James L Kugel
Biographic Data
| ID | 1095770 |
|---|---|
| NAME | James L Kugel |
| GIVEN NAMES | James L |
| FAMILY NAME | Kugel |
| SIGNATURE | KUGEL J L |
| AFFILIATIONS | Harvard University Press |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 18 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 0 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 16 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1983 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2020 |
| H-INDEX | 0 |
Poetry and Prophecy
The idea that poetry and prophecy are intimately related has been a central motif in Western literary history. Since the Renaissance, the connections perceived between biblical prophecy and poetry have frequently been invoked to elevate poetry to the highest level of human accomplishment. Poetry and Prophecy illuminates the sources of this tradition, ranging over a number of literatures and cultures.
Interpreting Scriptures in Judaism, Christianity and Islam
This comparative study traces Jewish, Christian, and Muslim scriptural interpretation from antiquity to modernity, with special emphasis on the pivotal medieval period. It focuses on three areas: responses in the different faith traditions to tensions created by the need to transplant scriptures into new cultural and linguistic contexts; changing conceptions of the literal sense and its importance vis-à-vis non-literal senses, such as the figurat…
Modern Orthodoxy ’ S Ancient Past
The movement known as Modern Orthodox Judaism is often distinguished from “ultra-Orthodoxy” (or Haredi Judaism) in terms of openness. While adherents of the latter form of Judaism typically live together in isolated communities and seek to seal themselves off from secular books and learning (and, in our own age, such potentially malign influences as television, movies, and the internet), Modern Orthodox Jews are generally characterized by a more …
The Figure of Moses in Jubilees
Moses is a central figure in numerous Second Temple period writings: in a number of them, he is even presented as a semi-divine »God-like man.« By comparison, the Moses of the book of Jubilees is a rather pale figure, altogether overshadowed by the towering portraits of Noah, Abraham, Jacob, and others. The reason for this calculated de-emphasis of Moses' importance and role is connected to the contrasting ideologies of two writers, the original …
Traditions of the Bible
Shem in the Tents of Japhet
These essays, by some of today’s greatest scholars of Judaism and Hellenism in antiquity, explore a variety of ways in which these two great civilizations interacted. The common focus of these studies is the transition from one culture to the next – how words or concepts or conventions from the one came to be transplanted, and often modified in the process, in the other. Taken together, however, they provide something broader: a large, variegated…
The Bible as It Was
Traditions of the Bible
Kugel’s The Bible As It Was has been universally praised. Here is the full scholarly edition, expanding the author’s findings into an incomparable reference. Focusing on 24 core stories in the Pentateuch, Kugel shows us how the earliest interpreters of the scriptures radically transformed the Bible and made it into the book we know today.
On Being a Jew
The Creation of the World
The Ladder of Jacob
One of the strangest texts to be included in recent collections of biblical pseudepigrapha is that known as the Ladder of Jacob . Known only from the Slavonic Tolkovaya Paleya , this text elaborates on the story of Jacob's dream at Bethel in Gen 28:11–22, adding details to the vision described there and containing a prayer and angelic revelation nowhere present in the biblical narrative. It is clear that the Slavonic text is a translation from Gr…
Levi's Elevation to the Priesthood in Second Temple Writings
In ancient Israel, the tribe of Levi was deemed to have a special connection with the service of God. Numerous biblical texts speak of the Levites as the priestly tribe or attribute to them certain special functions connected with cultic worship. But why exactly had the Levites been selected for such honors, and how did their selection come about? Several biblical narratives appear to have been designed in order to answer this question. Thus, the…
Poetry and Prophecy
The Story of Dinah in the Testament of Levi
It is normal for scholars to read a text of the Second Temple period with an eye to the particular historical circumstances and ideology that it seems to embody. For this was a period of rapid historical changes and sharp ideological conflicts, and by paying attention to reflections of history and ideology in a text, one can often better understand its meaning and situate it chronologically with greater accuracy. And so, scholars regularly ask: W…
Early Biblical Interpretation
On Hidden Hatred and Open Reproach
As is well known, the beginnings of biblical exegesis are to be found within the Hebrew Bible itself: later books or passages often comment on earlier ones, clarifying perceived ambiguities, at times harmonizing apparent contradictions, or seeking to bring an ancient text up to date, even rewriting history or trying to bring out some would-be esoteric meaning. Indeed, evidence of these interpretive concerns is to be found not only within the late…
A Feeling of Déjà LuThe Art of Biblical Poetry. Robert Alter
The Idea of Biblical Poetry
Is there in the Bible? Does it have rhyme or meter? How did ancient Hebrew writers compose their works? James Kugel's provocative study provides surprising new answers to these age-old questions. Biblical poetry is not a concept native to the Bible itself, he proposes, and the idea that the Bible is divided into prose and verse is merely an approximation of the reality of biblical style. Arguing that the Bible presents a continuum of speech heigh…
No prominent works on this page.
