
The Hebrew Syllable: Definition and Practical Application . . . . . . . 111
Russell Fuller
Neither Slave Nor Free: Children Living on the
Edge of a Social Status . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Kristine Henriksen Garroway
The Administration of Copper Tools at Umma
in the Ur III Period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Charles Halton
v
vi Contents
Rabbi Joshua Briskin’s Tav Y’hoshua: Yalkut Derekh Ereẓ,
A Handbook for Busy Jews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Rabbi Barton Lee
The Changing Face of Victory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
R. Russell Mack
Zêru, “to Hate” as a Metaphor for Covenant Instability . . . . . . . . . 175
Andrew J. Riley
With Mace in Hand . . . and Praise in Throat: Comparisons and
Contrasts in the Bookends of the Psalter. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Tim Undheim
Do Deities Deceive? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Ronald A. Veenker
Toward an Ethic of Liberation for Bible Translation:
A Work in Progress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215
Steven Voth
Demons in Mesopotamia and Israel: Exploring the Category of
Non-Divine but Supernatural Entities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
John H. Walton
The Literary Structure of Judges Revisited:
Judges as a Ring Composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 247
Kenneth C. Way
The Perfect Verb and the Perfect Woman in Proverbs . . . . . . . . . 261
Brian L. Webster
Index of Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273
Index of Scripture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 278
Preface
Professor Samuel Greengus has had a long and illustrious career as
scholar and mentor at Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion
in Cincinnati. His scholarly contributions are well known through his nu-
merous publications (see pp. xv–xvi). Perhaps less well known outside
the immediate HUC–JIR family is the influence of Sam’s teaching and men-
toring career, spanning nearly 50 years. Remarkably, he supervised more
than four dozen doctoral dissertations.
On April 10, 2011, the College–Institute sponsored a symposium on
the Cincinnati campus in Sam’s honor. Twelve of his former doctoral stu-
dents were invited to present papers related to their current research. Those
papers were the firstfruits of the full harvest presented here. We are happy
to present them together in this volume in honor of Professor Greengus.
Sam has hundreds of former students, colleagues, and admirers around
the world, many of whom wanted to participate in the symposium and later
to contribute to this Festschrift. In order to limit the volume to a manage-
able size, contributions have been invited only from former students who
worked directly with Sam on doctoral dissertations. Countless others could
have written for the volume who were his students or colleagues, but the
project would quickly have become a multivolume work. We have chosen
instead to avoid the “weariness of the flesh” precipitated by the making of
“many books” of which there is no end (Qoh 12:12).
We hope these scholarly contributions demonstrate our great esteem
for Samuel Greengus and our appreciation for his influence while we stud-
ied with him at HUC–JIR, Cincinnati, if inadequately honoring his contri-
butions to the field of Hebrew Bible and ancient Near Eastern studies.
Bill T. Arnold,
Nancy L. Erickson,
and John H. Walton
vii
viii Preface
A Colleague’s Appreciation
Nili S. Fox
Samuel Greengus is one of those rare persons whose academic life re-
flects Wisdom in the truest biblical sense. He is a scholar and a gentleman.
As a member of the Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion
faculty in Cincinnati for nearly five decades, he has modeled the finest attri-
butes of collegiality and leadership. In his multiple roles as professor, dean,
and vice president, his very being was entwined with that of the College–
Institute. His actions have always been goal-oriented but fair, his words soft
but strong. To his colleagues, as to his students, Sam served as teacher, ad-
visor, and friend.
In Spring 2012, I taught the Biblical and Ancient Near East Law course
traditionally taught by Sam. His 2011 book, Laws in the Bible and in Ear-
ly Rabbinic Collections: The Legal Legacy of the Ancient Near East, served
as the course core text. It allowed a new generation of students to engage
in Professor Greengus’s depth of knowledge and insight of subject matter,
which he researched and studied for a lifetime. This, I hold, is one of the
greatest rewards of teaching.
It has been a blessing working with Sam, and we continue our team-
work on Ph.D. dissertations still in progress. As his successor in the role
of Director of the School of Graduate Studies, I stand on broad shoulders,
continually benefiting from his guidance. This Festschrift, so lovingly pre-
pared and offered to Sam by his students, is truly a fitting gift for one devot-
ed to the ideals of the academy.
A Student’s Appreciation
Richard S. Hess
It is a pleasure to reflect on my experiences as a student of Sam Green-
gus. Sam was one of those role models who combined scholarly integrity
with a civility that always looked for the best in people, not least in his
students. These qualities contributed to the long line of HUC–JIR Ph.D.
students who worked with him and to the great influence he exerted on
them and on many of us who took his classes. I well remember the Sumer-
ian courses I took with Sam during my first year in graduate school. He
had a knack for explaining some of the difficult concepts and a great skill at
including some of the most interesting texts to read. The class of four met
in the Sumerian cuneiform room in the library. Although he was clearly the
master of the language, he sat beside us in the role of a fellow traveler as we
studied and learned. Of course, the fun part was always the stories he would
Preface ix
relate concerning his own teachers and experiences. His obvious respect
for the late Benno Landsberger shone through his words, as did Sam’s ad-
miration for his many anecdotes. I have yet to put to the test the method by
which Landsberger assured the prompt arrival of a taxi, involving generous
gifts of good whiskey.
There were many insights in the classes of Sam Greengus, and they went
beyond wisdom and other genres of texts that we read. One day, he congrat-
ulated one of the students whose wife had just given birth to a healthy baby.
He then observed how this moved one another generation along the family
line. I have often reflected on that as, like Sam, I have had the opportunity
to move from the role of a child to that of a parent and a grandparent. His
love for and connection with his family always served as an example to his
students of some of the fundamental values of human life.
As doctoral students, we all dreaded the week of doctoral exams. As a
member of my exam committee, Sam was always clear about what I should
study and how I should prepare. When the time came and I was in the
midst of writing the exams, one of the papers contained a question that we
had agreed would not be on the test. At the end of that day, I appeared in
Sam’s office and made my appeal to him. As a member of my committee
and as a friend, he was able to calm my concerns and proceed to set aright
the matter. I am sure that, like me, many found in Sam their advocate so
that they could have their work fairly evaluated and successfully complete
their programs. Indeed, it was a special role that he had during my years at
HUC–JIR. He was one to whom many came to seek guidance and counsel
in their lives. He had the gifts of listening and of empathy that are some-
times rare in the highest levels of scholarship.
One of the great gifts of life is to encounter one’s teacher and friend
again and again as one moves through a career. It was always a pleasure to
see and visit with Sam, whether in visits back to the Cincinnati campus, in
academic conferences, or, most recently in the honor he bestowed on Bill
Arnold and me by agreeing to contribute to a history of Israel volume we
have been editing. The joy of this is to see the friendship grow and deepen.
And that was easy with Sam. On each occasion, he expressed genuine in-
terest in his students’ lives, families, and careers; and this always came with
encouraging words. Sam Greengus’s inquisitive mind, sense of humor, and
joy of life combine to make him one of those sure guides along the way.
Sam, blessings with this volume. May you have many more years to
lead your students along the paths that you love.