Academic literature on the topic 'Bible Genesis;Criticism, interpretation, etc History'

THE BIBLE & ANCIENT SCIENCE: Principles of Interpretation by Denis O. Lamoureux. Tullahoma, TN: McGahan Publishing, 2020. 218 pages. Paperback; $15.99. ISBN: 9781951252052. *"Simply stated, I believe the literary genre of Genesis 1-3 is an ancient account of origins. Notably, it is deeply rooted in ancient science" (p. 195). *Denis O. Lamoureux is Professor of Science and Religion at St. Joseph's College at the University of Alberta. He possesses three earned doctorates (dentistry, theology, and biology) and tells of an intellectual and spiritual journey out of atheism, through fundamentalism, and to his current position. Consequently, if there was ever a model voice that displays the academic and personal experience necessary to speak formidably about the hermeneutical issues associated with Genesis 1-3 and the other creation texts of the Bible, it is Lamoureux. *The study begins with what seems like a simple question, "Is the Bible a book about science?" However, before the opening chapters are completed, the reader understands that the question is anything but simple. In fact, the difficulty of the conversation is poignantly displayed when he offers answers to his leading question from two giant figures within the evangelical tradition. Henry M. Morris answers in the affirmative, but Billy Graham answers negatively. Yet, to his credit, Lamoureux does not dwell on this disagreement. He quickly emphasizes that a proper answer to his question requires an entanglement with issues of hermeneutics, or principles of interpretation (p. 13). Consequently, the remainder of the book is a journey through the wild and woolly world of biblical hermeneutics on the way to answering the question of whether the Bible is a book about science. *Lamoureux guides the reader toward his answer by discussing twenty-two hermeneutical principles that range from the mundane topics of "literalism," "literary genre," and "historical criticism" to the more complex, such as "cognitive competence," "accommodation," and "concordism." Each chapter is devoted to one principle, and all the chapters are organized similarly. They discuss the principle and then specific applications to the creation texts. This approach produces manageable-sized chapters that can be pondered without a fear of being overwhelmed by complex arguments; however, presenting an argument by a series of propositional statements can obfuscate how each proposition interacts with the others and how they all cooperate. In Lamoureux's defense, however, he does well to minimize any dissonance. *Ultimately, Lamoureux finds himself landing between Morris and Graham when answering his leading question. According to Lamoureux, the Bible contains science, but it's ancient science. And that qualification makes all the difference. The biblical writers are indeed talking about the origins of the universe, but they are doing so in terms of an Iron Age worldview while using Iron Age concepts. Therefore, their "science" is incompatible with the scientific inquiry and discourse of today. This conviction implies that concordism neither does justice to the text and its message nor frames a useful conversation. *In pushing back against any simplistic appropriation of the Bible's message upon the demands of modern scientific discourse, Lamoureux offers a very nuanced proposal. But at its heart is a respect for the ancient worldview of the biblical authors with all its frustrating peculiarities. For example, Lamoureux emphasizes how things such as the rhetoric and ahistorical symbolism of parables must be respected. Simple enough; however, Lamoureux also recognizes that ancient Israel perceived the universe through a three-tiered concept, a reality that finds itself alongside flat-earth theories in the hall of fame of modern-day cosmological ludicrousness. Similarly, ancient Israel's botanical awareness was clearly ignorant of the data we have today. Therefore, Lamoureux's discussions eventually bring the reader to a crossroad. How can a reader respect the Bible if it is invoking principles of, say, botany or any other field of science, in ways that run counter to contemporary scientific discourse? Is the reader confronted with the terrible situation in which they must support the Bible's claims despite the contradictory scientific evidence? Are they forced to abandon any notion of inerrancy? *It is at this point that the integrity of Lamoureux's argument reaches a critical point. His argument cannot work without certain hermeneutical principles. First, the principle of accommodation argues that God accommodates himself to humanity--through language, culture, concepts, etc.