Bible Review

See Graham Stanton, “A Gospel Among the Scrolls,” BR 11:06.

See, for example, William Foxwell Albright, From the Stone Age to Christianity: Monotheism and the Historical Process, 2nd ed. (New York: Doubleday, 1957); and G. Ernest Wright, The Old Testament Against Its Environment (London: SCM, 1957).

Rashi, a French Jew who lived from 1040 to 1105, wrote commentaries on almost every book of the Hebrew Bible and the Babylonian Talmud.

Interestingly, the part of Deuteronomy that stems from the so-called Deuteronomic source (D) makes no reference to the pillar of cloud that guided Israel in the desert.

Moshe Weinfeld, “Deuteronomy’s Theological Revolution,” BR 12:01.

See Victor Hurowitz, “Inside Solomon’s Temple,” BR 10:02.

The name Horeb is also used to designate the place where Moses came upon the burning bush (Exodus 3:1) and where Elijah experienced his own personal theophany when fleeing Jezebel (1 Kings 19:8). Horeb is also mentioned in 1 Kings 8:9 and Malachi 3:22 as the site of revelation and law giving. Psalms 106:19 recalls Horeb as the site of the golden calf incident.

Kabbalah, meaning “that which is received,” is a term for Jewish mystical lore that originated orally and was eventually written down in numerous compositions, the most prominent of which is the Zohar (Book of Splendor), a medieval work traditionally attributed to the much earlier sage Rabbi Shimeon bar Yochai.

Written Torah refers to the Hebrew Bible. Oral Torah is Jewish nomenclature for the entire body of authoritative rabbinic law and lore. Some of this was eventually committed to writing in works such as the midrashim, which expound on books of the Bible; the Mishnah, a law corpus compiled by Rabbi Judah the Prince in about 200 C.E.; and the Gemara, a running commentary on the Mishnah from the fifth century C.E.

See Robin Jensen, “The Raising of Lazarus,” BR BR 11:02.