Author: Shervin Farridnejad

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Zoroastrian Religion, History and Tradition

Williams, Alan, Sarah Stewart & Almut Hintze (eds.). 2016. Zoroastrian flame: Exploring religion, history and tradition. London: I.B. Tauris.
For many centuries, from the birth of the religion late in the second millennium BC to its influence on the Achaemenids and later adoption in the third century AD as the state religion of the Sasanian Empire, it enjoyed imperial patronage and profoundly shaped the culture of antiquity. The Magi of the New Testament most probably were Zoroastrian priests from the Iranian world, while the enigmatic figure of Zarathushtra (or Zoroaster) himself has exerted continual fascination in the West, influencing creative artists as diverse as Voltaire, Nietzsche, Mozart and Yeats. This authoritative volume brings together internationally recognised scholars to explore Zoroastrianism in all its rich complexity. Examining key themes such as history and modernity, tradition and scripture, art and architecture and minority status and religious identity, it places the modern Zoroastrians of Iran, and the Parsis of India, in their proper contexts. The book extends and complements the coverage of its companion volume, The Everlasting Flame.
ToC:
Part I: Themes and Approaches
  • Philip Kreyenbroek: „Looking to the Past in the Gāthās and in later Zoroastrianism“
  • Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina: „Knowledge, Power and Positionally across the Insider-Outsider Divide in the Study of Zoroastrianism“

Part II: Antiquity and Tradition

  • Alberto Cantera: „The ‚Sacrifice‘ to Mazdā: Its Antiquity and Vareity“
  • Almut Hintze: „A Zoroastrian Vision“
  • Daster Firouze M. Kotwal: „Continuity, Controversy and Change: A Study of the Ritual Practice of the Bhagaria Parsis of Navsari“
  • Antonio Panaino: „Betten Astral Cosmology and Astrology: The Mazdean Cycle of 12,000 Years and the Final Renovation of the World“
  • Touraj Daryaee: “Refashioning the Zoroastrian Past: From Alexander to Islam“

Part III: Tradition and Culture

  • James R. Russel: „On the Image of Zarathustra“
  • Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis: „Ancient Iranian Motifs and Zoroastrian Iconography“
  • Franz Grenet: „Extracts from a Calendar of Zoroastrian Feasts: A New Interpretation of the ‚Soltikoff‘ Bactrian Silver Plate in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris“
  • Albert de Jong: „The Dēnkard and the Zoroastrians of Baghdad“
  • Jamsheed K. Choksy: „Friendship in the Pahlavi Books“
  • Ashk Dahlén: „Literary Interest in Zoroastrianism in tenth-Century Iran: The Case of Daqiqi’s Account of Goshtāsp and Zarathustra in the Shāhnāmeh“

Part IV: Modernity and Minorities

  • Shernaz Cama: „The Sacred Armour of the Sudreh-Kusti and its Relevance in a Changing World“
  • Jenny Rose: „Riding the (Revolutionary) Waves between Two Worlds: Parsi Involvement in the Transition from Old to New“
  • Richard Foltz: „Co-opting the Prophet: The Politics of Kurdish and Tajik Claims to Zarathustra and Zoroastrianism“
  • Khojaste P. Mistree: „Collision, Conflict and Accommodation: A Question of Survival and the Preservation of the Parsi Zoroastrian Identity“
  • Sarah Stewart: „Ideas of Self-Definition among Zoroastrians in Post-Revolutionary Iran“
Alan Williams is Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Religion at the University of Manchester and a British Academy Wolfson Professor from 2013-2016. His publications include The Zoroastrian Myth of Migration from Iran and Settlement in the Indian Diaspora (2009) and The Vision of Rumi: Revealing the Masnavi, Persia’s Great Masterpiece (I.B.Tauris, 2016).

Sarah Stewart is Lecturer in Zoroastrianism at SOAS, University of London. She is co-general editor of the series ‘The Idea of Iran’, within which she has co-edited six volumes (all published by I.B.Tauris), and editor of The Zoroastrian Flame: Zoroastrianism in History and Imagination (I.B.Tauris, 2014).

