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OverviewPostmortem existence in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament was rooted in mortuary practices and conceptualized through the embodiment of the dead. But this idea of the afterlife was not hopeless or fatalistic, consigned to the dreariness of the tomb. The dead were cherished and remembered, their bones were cared for, and their names lived on as ancestors. This book examines the concept of the afterlife in the Hebrew Bible by studying the treatment of the dead, as revealed both in biblical literature and in the material remains of the southern Levant. The mortuary culture of Judah during the Iron Age is the starting point for this study. The practice of collective burial inside a Judahite rock-cut bench tomb is compared to biblical traditions of family tombs and joining one's ancestors in death. This archaeological analysis, which also incorporates funerary inscriptions, will shed important insight into concepts found in biblical literature such as the construction of the soul in death, the nature of corpse impurity, and the idea of Sheol. In Judah and the Hebrew Bible, death was a transition that was managed through the ritual actions of the living. The connections that were forged through such actions, such as ancestor veneration, were socially meaningful for the living and insured a measure of immortality for the dead. Full Product DetailsAuthor: Matthew Suriano (Assistant Professor of Jewish Studies, Assistant Professor of Jewish Studies, University of Maryland, College Park)Publisher: Oxford University Press Inc Imprint: Oxford University Press Inc Dimensions: Width: 23.90cm , Height: 3.10cm , Length: 15.50cm Weight: 0.476kg ISBN: 9780190844738ISBN 10: 0190844736 Pages: 314 Publication Date: 10 May 2018 Audience: Professional and scholarly , Professional & Vocational Format: Hardback Publisher's Status: Active Availability: To order  Stock availability from the supplier is unknown. We will order it for you and ship this item to you once it is received by us. Table of ContentsAcknowledgements Abbreviations Note on Sources Chronology Map Prolegomenon: The Afterlife Embodied Part I: The Archaeology of Death in Iron Age Judah Chapter One: Death as Transition in Judahite Mortuary Practices Chapter Two: The History of the Judahite Bench Tomb Chapter Three: Writing and the Tomb Part II: Death and the Afterlife in the Hebrew Bible Chapter Four: Care for the Dead Chapter Five: The Narrative of Bones Chapter Six: The Tomb and the Identity of the Dead Chapter Seven: Death, Dying, and the Liminality of Sheol Epilogue: The Invisible TombReviewsSuriano is to be commended for this effort to bring social and archaeological questions to bear on the meaning of the Hebrew text. He has made an impressive contribution to the study of death in ancient Israel. * Matthew McAffee, Welch College, Bulletin for Biblical Research * Anyone acquainted with the problem of death in the HB will know how formidable and tortuous a task it is to write about it. In this recent contribution to the subject, S. provides a fresh and detailed look at Judahite mortuary practices with special emphasis on the Iron Age bench tomb...S. has proffered some interesting ideas in a valuable contribution to the growing body of literature on this topic, and one that will likely generate further research. * Seth Cole, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament * Author InformationMatthew Suriano is an Assistant Professor in the Joseph and Rebecca Meyerhoff Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Maryland. His research focuses on the history and culture of ancient Israel through the integration of biblical literature, Northwest Semitic inscriptions, and the archaeology of the Levant. He received his PhD from the University of California, Los Angeles in Near Eastern Languages and Cultures. Tab Content 6Author Website:Countries AvailableAll regions |
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