Ernst Axel Knauf – författare

There was probably only one past, but there are many different histories. As mental representations of narrow segments of the past, 'histories' reflect different cultural contexts and different historians, although 'history' is a scientific enterprise whenever it processes representative data using rational and controllable methods to work out hypotheses that can be falsified by empirical evidence. A History of Biblical Israel combines experience gained through decades of teaching biblical exegesis and courses on the history of ancient Israel, and of on-going involvement in biblical archaeology. 'Biblical Israel' is understood as a narrative produced primarily in the province of Yehud to forge the collective memory of the elite that operated the temple of Jerusalem under the auspices of the Achaemenid imperial apparatus. The notion of 'Biblical Israel' provides the necessary hindsight to narrate the fate of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah as the pre-history of 'Biblical Israel', since the archives of these kingdoms were only mined in the Persian era to produce the grand biblical narrative.The volume covers the history of 'Biblical Israel' through its fragmentation in the Hellenistic and Roman periods until 136 CE, when four Roman legions crushed the revolt of Simeon Bar-Kosiba.

There was probably only one past, but there are many different histories. As mental representations of narrow segments of the past, 'histories' reflect different cultural contexts and different historians, although 'history' is a scientific enterprise whenever it processes representative data using rational and controllable methods to work out hypotheses that can be falsified by empirical evidence. A History of Biblical Israel combines experience gained through decades of teaching biblical exegesis and courses on the history of ancient Israel, and of on-going involvement in biblical archaeology. 'Biblical Israel' is understood as a narrative produced primarily in the province of Yehud to forge the collective memory of the elite that operated the temple of Jerusalem under the auspices of the Achaemenid imperial apparatus. The notion of 'Biblical Israel' provides the necessary hindsight to narrate the fate of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah as the pre-history of 'Biblical Israel', since the archives of these kingdoms were only mined in the Persian era to produce the grand biblical narrative.The volume covers the history of 'Biblical Israel' through its fragmentation in the Hellenistic and Roman periods until 136 CE, when four Roman legions crushed the revolt of Simeon Bar-Kosiba.

Geschichte ist nicht re-konstruierbar. "Konstruiren muss man bekanntlich die Geschichte immer... Der Unterschied ist nur, ob man gut oder schlecht konstruirt." (J. Wellhausen, 1886). Dieses Buch konstruiert mit Daten, mit rationalen und kontrollierbaren Methoden. Die Autoren verbinden Jahrzehnte ihrer archäologischen Feldarbeit in Israel mit Erfahrung universitärer Lehrtätigkeit zur biblischen Exegese und der Geschichte Israels vom 13.Jh. v.Chr. bis 135 n.Chr. Ihre Schwerpunkte liegen auf geographischem Kontext, sozialen und ökonomischen Verhältnissen, Darbietung zeitgenössischer Inschriftlichen und ikonographischen Funde und biblischer Texte. Sie konstruieren den Hintergrund der Groß-Erzählung, die vor allem Angehörige der Tempel in Jerusalem und auf dem Garizim in persischer Zeit mit der Thora als religiöser Lebensbasis und kollektiver Erinnerung erarbeiteten, ergänzt durch prophetische, geschichtstheologische und weisheitliche Texte der Bibel.So bietet das Buch neueste Ergebnisse der Archäologie, der Analyse (außer-)biblischer Texte und eine Konstruktion der Geschichte Israels und Judas als Grundlagen biblischer Exegese und Theologie.