--in order to ensure effective communication. So, in the example of Israel's botanical awareness, God is "using the botany-of-the-day" to ensure that the audience would understand the message. Similarly, this should also be applied to Israel's three-tiered universe and other cosmological concepts. Second, the message-incident principle argues that the mode of communication is incidental to the core message. To be clear, "Incidental has the meaning of that which happens to be alongside and happening in connection with something important" (p. 46). Therefore, applied to the creation texts, ancient science is incidental but important to delivering spiritual truths (p. 47). Third, Lamoureux champions incarnational inspiration. According to Lamoureux, the incarnation, as understood in Jesus, becomes the analogy par excellence for understanding the nature of scripture. It is fully divine and fully human. The Bible, like Jesus, transcends time and history. And God's perfect message comes through finite and imperfect humanity. *Many of Lamoureux's arguments echo similar arguments made by biblical scholars in recent memory. For example, Kenton Sparks, in God's Word in Human Words: An Evangelical Appropriation of Critical Biblical Scholarship (2008), emphasized accommodation in his attempt to balance a conviction that the Bible contains factual errors but is also inerrant. Peter Enns systematically argued for incarnational inspiration, as in Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament (2005). John Walton and Brent Sandy display affinities to Lamoureux's message-incident principle in their work The Lost World of Scripture: Ancient Literary Culture and Biblical Authority (2013). Consequently, the pitfalls that face these scholars face Lamoureux as well. If accommodation explains the scientific ignorance of the biblical writers, is inerrancy the best description of scripture? Or, because the incarnation is unique to the realities of Jesus, how appropriate is it to invoke it as an analogy for something else? At what point does it break down (cf. Ben Witherington, The Living Word of God [Waco: Baylor University Press, 2007], 35-49)? *I wholeheartedly agree with Lamoureux that it is paramount for the interpreter to dutifully consider the text on its own terms, particularly since I take seriously the notion that God used ancient Israel to communicate his redemptive plan. Thus, the interpreter should yield to Israel's concepts, conventions, and philosophies on the way to understanding the message before they move to appropriation for theological discourse. Nevertheless, several elements in The Bible and Ancient Science could be fine tuned. These include Lamoureux's framing of the discussion of translating Genesis 1:1 (pp. 75-81) as a text-critical issue, when it is more of a translation problem. Lamoureux also presents a generic, almost flat, portrait of the classic criticisms of biblical studies (e.g., textual criticism, literary criticism, historical criticism) that does not support a nuanced understanding of their results for the creation texts. *A little more significant is Lamoureux's understanding of Paul's typological argument in Romans 5. He struggles with the possibility that Paul's argument appears historical in nature. He states, *"As a consequence, Paul undoubtedly believed Adam was a historical person and that the events of Genesis 2-3 really happened. However, it must be emphasized that Paul's belief in the reality of Adam and the events in the Garden of Eden does not necessarily mean they are historical" (p. 175). *Thus, he is forced to wrestle with the implications of his argument as it confronts the semantics of the text. He may well have been influenced by Enns in how he tries to navigate this, but a difficult tension remains (Peter Enns, The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn't Say about Human Origins [2012]). For Lamoureux, and Enns for that matter, it is difficult to advocate a framework-like typology which usually interprets historical figures in the context of history as, in this instance, functioning with a significant level of historical ignorance. *A deeper commitment to comparative investigations would also have enhanced Lamoureux's argument. He is certainly aware of non-Israelite texts and how they help us understand the concepts, conventions, and message of the biblical text, for he references them in his discussions of worldview and ancient conceptions of the universe. However, reading Genesis 1-2 in the shadow of texts such as the "Enuma Elish" and the "Memphite Theology" crystalizes the form and function of the genre as well as the Old Testament's theological emphases. *Nevertheless, overall Lamoureux gets far more right than wrong and this work is valuable. It makes potentially complicated concepts accessible and applies them to the very important debate about what "inerrant" means when describing the nature of scripture. *Reviewed by David B. Schreiner, Associate Dean and Associate Professor of Old Testament, Wesley Biblical Seminary, Ridgeland, MS 39157.

