Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 5 of 5
Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities
Ritual Rhetoric In The Pentateuch: The Case Of Leviticus 1-16, James W. Watts
Ritual Rhetoric In The Pentateuch: The Case Of Leviticus 1-16, James W. Watts
Religion - All Scholarship
The writers of the Pentateuch combined distinct ancient literary conventions of ritual rhetoric from diverse genres in order to place ritual concerns at the thematic and literary center of the Torah. The combination emphasizes the ritual texts as key components of the Pentateuch's persuasive strategy. Ritual rhetoric plays a vital role in unifying the Pentateuch's diverse contents into a persuasive argument for obedience to Torah and for cultic mediation by Aaronide priests. In the Second Temple period, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers presented a utopian religious ideal (worship in the Tent of Meeting surrounded by the idealized camp of the twelve …
The Synagogues Of Piedmont, Samuel D. Gruber
The Synagogues Of Piedmont, Samuel D. Gruber
Religion - All Scholarship
History and architecture of the synagogues of Piedmont, Italy.
Innovation By Translation: Yiddish And Hasidic Hebrew In Literary History, Ken Frieden
Innovation By Translation: Yiddish And Hasidic Hebrew In Literary History, Ken Frieden
Religion - All Scholarship
No abstract provided.
The Three Dimensions Of Scriptures, James W. Watts
The Three Dimensions Of Scriptures, James W. Watts
Religion - All Scholarship
This article proposes a new model for understanding the ways that scriptures function. Several big media stories of recent years, such as those surrounding controversies over Ten Commandments monuments in U.S. courthouses and Qur’ans desecrated at Guantánomo Bay, involve the iconic function of scriptures. Yet contemporary scholarship on Jewish, Christian or Muslim scriptures is ill-prepared to interpret these events because it has focused almost all its efforts on textual interpretation. Even the increased attention to the performative function of scripture by Wilfred Cantwell Smith and his students does not provide resources for understanding the iconic roles of scriptures. This paper …
Performing The Torah: The Rhetorical Function Of The Pentateuch In The Second Temple Period, James W. Watts
Performing The Torah: The Rhetorical Function Of The Pentateuch In The Second Temple Period, James W. Watts
Religion - All Scholarship
The Torah comes equipped with instructions for its own performance: a public reading of the entire scroll before the assembled people of Israel (Deut 31:9-11). The books of Kings and Nehemiah portrays similar ceremonies occurring in 7th and 5th century Jerusalem (2 Kgs 22-23; Neh 8). Yet later liturgical readings have rarely presented the entire Torah scroll at one time. Juxtaposition of biblical depictions of public readings with rhetorical analysis of the Pentateuch’s contents as well as evidence for its uses in the Second Temple period provides a test case for evaluating the possibilities and limitations of performance criticism of …