Perspectives on Purity and Purification in the Bible

Mention -New Testament Abstracts, Vol. 53 No. 1, 2009 Mention in Hebrew Studies 50 (2009) Reviewed in Religious Studies Review, Vol. 36, No. 2, June 2010 (UK)

Baruch J. Schwartz is the A. M. Shlansky senior lecturer in Biblical History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His research centers on Biblical religion and law, the Torah, classical prophetic literature and medieval biblical exegesis. He is the author of The Holiness Legislation (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1999) and of the commentary on Leviticus in The Jewish Study Bible (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004). He was an editor of the volume Texts, Temples and Traditions: A Tribute to Menahem Haran (Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1996). David P. Wright is associate professor of Hebrew Bible and ancient Near East at Brandeis University.

Baruch J. Schwatrz and David P. Wright; Introduction; Roy E. Gane, Andrews University; The Function of the Nazirite's Concluding Purification Offering; Jonathan Klawans, Boston University; Methodology and Ideology in the Study of Priestly Ritual; Jay Sklar, Covenant Theological Seminary; Sin and Impurity: Atoned and Purified? Yes!; Frank Gorman, Bethany College; Priests and Pagans: Ritual Structures, Blood, and Purification; Naphtali S. Meshel, Hebrew University, Jerusalem; Pure, Impure, Permitted, Prohibited: A Study of Classification Systems in P; Nicole J. Ruane, Union Theological Seminary; Sacred Impurity: The Red Cow (Numbers 19) as Anti-Sacrifice; William K. Gilders, Emory University; Blood as Purificant in Priestly Torah: What Do We Know and How Do We Know and How Do We Know It?; David Tabb Stewart, Southwestern University; Does the Priestly Purity Code (Leviticus 11-15) Domesticate Women?; Thomas Kazen, Stockholm School of Theology; Dirt, Disgust, and Demons: Body and Morality in Biblical Purity Laws.