Šiame straipsnyje keliamas etninės tapatybės genezės klausimas šiuolaikinėje lietuviškoje kultūroje. Pirmiausia aptariamas žodžių „etnosas“, „etniškumas“ apibrėžimų problemiškumas, atkreipiant dėmesį į tai, kad šie žodžiai imti intensyviai eksploatuoti tik prasidedant pokolonijiniam laikotarpiui, siekiant nurodyti tam tikras žmonių grupių tapatybes (Sovietų Sąjungoje – tautybę, JAV, Didžiojoje Britanijoje ir susijusiuose kraštuose – įvairias mažumas). Antroje straipsnio dalyje lyginamas LXX ir hebrajiškos Biblijos (MT) terminų, nurodančių įvairias žmonių grupines tapatybes, taip pat ir ethnos, vartojimas, analizuojamos įvairios Biblijos tekstų vertimų į lietuvių kalbą strategijos. Parodoma, kaip radikaliai keitėsi grupinę tapatybę žyminčių terminų samprata ir interpretacija XX a. Tyrimas leidžia daryti išvadą, kad žodis „tauta“ XX a. pradžioje Lietuvoje pakeitė neutralų anksčiau vartotą žodį „žmonės“, kuriuo būdavo perteikiami graikiški žodžiai laos, neretai ir ethnos, ar lotyniškas populus, ir taip buvo sukonstruotos „tautos“; taip pat atkreipiamas dėmesys į tai, kad žodynai, kuriuose LXX ir NT graikiškas terminas ethnos aiškinamas kaip stereotipiškai nurodantis nežydus, nekrikščionis, pagonis, yra anachronistiškai perdedantys, nors ir būta negatyvumo, siejamo su šiuo terminu krikščioniškoje kultūroje. Šitą negatyvumą tebegalima apčiuopti ir šiuolaikinėje lietuviškoje kultūroje per susvetimėjimą su lietuviškumu. Galiausiai straipsnyje aptariama lietuviškoji savivoka, pasireiškianti per svetimumo su savimi, su šiuolaikine visuomene momentus, ir pateikiami keli pavyzdžiai pastangų įveikti minėtą susvetimėjimą naujų utopijų kūrimu, tik utopijų, nukreiptų ne į ateitį, o į praeitį, bandančių perkurti Lietuvos istoriją, kurią esą šiuolaikiniai akademiniai istorikai yra iškraipę, taip lyg tapdami atsakingi už tą susvetimėjimą.Pagrindiniai žodžiai: etniškumas, ethnos, tauta, Biblija, Biblijos vertimai, biblinė tauta, susvetimėjimas, lietuviškas etnosas, pagonybė. CHANGES IN THE MEANING OF THE TERM ETHNOS: FROM THE BIBLE TRANSLATIONS TO THE NEW UTOPIASAušra Kristina Pažėraitė SummaryThis article presents an analysis of the genesis of ethnic identity in the contemporary Lithuanian culture. In particular, the definitions of such words as “ethnos”, “ethnicity” are discussed by paying more attention to the fact that these words became common words denoting particular identities of the people only at the beginning of the post-colonial era (nearly synonymous to nation in the Soviet Union and denoting different minorities in the USA, Great Britain, etc.). In the second part of the article, the Biblical (LXX and the MT) words that name different peoples, group identities are compared, their use and the strategy of translation of various texts of the Bible into Lithuanian are analyzed. The article shows how radically the conception and interpretation of the terms that denote various biblical group identities have changed. In the Bible translations into Lithuanian, the word “nation” in the beginning of the 20th century replaced the ancient and more neutral word “people”, which conveyed the Greek word laos, sometimes also ethnos, or the Latin populus. Although the negativity of the term ethnos in its Christian usages can be perceived in the post-soviet Lithuanian culture, a conclusion is made that the traditional explication of the word ethnos in various dictionaries, which stereotypically denotes in LXX pagan people, non-Judeans, non-Christian, is an anachronistic exaggeration. In the final part of the article, certain aspects of post-soviet Lithuanian self-consciousness are discussed by pointing to the self-alienation of this consciousness on the “ethnic” background (Lithuanian nationality is equated to ethnicity, and the concept of ethnicity still preserves a certain negativity of the minority, if not hated, heathen, pagan minority). Finally, certain examples of the attempt to overcome this alienation are presented as the new Utopias, although oriented not toward the future, but back to the past as the attempts to create a new History of Lithuania instead of the present official academic History, which is considered as an essentially alienating one.Keywords: ethnos, ethnicity, the Bible, nation, people, translations of the Bible, biblical nation, Lithuanian ethnicity, alienation, paganism.

The Bible: Text and subversionThis article explores both the subversive dimension of the biblical text, in particular the Old Testament, as the ramifications thereof for the concept of a religious text. It argues that interpretation has been historically and fundamentally part and parcel of the genesis and reception history of the biblical text. The texts of Job and Jonah have been chosen for their explicit subversive strategies. The article shows that if the biblical text exploits strategies of subversion, it also contravenes the traditional opinion subscribing to a referential meaning of texts. A subversive text cannot simultaneously deny and confirm a constant (fixed) and an immutable reality. The article argues that biblical scholars should reconsider other perceptions of the religious text to avoid the destructive criticism of referential meaning in postmodern studies. One option to be considered is the view of a text as performative communication.