Almut Hintze is the Zartoshty Brothers Professor of Zoroastrianism at SOAS, University of London. Her publications include A Zoroastrian Liturgy: The Worship in Seven Chapters, Yasna 35-41 (2007).

 

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Books

Cultural, Religious and Social aspects of Vaqf in Iran

Werner, Christoph. 2015. VAQF en Iran aspects culturels, religieux et sociaux. (Cahiers de Studia Iranica 56). Paris; Leuven: Peeters.
This volume contains the text of the five Ehsan and Latifeh Yarshater Distinguished Lectures on Iranian Studies, organized by the Unité Mixte de Recherche 7528 “Mondes iranien et indien”, and delivered in 2012 at the Collège de France in Paris.
It analyses cultural and social – as well as religious, economic, political and material aspects of endowments in Iran from the 14th century up to the present time. The five chapters cover various periods and are arranged chronologically along major themes: The institution of vaqf in early modern and contemporary Iran; Mystical endowments and religious endowments in fourteenth and fifteenth century Azerbaijan; Mashhad and its illumination vaqfs; Robes of honour conferred by Imam Reza; and Philanthropy, public education and nationalism in vaqf foundations of the Pahlavi period.
Table of Contents:
I. L’institution du vaqf en Iran
  • Vers une définition de l’institution du vaqf en Iran
  • Administration du vaqf et indépendance de l’institution
  • Le vaqf comme institution vivante
  • Vaqf et bonyād : un imbroglio idéologique
  • Manuels juridiques et vaqf : questions et réponses

II. Mouvements mystiques et fondations pieuses : les Kujujī et les Ṣafavides au 14e siècle

  • Les cheikhs Kujujī
  • L’histoire de Tabrīz et du nord-ouest de l’Iran au 14e siècle
  • La Kujujī Vaqfīye de 782h.q./1380
  • Le fondateur comme notable urbain dans les chroniques
  • Le fondateur poète
  • Le fondateur comme cheikh et mystique

III. Ville de lumière : Machhad et ses fondations d’illumination
Fondations d’illumination à Machhad selon le «Paradis des
histoires»

  • Le sanctuaire de l’Imam Reżā – origine, développement et administration
  • Le catalogue de Seyyed Hamadānī, «s̱ār al-rażavīye»
  • Les objectifs des fondations de l’Āstān-e Qods
  • L’administration des fondations d’illumination à l’époque qajare
  • Fondations d’illumination et introduction de l’éclairage électrique

IV. Robes d’honneur conférées par l’Imam Reżā

  • Robes d’honneur – la tradition des ḫelʿat
  • Pīškeš et ḫelʿat
  • Une collection des décrets émis par l’Āstān-e Qods
  • L’Āstān-e Qods-e Rażavī comme état semi-indépendant
    Conclusion

V. Mécénat, instruction publique et nationalisme : Le vaqf à l’époque Pahlavi

  • Législation et l’administration des owqāf à l’époque Pahlavi
  • Les Fondations Malek
  • Les Fondations Doktor Maḥmūd Afšār
  • La Fondation Moqaddam à Téhéran et autres fondations hybrides
    de l’époque Pahlavi

English summaries: Vaqf in Iran Cultural, Religious and Social aspects
Introduction
I. The institution of vaqf in Iran
II. Mystical movements and pious foundations: the Kujujī and the
Ṣafavids in the 14th century
III. City of light: Mashhad and its illumination vaqfs
IV. Robes of honour conferred by Iman Reżā
V. Philanthropy, education and nationalism: vaqf in Pahlavi Iran

About the Author:

Christoph Werner is Professor of Iranian Studies at Center for Near and Middle Eastern Studies (CNMS) was established at the Philipps-University of Marburg.

