Joyce Rilett Wood – författare

From Babel to Babylon explores the literary and historical character of biblical texts in the Torah, Prophecy, and Writings. It considers questions of composition and the writing of history. The book situates biblical texts in their immediate and distant context. It reflects upon their intertextuality and identifies their literary sources. Key events and figures are discussed in light of the politics of the age. Gender issues are explored, with attention to the different social roles of men and women and the character of the interaction. Theology is another important topic, and the character of God keeps changing to reflect the development of historical and prophetic traditions. The books ends with biblical wisdom, with the specific instruction to rely on the experience of the sage, whose superior understanding is greater than our own. This exhortation to listen to the text directs us back to the introduction, where readers are asked to pay attention to the principles the text sets up for its own interpretation.

This study argues that the gist and movement of the prophecy in the book of Amos can be attributed to Amos himself, who composed a coherent cycle of poetry. His dire predictions came after the Fall of Samaria but before the Fall of Jerusalem. Writing a century later, the author of the book preserved but updated Amos'' text by fitting it into a developing literary, historical and prophetic tradition. Amos is used as a test case to show that prophecy originated in the performing arts but was later transformed into history and biography. The original prophecy is a song Amos recited at symposia or festivals. The book''s interest focusses on the performer and his times.