Families in Ancient Israel (Family, Religion, and Culture) [Paperback]

Leo G. Perdue (Author), Joseph Blenkinsopp (Author), John J. Collins (Author), Carol L. Meyers (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 1997 | Series: Family, Religion, and Culture

Four respected scholars of the Hebrew Bible and early Judaism provide a clear portrait of the family in ancient Israel. Important theological and ethical implications are made for the family today.

The Family, Culture, and Religion series offers informed and responsible analyses of the state of the American family from a religious perspective and provides practical assistance for the family's revitalization.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Families in Ancient Israel, by Perdue, Blenkinsopp, Collins, and Meyers develops an impressive social history based on thorough archaeological and anthropological spadework . . . Perdue appropriately cautions against modern impositions of uniformity on diverse materials and also against making the Bible's depictions of families into a handbook of stipulations for today's families." -- Eric Mount, Jr. Theology Today, April 1998

About the Author

Leo G. Perdue is Professor of Hebrew Bible at Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth, Texas. He is an international authority on wisdom literature and the author of numerous books, including Proverbs in the esteemed Interpretation commentary series.

Joseph Blenkinsopp is John A. O'Brien Professor Emeritus of Biblical Studies at the University of Notre Dame in Notre Dame, Indiana. He is the author of Sage, Priest, Prophet: Religious and Intellectual Leadership in Ancient Israel and coauthor of Families in Ancient Israel.

John J. Collins is Holmes Professor of Old Testament Criticism and Interpretation at Yale Divinity School in New Haven, Connecticut. His books include Daniel, a commentary in the Hermeneia series, and The Bible after Bable: Historical Criticism in a Postmodern Age. He is co-editor of the three-volume Encyclopedia of Apocalypticism and has participated in the editing of the Dead Sea Scrolls. He has served as president of both the Catholic Biblical Association and the Society of Biblical Literature.

Carol L. Meyers holds the Mary Grace Wilson Professorship in Religion at Duke Univeristy, Durhum, North Carolina. A specialist in biblical studies and archaeology, she is a prominent scholar in the study of women in the biblical world and has been a staff member or Co-Director of many archaeological field projects. She has also been a consultant for many media productions focusing on the Bible, including DreamWorks's Prince of Egypt, Nova's The Bible's Buried Secrets, and many segments of the A&E Mysteries of the Bible and Biography series. She was recently appointed to the Advisory Board of Bible Park, USA. She has authored or co-authored ten books and has edited or co-edited five others. Her book, Discovering Eve is a landmark study of women in ancient Israel; and her reference book, Women in Scripture, is the most comprehensive study ever made of women in Jewish and Christian scriptures. Her most recent books are Exodus, for a Cambridge University Press commentary series, and Households and Holiness: The Religious Culture of Israelite Women. Meyers co-directs Duke's Summer in Israel program, is currently serving as Director of Undergraduate Studies in Religion and Convener of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament graduate program, and is an affiliated faculty member of Duke's Women's Studies Program.

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press; 1st edition (May 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0664255671
• ISBN-13: 978-0664255671
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #849,334 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Behind the Biblical Family, May 26, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Families in Ancient Israel (Family, Religion, and Culture) (Paperback)

This is the book for anyone who has ever wondered about the political homage paid to the "biblical family" in recent years. Profiting from recent breakthroughs in the study of Hebrew scriptures, this book, one of a series produced by the Religion, Culture, and Family Project of the University of Chicago Divinity School, argues that the family in ancient Israel should be understood as a complicated, multi-generational "household" system organized around a core "covenant" between father and mother, parents and children, households and land, and families and God. The ancient Hebrew family was hardly the "nuclear family" of today. Codes of hospitality insured that even outsiders and marginal members of the community were included when necessary. Indeed, the ancient Hebrew family resembled more the "village" concept, not only for raising children, but for building up community. Religious ideas in ancient Israel gave order and significance to the practical realities of family life, and were closely connected to the realities of household labor, land, wealth, procreation, inheritance, economic profit and loss, sickness, and dependency. This book is the only recent comprehensive review in the English language of the family in ancient Israel. It is well worth reading for anyone who wants to understand the biblical families of the Old Testament.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Enriching, May 14, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Families in Ancient Israel (Family, Religion, and Culture) (Paperback)

This collection of papers on the Family in ancient Israel covers the various periods of Israelite history. From pre-monarchy to second temple Judaism the chapters discuss many aspects of the family. The various authors discuss the members of the family, divorce, inheritance, and other issues that families of old as well as modern families experience. The ancient Israelite family was similar to those in the ancient Near East in their work ethic, structure, and culture.

This book helps the American family redefine their concept of family, extended family, and household as a source of strength for their cultural development.

4.0 out of 5 stars Favorable - Familes in Ancient Israel, July 1, 2009

By 

J. Allison "ymguy15" (Weatherford, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Families in Ancient Israel (Family, Religion, and Culture) (Paperback)

This book's first strength is that it is divided into sections which describe the family based upon each scholar's area of expertise. So, Meyers takes the archaeological discussion, and Perdue takes the theological discussion.

Meyers does a good job of describing the way in which rural settings differ from urban settings in terms of the family. She uses inductive logic to demonstrate her position about the family in Ancient Israel. Meyers describes hard evidence in the material culture, such as the shape and design of houses, and then makes statements about the amount of occupants based on population densities in other rural

villages in the world. So, her numbers aren't hard facts, but they are probably excellent ideas.

read the full review at [...]