Аполлон Григорьев и Бахтин затрагивали достаточно разные вопросы творчества Достоевского, но корреляция между их работами очевидна на уровне их металогики, их философии, их культур-философских оснований. Григорьев, вместе с Достоевским, находился у истоков почвенничества, хотя отзывы Григорьева о творчестве Достоевского эпизодичны и довольно инвективны. Григорьев, в основном, отказывал Достоевскому в том, что его искусство соответствует «правде жизни». Но и первый вариант книги Бахтина о Достоевском не был апологетическим. Григорьев и Бахтин реализуют свою философию через эстетику (философию искусства). Искус-ство, согласно Григорьеву, имеет истоки в самой жизни, а жизнь через искусство реализует себя и сама себя понимает; поэтому критик – также «художник». Бахтин также исходит из принципа корреляции искусства и жизни, выводя отсюда свое понятие «творческий хронотоп». У Григорьева, Бахтина, Достоевского дело идет об онтологии искусства, как и об искусстве онтологии. Искусство онтологии подразумевает самую широкую эстетизацию жизни: ее вдвижение в горизонт искусства. Данная установка – предмодернистская и модернистская. В генезисе понятия «органическая критика» отозвались уроки Канта как автора трех философ-ских «Критик». Идеи Канта были значимы также для Достоевского и Бахтина. Григорьева могло за-интересовать философское измерение, приданное Кантом понятию «критика». Поэтому «органиче-ская критика» относится преимущественно к философии, поднимая объемный перечень вопросов, превышающих собственно эстетические. Согласно Бахтину, полифония Достоевского заключается в том, что автор выступает «медиумом», «пропускающим» через себя различные идеи («голоса» персонажей, различные «точки зрения» и т. п.) Автор-медиум «проводит» «через себя» и «из себя» массу различных идей без сущностного отвержения какой-либо из них. «Автор-медиум» пытается говорить от лица жизни, но также и даже «вместо жизни», что ведет к логической и смысловой подмене «мира» – «картиной мира». Отвер-жение сущностное вовсе не означает отсутствия у автора отвержения формального, т. е. просто констатированного. Однако сущностное неотвержение означает гораздо больше, чем то или иное формальное отвержение. Жизнь, историческое бытие в таком случае оказывается для Достоевского практически «хаосом». В развитие идей Бахтина следует, что при внедрении в свой художественный мир карнавального начала Достоевский утверждает «связку» чувствительность / физиологизм. Ее истоки – в сентимен-тализме XVIII в. Данная «связка» находит религиозную проекцию в феномене юродства. Поэтому итоговой бахтинской трактовкой Достоевского (1963) движет пафос «оправдания» писателя, полно-та художественного мира которого в главном реализована через религиозно трактованную Досто-евским «картину мира» (все-таки «картину мира», но не сам «мир»). Apollon Grigoriev and Bakhtin touched upon quite different issues of Dostoevsky’s work but the correlation between their works is obvious at the level of their metalogic, their philosophy, and their cultural-philosophical foundations. Grigoriev, together with Dostoevsky, was at the origins of “pochvennichestvo” (a grassroots movement), although Grigoriev’s comments on Dostoevsky’s work are episodic and rather injective. Grigoriev basically denied Dostoevsky that his art corresponded to the “truth of life”. But even the first version of Bakhtin’s book about Dostoevsky was not apologetic. Grigoriev and Bakhtin realize their philosophy through aesthetics (philosophy of art). Art, according to Grigoriev, has its origins in life itself, and life through art realizes itself and understands itself; therefore the critic is also an “artist”. Bakhtin also proceeds from the principle of correlation between art and life, deriving from this his concept of “creative chronotope”. Grigoriev, Bakhtin, and Dostoevsky deal with the ontology of art as well as the art of ontology. The art of ontology implies the broadest aestheticization of life: its movement into the horizon of art. This attitude is pre-modern and modern. In the genesis of the concept of “organic criticism”, the lessons of Kant as the author of three philosophical “Critics” could be echoed. Kant’s ideas were also significant for Dostoevsky and Bakhtin. Grigoriev might have been interested in the philosophical dimension that Kant gave to the concept of “criticism”. Therefore, “organic criticism” refers primarily to philosophy, raising a voluminous list of issues that exceed the aesthetic ones themselves. According to Bakhtin, Dostoevsky’s polyphony consists in the fact that the author acts as a “medium”, “passing” various ideas through himself (“voices” of characters, different “points of view”, etc.). The author- medium “conducts” “through himself” and “out of myself” a lot of different ideas without the essential rejection of any of them. The “author-medium” tries to speak on behalf of life but also even “instead of life”, which leads to a logical and semantic substitution of “the world” – “an image of the world”. Essential rejection does not at all mean that the author has no formal rejection, i.e. just stated. Essential non-rejection, however, means much more than any formal rejection. Life, historical being in this case turns out to be practically “chaos” for Dostoevsky. In the development of Bakhtin’s ideas, it follows that, when introducing carnivalization into his artistic world, Dostoevsky affirms a “link” of sensitivity / physiology. The origins of this “link” are in the sentimentalism of the 18th century. This “link” finds a religious projection in the phenomenon of “yurodstvo” (foolishness). Therefore, Bakhtin’s final interpretation of Dostoevsky (1963) is driven by the pathos of the “justification” of the writer, whose integrity of the artistic world is mainly realized through the religious “image of the world” (aft er all, the “image of the world” and not the “world” itself).