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Books

Iranian Studies in Honour of Éva M. Jeremiás

Szántó, Iván (ed.). 2015. From Aṣl to Zā’id: Essays in honour of Éva M. Jeremiás (Acta et Studia XIII). Pilis-csaba: The Avicenna Institute of Middle Eastern Studies.
Cove­ring a wide range of subjects within the general field of Iranian studies, this collec­tion of essays consists of contri­bu­tions by twenty scho­lars. Most arti­cles concen­t­rate on Persian lingu­istics.
A number of further essays discuss Persian lite­ra­ture, histo­rio­graphy; reli­gion, science ; and art. The volume contains nume­rous illu­s­t­ra­tions, mostly in colour, and it includes a compre­hen­sive biblio­graphy of Éva M. Jere­miás up to 2015.
Table of Contents:
  • C. EDMUND BOSWORTH: The poet ‘Asjadī and early Ghaznavid history
  • MÁRIA GÓSY: Similarities and differences in the early acquisition of grammar by Persian and Hungarian children
  • ELA FILIPPONE: The so-called Old Persian ‘potential construction’ (being Text production strategies and translation strategies in the Achaemenid documentation, III)
  • BERT G. FRAGNER: Orientalismus in Abenteuererzählungen aus der frühen Sowjetunion
  • CARINA JAHANI: Complex predicates and the issue of transitivity: The case of Southern Balochi
  • ANNA KRASNOWOLSKA: The Sarmatian myth and Poland’s nineteenth-century Orientalism
  • PAUL LUFT: Authenticity and identity of Qājār poetry on stone and paper
  • MARIA MACUCH: Precision orientated legal language in the Sasanian law of inheritance
  • ÁGNES NÉMETH: How do young Iranians speak?
  • PAOLA ORSATTI: Spoken features in classical Persian texts: subordinate conditional clauses without a conjunction
  • ANTONIO CLEMENTE DOMENICO PANAINO: Jesus’ trimorphisms and tetramorphisms in the meeting with the Magi
  • ADRIANO V. ROSSI: Diglossia in Persian
  • CHRISTINE VAN RUYMBEKE: Sir William Jones and the Anwār-i Suhaylī. Containing a fortuitous but nevertheless essential note on the Orient Pearls
  • ‘ALI ASHRAF SADEGHI: Rare forms of personal endings in some Classical Persian texts
  • NICHOLAS AND URSULA SIMS-WILLIAMS: Rustam and his zīn-i palang
  • IVÁN SZÁNTÓ: Bahāʼ al-Dīn al-‘Amilī and the visual arts
  • KATALIN TORMA: Georgius Gentius and the early reception of the Gulistān in Hungary
  • ZIVA VESEL: Les figures astrologiques dans les traités persans
  • SIBYLLE WENTKER: A visit of the Shah. Vienna and the false Rūznāma of Nāṣir al-Dīn Shah

About the Editor:

Iván Szántó (PhD 2009) is a scholar of Art History with special focus on Iranian Art and staff member of  The Institute of Iranian studies at the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW).

