Overview
Persepolis and Jerusalem reconsiders Iranian influence upon Jewish apocalyptic, and offers grounds upon which such study may proceed. After describing the history of scholarship on the question of Iranian influence and on Jewish apocalyptic, Jason M. Silverman reformulates the methodology for understanding apocalyptic and influence. Two chapters set the discussion firmly in the Achaemenid Empire, describing the sources for Iranian religion, the issues involved in attempting a historical reconstruction, the methodology by which one can date the various texts and ideas, and the potential loci for Iranian-Judaean interaction. The historical context is expanded through media-contextualization, particularly Oral Theory, and critiques the standard text-centric method of current Biblical Scholarship. With this background, pericopes from Ezekiel, Daniel, and 1 Enoch are analyzed for Iranian influence. The study then brings together the contexts and analyses to argue for an ‘Apocalyptic Hermeneutic' which relates the phenomena of apocalypticism, apocalypse, and millenarianism—seeing the hermeneutic as a dialectical thread holding them all together as well as apart— and posits this as the best place to understand Iranian influences.
Full Product Details
Author: Dr. Jason M. Silverman (University of Helsinki, Finland)
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Imprint: T.& T.Clark Ltd
Edition: Annotated edition
Volume: No. 558
Dimensions:
Width: 15.50cm
, Height: 2.50cm
, Length: 23.50cm
Weight: 0.617kg
ISBN: 9780567205513
ISBN 10: 0567205517
Pages: 320
Publication Date: 26 April 2012
Audience:
General/trade
,
College/higher education
,
Professional and scholarly
,
General
,
Tertiary & Higher Education
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: Manufactured on demand
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.
Language: English
Reviews
[Persepolis and Jerusalem]...attempts to establish not so much the extent and nature of Persian influence on Jewish apocalypticism but a methodologically sophisticated program for doing so. Silverman therefore combines a theoretical model for understanding cultural influence with a series of detailed case studies, offering the entire package as a blueprint for future research ... the value of this monograph [lies in] moving scholars of the Bible and of Ancient Judaism toward appreciating the complexity of evaluating Persian influence on Jewish apocalypticism; acknowledging the likelihood that this did in fact occur, however obscure the sources; and pursuing a sophisticated analysis of cultural appropriation as the category for understanding this influence. Silverman bases his arguments on prodigious learning and sets them forth with clarity. His volume has an important voice among those investigating the origins of Jewish apocalypticism. -Reviews of the Enoch Seminar
Summarized. * New Testament Abstracts * This study proves useful to any scholar working in the field of Second Temple Judaism, and particularly in early Jewish apocalyptic. Silverman’s conclusion that the Iranian tradition had a great impact on the development of the Jewish Apocalyptic Hermeneutic is reasonable and well researched. This work represents a great step toward a better understanding of the origins of Jewish apocalypticism and its subsequent development. -- Amanda M. Davis Bledsoe, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich * Reviews in Religion and Theology *
Author Information
Dr. Jason M. Silverman completed his doctorate at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. He has edited two collections, A Land Like Your Own (2010) and Text, Theology, and Trowel (2011).
