Alice Bach - Böcker

Women in the Hebrew Bible presents the first one-volume overview covering the interpretation of women's place in man's world within the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament. Written by the major scholars in the field of biblical studies and literary theory, these essays examine attitudes toward women and their status in ancient Near Eastern societies, focusing on the Israelite society portrayed by the Hebrew Bible.

Women in the Hebrew Bible presents the first one-volume overview covering the interpretation of women's place in man's world within the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament. Written by the major scholars in the field of biblical studies and literary theory, these essays examine attitudes toward women and their status in ancient Near Eastern societies, focusing on the Israelite society portrayed by the Hebrew Bible.

This accessible, readable book looks at the cultural study of the Bible, challenging the traditional mode of reading the women in the Bible. Alice Bach applies literary theory, cultural representations of biblical figures, films, and paintings to a close reading of a group of biblical texts revolving around the 'wicked' literary figures in the Bible. She compares the biblical character of the wife of Potiphar with the Second Temple Period narratives and rabbinic midrashim that expand her story. She then reads Bathsheba against a Yiddish novel by David Pinski, and finally looks at the Biblical Salome against a very different Salome created by Oscar Wilde, and the selection of Salomes created by Hollywood. Bach argues that biblical characters have a life in the mind of the reader independent of the stories in which they were created, thus making the reader the site at which the texts and the cultures that produced them come together.

These essay in honour of Professor Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza draw on international feminist scholarship indebted to her ground-breaking achievements in the areas of biblical studies, feminist thought and social justice. The contributors represent a wide variety of backgrounds, commitments, methodologies, talents and interests. They are united here by their appreciation for her as a scholar, teacher, mentor, colleague and friend. The spectrum is full of vitality, with important convergences and intersections. It exemplifies what Schussler Fiorenza has called "critical collaboration": women thinking together and creating together. This Festschrift is unique in that it celebrates the work of all women in the field.