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Books

Mani’s Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg Hymns

Shokri-Foumeshi 2015Shokri-Foumeshi, Mohammad. 2015. Mani’s Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg Hymns. Edition, Reconstruction and Commentary with a Codicological and Textological Approach Based on Manichaean Turfan Fragments in the Berlin Collection. (Religions and Denominations 155). Qom: The University of Religions and Denominations.
This doctoral thesis with the title “Mani’s Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg Hymns: Edition, Reconstruction and Commentary with a Codicological and Textological Approach Based on Manichaean Turfan Fragments in the Berlin Collection” deals with the fragments of Mani’s Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg hymns (The hymn of the Gospel) discovered in the Turfan Oasis in the early 20th century, preserved in the Berlin Turfan Collection. 25 fragments have been studied in this work. Some of these fragments have already been published by other scholars, but only the work presented here aims at finalizing the work begun by others, as I was able to identify new fragments and with their help, was able to complete the fragments available. The combination of the new fragment M5439 with the previously published M17, the former completing the latter, proved to be one of the most important examples for my research on the Middle Persian version of Mani’s Gospel. I was able to reconstruct and conclusively join two of the already published fragments of the Ewangelyōnīg hymns with the help of two new fragments. I have also attempted in the scope of this work, to present an identification of several other fragments that were probably part of Mani’s Gospel. To accomplish this, I have analyzed all the Gnostic-Christian and Iranian sources in depth, and contrasted them with the Manichaean documents, both Iranian and non-Iranian. Thus I was able to present new suggestions and was likewise able to prove or disprove prior assumptions made by others about Mani’s Gospel. To ensure a deeper understanding of the Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg hymns, I have added a few explanatory chapters and paragraphs to this dissertation that mainly deal with the inner and outer structure of the Gospel and serve, as I hope, in establishing a comprehensive relation between the Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg hymns. Further research on the Manichaean sources, e.g. the Greek version of the Gospel and the Coptic Synaxeis on the one hand, and the Greek anti-Manichaean sources and accounts by Muslim writers on the other hand, served to deepen our understanding of the content of the Gospel greatly. By incorporating a study of these sources into this dissertation, I was able to close some of those gaps that impeded our understanding of the Gospel. Some important questions pertaining to the alphabetic structure of the chapters of the Gospel and the abecedarian order of the Parthian (Ewangelyōnīg) hymns, I was able to answer in this work. For some hapax legomena I was able to present a reasonable etymology in this dissertation. This doctoral thesis was not only designed to enlarge our understanding of the Turfan texts by presenting the new texts and reconstructions, moreover the new proposed codicological and textological approaches applied to the texts may serve to facilitate or at least simplify further research in this field.
For more information read the author’s introduction to this volume.
A PDF of this Volume is free accesable for download here.
Table of Contents:

Chapter One. Introduction

  • Aim
  • Material and Content of the Living Gospel and Ewangelyōnīg
  • Hymns
  • Outline of the Study
  • History of Prior Research

Chapter Two. Mani and his Gospel

  • The Living Gospel and Manichaeism
  • Position of the Gospel among the Canonical Writings
  • Names and Epithets
  • Composition Date
  • Chapter Order of the Living Gospel

Chapter Three. Living Gospel and Doubtful Fragments

  • Mani and the New Testament
  • Sayings of Jesus in Tatian’s Διà τεσσάρων and the Nag Hammadi
  • Codices
  • Double-edged Sword: Similarities and Differences
  • Possible Quotations of the Living Gospel in other Sources: An
  • Overview
  • The Paraclete as a Main Point of Issue in the Living Gospel
  • Not Near but not Far: Jesus’ Sayings and Acts
  • Citations of the Living Gospel: Some Tentative Suggestions

Chapter Four. Manichaean Turfan Texts of the Living Gospel

  • Overview and General Concepts
  • Turfan Fragments of the Living Gospel: Critical Middle Persian
  • Text and its Alternating Sogdian Version
  • Text I: M 17
  • Text II: M 172/I/
  • Text III: M 644
  • Text IV: A Newly Recognized Small Fragment: M 5439 [= T II D67]
  • Text V: An as yet Unpublished Manuscript Page in Sogdian Script
  • Return to the Verso Side of M 644
  • Unified Middle Persian Text of the Living Gospel
  • Commentary
  • Content of the Living Gospel According to an Unpublished Parthian Manuscript page

Chapter Five. Living Gospel Based on the Non-Iranian Manichaean Codices: Structure and Content

  • Greek Version
  • First Fragment: CMC 65, 23-68, 5
  • Second Fragment: CMC 68, 5-69, 8
  • Third Fragment: CMC 69, 9-70, 10
  • A Textological Commentary
  • Coptic Synaxeis
  • Chapter Titles
  • Plain Text
  • First Discourse (logos)
  • Other Discourses

Chapter Six. The Gospel in the Non-Manichaean Heritage

  • Accounts of the Greek Anti-Manichaean Writings
  • Arabic and Classical New Persian Testimonia
  • Testimonies
  • Commentary

Chapter Seven. Ewangelyōnīg Hymns

  • General Observations
  • Abecedarian System in the Parthian Hymns
  • Texts
  • Text I
  • Text II
  • Text III
  • Text IV
Chapter Eight. Miscellaneous Scraps: Living Gospel and Ewangelyōnīg Hymns
  • Fragment I
  • Fragment II
  • Fragment III
  • Fragment IV
  • Fragment V
Chapter Nine. Content of the Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg Hymns: An Overview
  • Living Gospel
  • Ewangelyōnīg Hymns
  • Living Gospel in Context of the ‘Hymns of the Gospel’
  • Chapter Ten. Glossary of Turfan Texts in this Work
  • Middle Persian and Parthian
  • Sogdian

Chapter Eleven. Conclusion

Mohammd Shokri-Foumeshi (PhD 2014) is a scholar of Manichaean as well as Middle Iranian studies and a lecturer at the The University of Religions and Denominations, Qom (Iran).