This thesis undertakes to apply some of the insights from postcolonial criticism to understand the history of Christianity in Japan, focusing on key Christian thinkers in the period since Japan’s national isolation ended in the mid 19th century. It studies these theologians' interaction with the the Bible as a “canonical”text in the Western civilisation, arguing for a two-way connection between Japan’s reception of Christianity and reaction to the West. In particular, it considers the process through which Christianity was employed to support or criticise Japan’s colonial discourse against neighbouring Asian countries. In this process, I argue that interpretation of the Bible was a political act, informed not simply by the text itself, but also by the interpreter’s positionality in the society. The thesis starts by reviewing the history of Christianity in Japan. The core of the thesis consists of three chapters, each of which considers the thought of two contemporaries. Ebina Danjo (1866-1937) and Uchimura Kanzo (1861-1930) were two first-generation Christians who converted to Christianity through missionaries from the United States, and responded to Japan’s westernisation and military expansion from opposite perspectives. Kagawa Toyohiko (1888-1960) and Yanaihara Tadao (1893-1961) spoke about the country’s situation in the years preceding the Asia-Pacific War (1941-1945), and again reached two different conclusions. Nagai Takashi (1908-1951) and Kitamori Kazo (1916-1998) were Christian voices immediately after the war, and both dealt with the issue of suffering. Each chapter explores how the formation of their thoughts was driven by their particular historical, economic, and social backgrounds. The concluding chapter outlines Christian thought in Japan today and deals with the major issue facing Japanese theology: cultural essentialism.

The phenomenon of inner-biblical interpretation and inter-textual replication of scriptural material within the Old Testament is receiving significant attention in current scholarship. Two narratives which are repeated three times in the Hebrew Bible provide a particularly fruitful case study for this type of research: the Hezekiah narrative (2 Kgs 18-20; Isa 36-39; 2 Chr 29-32) and the account of the fall of Judah (2 Kgs 24-25; Jer 52; 2 Chr 36). This study extends the contributions of redaction-critical, literary-critical, and text-critical studies examining the narratives of 2 Kings 18-20//Isaiah 36-39 and 2 Kings 24:18-25:30//Jeremiah 52 and emphasizes their subsequent reception in Chronicles. In addition, this investigation advances the discussion of the Chronicler's reliance upon and method of incorporating material from the Latter Prophets. It is the conclusion of this thesis that the Chronicler was familiar with the versions of the Hezekiah narrative and the account of the fall of Judah in both 2 Kings and the Latter Prophets. His method of handling these alternative accounts reflects both direct quotation (particularly in the case of 2 Kings) and indirect allusion to themes and idioms (with regard to the Latter Prophets). The result is a re-telling of Judah's history which is infused with hope for restoration as articulated by the Latter Prophets. By portraying an idealized account of Israel's past history which corresponds to prophetic descriptions of the nation's restoration, Chronicles illustrates the accessible, utopic potential held out to every generation of faithful Israel.

Thesis (DTh (Old and New Testament))--University of Stellenbosch, 2006.
The interaction between scholarly and non-scholarly readings of Genesis 11:1-9 in the South African context refers to the transformation in biblical hermeneutics from the world of the text to the world of the reader and the post-colonial critique of Western essentialist scholarly modes of reading the Bible. This study explored three essentialist modes of scholarly reading from the South African context that perpetuated imperialism and colonialism: Anglocentric -, Afrikaner - and Anti-colonial modes of reading. Non-scholarly readings of Bible Study Groups, African mythology and artworks of Azaria Mbatha view the text as subject. Non-scholarly readings, from the margin of the South African context, informed by a holistic and interconnected cultural discourse, deconstruct essentialism and constructs responsible readings of the Bible. These readings deconstruct centralistic essentialist discourses and construct a liminal space for new creative and responsible readings of the Bible in the South African context that stimulates healing. The ubuntu reading of Genesis 11:1-9 by Desmond Tutu reflects this. His reading incorporates the African connected reading praxis of non-scholarly readings, from the margin of the 'South' African context, and makes use of scholarly discourse. Tutu's mode of reading leans on Western humanism and ecclesiology that does not follow a critical-holistic cultural discourse. The African Independent Church developed as a reaction to Western ecclesial structures. In the African Independent Church the concept, Moya or Spirit functions as a reading matrix that deconstructs the discriminatory and exclusive forces of essentialist disconnection. The study proposes that a Moya reading is an open-critical and inclusive theological-ethical concept. The interpretative thrust is decolonial, deconstructing essentialism and creating a liminal space, for new responsible readings of Genesis 11:1-9. A Moya reading is holistic and connects people to the land, a perspective that is foreign to essentialist scholarly readings of Genesis 11:1-9. This study contributes to the hermeneutical debate in South Africa, Africa and the global context by emphasising the importance of a continued interaction between scholarly and non-scholarly readings of the Bible from the margin.

It is widely agreed among scholars that the third part of the Hebrew canon, the Writings, is a miscellaneous collection of materials, as its name would seem to suggest. My thesis re-examines this assumption. The introduction sets out the critical issues, outlines the thesis and charts the larger picture from which the thesis makes a limited contribution. Chapter one explains my approach. In critical conversation with Brevard Childs and his adherents, I examine the need for contours within the canonical context that respect the discrete voice of each book, while understanding it in relationship to the larger collection in which it is located. The canon is not like a street map, rather, it is more like a topographical map providing contour and depth to the canonical terrain. Taking Childs’ approach one step further; I examine the formation of the Twelve Minor prophets and the Psalter in order to develop a redaction critical grammar for the compilation of texts into collections that serves as a methodological check for the project. This grammar includes the use of catchwords or phrases to bind adjacent books near their seams, the juxtaposition of similar or contrasting themes, framing devices, and superscriptions to provide an overall structure. Chapter two analyzes the formation of the Writings in antiquity. There were a number of different conceptions of sacred literature within Judaism, but probably within temple circles the canon of the Jews was closed prior to the end of the first century C.E. The Prologue to Ben Sira testifies to a tripartite arrangement of the Jewish canon, and 4 Ezra, which provides solid evidence that the canon was closed sometime prior to the end of the first century C.E., confirms the antiquity of a tripartite arrangement. Chapter three explores the various orders for the Writings. Within the conceptual world of Judaism, the concern with the order of the books is not the result of the invention of the codex or long scroll, but rather arises from the holiness attributed to these books in association with their strong connection to the temple and its sacred space. Despite the consensus that there are a vast number of orders for the collection, in fact there is only evidence that the Masoretic (Leningrad Codex) and the Talmudic (Baba Batra 14b) orders existed prior to the twelfth century C.E. The grouping of the Megilloth in the Masoretic tradition is probably not the result of liturgical practices within Judaism, as is commonly thought, which leaves room to re-examine the antiquity of this order. Both arrangements reveal a similar logic of association among the books of the Writings with the possible exception of Ruth. Chapter four explores the location of Ruth in the Former Prophets between Judges and Samuel and in the Writings after Proverbs and before the Psalter. Ruth has been purposefully figured into the Former Prophets and then later was integrated into the Writings after Proverbs as a wisdom book. In this case, different orders bear witness to the search for meaningful associations within the canon. Chapter five probes Esther’s position as part of the sub-collection of Lamentations, Esther, Daniel and Ezra-Nehemiah, in which it always follows Lamentations and is juxtaposed to Daniel. Within this canonical frame I explore Esther’s links to Daniel 1-6 and Lamentations 5 and the way this sets in relief Esther’s theology. Chapter six briefly observes some compilational phenomena in Song of Songs, Ecclesiastes and Lamentations. I also examine the structure of the Megilloth as a whole and the forces at work in this sub-collection. The thesis concludes, due to historical and exegetical reasons, that the codification of the Megilloth into a collection is an integral part of the canonical process rather than a formal feature that is the result of some supposed effort to close the canon.