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Books

Sogdian Art and Archaelogy in China

Wertmann, Patrick. 2015. Sogdians in China. Archaeological and art historical analyses of tombs and texts from the 3rd to the 10th century AD. Deutschen Archäologischen Institut, Eurasien-Abteilung, Außenstelle Peking. (Archaeology in China and East Asia 5). Philipp von Zabern.

Sogdians, originating from present-day Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, dominated one of history’s greatest trade empires, extending from Constantinople to Korea between the 6th and 8th centuries AD. They established settlements in China and were granted positions of the highest rank at the imperial court. In recent years, richly equipped tombs attributed to members of the Sogdian diaspora were discovered in north and west China. The burial objects and inscriptions in these tombs offer surprising insights into the lives of these Central Asians. Patrick Wertmann followed the routes of the Sogdian traders and documented for his dissertation their traces in 54 museums and collections in eight countries, particularly in China. This fifth volume of the series Archaeology in China and East Asia offers the most comprehensive overview of Sogdian artefacts thus far assembled, with numerous colour photographs by the author.

The book has 347 pages with 116 full-page plates and 15 tables.

 About the Author:
Patrick Wertmann (PhD 2013) .is a specialist in East Asian art history and now working in the Sino-German cooperation project “Silk Road Fashion” of the Beijing Branch Office, Eurasia Department, German Archaeological Institute.
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Books

The Seleucids and Iran

Plischke, Sonja. 2014. Die Seleukiden und Iran: die seleukidische Herrschaftspolitik in den östlichen Satrapien. (Classica et Orientalia 9). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag.
This revised doctoral thesis surveys the eastern provinces of the Seleucid Empire. Much work has been done in the last decades, especially on the documents from Babylon, which allows for certain periods a much more certain chronology than was possible earlier. Plischke makes good use of this material and provides in general a sound survey of the sources and the voluminous secondary literature on the Seleucid kingdom, although her main focus is on Iran. She begins with a survey of recent research and follows it up with a rather long-winded listing of the literary, epigraphic and numismatic sources, which offers nothing new and could have been more sharply focussed – does a reader of this highly complex work really need to be told that Polybios is “generally regarded as reliable” or that Livy wrote his History of Rome in the Augustan period? The preliminary chapter also offers a cursory account of well-known events from Kyros II until the death of Roxane and Alexander IV. This makes a reader wonder whether the book is intended for a professional or a general readership. (R. Malcolm Errington, BMCR)*
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Articles

The vision of Ahura Mazdā’s poet

Image © Euromazdean Traditional Reader

Panaino, Antonio. 2015. The vision of Ahura Mazdā’s poet. Notes on Y. 31,5. In M.C. Pelevin (ed.), «НА ПАСТБИЩЕ МЫСЛИ БЛАГОЙ» Сборник статей к юбилею И. М. Стеблин-Каменского [Collection of articles for the anniversary of Steblin-Kamensky], 47–62. St. Petersburg: Контраст.

Y.31,5 is a very intriguing O.Av. stanza, which presents some interesting problems centered on the pivotal role of ərəšiš “seer, inspired poet”, corresponding to Ved. r̥ṣi-, whose insight should be connected not only with the Manah who was Vohu, but also with the inner manah- of Ahura Mazdā himself by means of a word-game played around the stem manah- evoked in its compositional form (mə̄ṇ°). The “better” (vahiiō) rule assigned by the Gods to the poet and priest (Zoroaster) opens his eyes offering the Av. ərəši– a new power of discrimination and comprehension of the world (probably both in the ritual dimension and in reality) so that he might actually impress in his own mind what does not exist and what is really existent. In this respect the text by means of the direct opposition between two subjunctives (yā nōit̰ vā aŋhat̰ aŋhaitī vā) of the root ah (very interestingly, one with a secondary ending, the latter with a primary one), shows how the idea of “existence” and “inexistence” — in this very case deeper than that of “being” or not “being” — was fittingly formulated already in the earliest Mazdean framework.
Antonio Panaino is professor of ancient Iranian philology and hitory of religion at the University of Bologna.
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Books

From Samarkand to Istanbul

Schiltz, Véronique (ed.). 2015. De Samarcande à Istanbul: étapes orientales. (Hommages à Pierre Chuvin 2). Paris: CNRS Éditions.
 Pierre Chuvin, the renomate scholar of hellenistic studies has devoted his academic life to the study of the Central Asian World in its most diverse aspects.
He founded and directed the French Institute for the Study of Central Asia (1993-1998), before taking the responsibility as the head of the French Institute of Anatolian Studies (2003-2008). Succeeding first collection of tributes dedicated to the world of Greek mythos to logos, this volume brings together contributions devoted to East Central Asian and Turkish studies. Their diversity is a reflection of the tireless curiosity, to whom they are dedicated. From Mausoleums of Samarkand to the Sublime Porte, from antiquity to modern times, from mythology to medicine, as well as the Poetry are very many aspects of a culture of extreme wealth, which are shown here.
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Books

Waterways of Iraq and Iran in the early Islamic period

Verkinderen, Peter. 2015. Waterways of Iraq and Iran in the early Islamic period: changing rivers and landscapes of the Mesopotamian plain. I.B. Tauris.
The waterways of ancient Iraq were crucial to its prosperity. While they were maintained, Iraq and neighbouring Khuzistan, in southwest Iran, were the richest and most productive agricultural areas of the Middle East, supporting the Sasanian, Umayyad and Abbasid empires. When the waterways changed or fell into decay, both the prosperity and the political role of Iraq largely disappeared. Understanding the course of the rivers and how they changed is therefore pivotal to understanding the history of the region. Peter Verkinderen’s important book provides the first major re-examination of the waterways of early Islamic Iraq in almost seventy years. Presenting a much fuller and more accurate picture than has previously been possible through analysis of modern satellite images, this is a work of the utmost importance, unlikely to be superseded for many years to come.
About the Author:
Peter Verkinderen (PhD) is research associate of Islamic Studies in the ERC Project “The Early Islamic Empire at Work – The View from the Regions Toward the Center”, at the University of Hamburg.
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Books

Biblical Covenant in the Persian Period

Bautch, Richard J. & Gary N. Knoppers (eds.). 2015. Covenant in the Persian Period: from Genesis to Chronicles. Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns.
The 22 essays in this new and comprehensive study explore how notions of covenant, especially the Sinaitic covenant, flourished during the Neo-Babylonian, Persian, and early Hellenistic periods. Following the upheaval of the Davidic monarchy, the temple’s destruction, the disenfranchisement of the Jerusalem priesthood, the deportation of Judeans to other lands, the struggles of Judeans who remained in the land, and the limited returns of some Judean groups from exile, the covenant motif proved to be an increasingly influential symbol in Judean intellectual life. The contributors to this volume, drawn from many different countries including Canada, Germany, Israel, South Africa, Switzerland, and the United States, document how Judean writers working within historiographic, Levitical, prophetic, priestly, and sapiential circles creatively reworked older notions of covenant to invent a new way of understanding this idea. These writers examine how new conceptions of the covenant made between YHWH and Israel at Mt. Sinai play a significant role in the process of early Jewish identity formation. Others focus on how transformations in the Abrahamic, Davidic, and Priestly covenants responded to cultural changes within Judean society, both in the homeland and in the diaspora. Cumulatively, the studies of biblical writings, from Genesis to Chronicles, demonstrate how Jewish literature in this period developed a striking diversity of ideas related to covenantal themes.
Continue reading “Biblical Covenant in the Persian Period”