The Idea of Biblical Poetry
Is there in the Bible? Does it have rhyme or meter? How did ancient Hebrew writers compose their works? James Kugel's provocative study provides surprising new answers to these age-old questions. Biblical poetry is not a concept native to the Bible itself, he proposes, and the idea that the Bible is divided into prose and verse is merely an approximation of the reality of biblical style. Arguing that the Bible presents a continuum of speech heigh…
On Hidden Hatred and Open Reproach
As is well known, the beginnings of biblical exegesis are to be found within the Hebrew Bible itself: later books or passages often comment on earlier ones, clarifying perceived ambiguities, at times harmonizing apparent contradictions, or seeking to bring an ancient text up to date, even rewriting history or trying to bring out some would-be esoteric meaning. Indeed, evidence of these interpretive concerns is to be found not only within the late…
A Feeling of Déjà LuThe Art of Biblical Poetry. Robert Alter
Early Biblical Interpretation
The Story of Dinah in the Testament of Levi
It is normal for scholars to read a text of the Second Temple period with an eye to the particular historical circumstances and ideology that it seems to embody. For this was a period of rapid historical changes and sharp ideological conflicts, and by paying attention to reflections of history and ideology in a text, one can often better understand its meaning and situate it chronologically with greater accuracy. And so, scholars regularly ask: W…
Levi's Elevation to the Priesthood in Second Temple Writings
In ancient Israel, the tribe of Levi was deemed to have a special connection with the service of God. Numerous biblical texts speak of the Levites as the priestly tribe or attribute to them certain special functions connected with cultic worship. But why exactly had the Levites been selected for such honors, and how did their selection come about? Several biblical narratives appear to have been designed in order to answer this question. Thus, the…
Poetry and Prophecy
The Ladder of Jacob
One of the strangest texts to be included in recent collections of biblical pseudepigrapha is that known as the Ladder of Jacob . Known only from the Slavonic Tolkovaya Paleya , this text elaborates on the story of Jacob's dream at Bethel in Gen 28:11–22, adding details to the vision described there and containing a prayer and angelic revelation nowhere present in the biblical narrative. It is clear that the Slavonic text is a translation from Gr…
Traditions of the Bible
Kugel’s The Bible As It Was has been universally praised. Here is the full scholarly edition, expanding the author’s findings into an incomparable reference. Focusing on 24 core stories in the Pentateuch, Kugel shows us how the earliest interpreters of the scriptures radically transformed the Bible and made it into the book we know today.
On Being a Jew
The Creation of the World
The Bible as It Was
Shem in the Tents of Japhet
These essays, by some of today’s greatest scholars of Judaism and Hellenism in antiquity, explore a variety of ways in which these two great civilizations interacted. The common focus of these studies is the transition from one culture to the next – how words or concepts or conventions from the one came to be transplanted, and often modified in the process, in the other. Taken together, however, they provide something broader: a large, variegated…
Traditions of the Bible
The Figure of Moses in Jubilees
Moses is a central figure in numerous Second Temple period writings: in a number of them, he is even presented as a semi-divine »God-like man.« By comparison, the Moses of the book of Jubilees is a rather pale figure, altogether overshadowed by the towering portraits of Noah, Abraham, Jacob, and others. The reason for this calculated de-emphasis of Moses' importance and role is connected to the contrasting ideologies of two writers, the original …
Modern Orthodoxy ’ S Ancient Past
The movement known as Modern Orthodox Judaism is often distinguished from “ultra-Orthodoxy” (or Haredi Judaism) in terms of openness. While adherents of the latter form of Judaism typically live together in isolated communities and seek to seal themselves off from secular books and learning (and, in our own age, such potentially malign influences as television, movies, and the internet), Modern Orthodox Jews are generally characterized by a more …
Interpreting Scriptures in Judaism, Christianity and Islam
This comparative study traces Jewish, Christian, and Muslim scriptural interpretation from antiquity to modernity, with special emphasis on the pivotal medieval period. It focuses on three areas: responses in the different faith traditions to tensions created by the need to transplant scriptures into new cultural and linguistic contexts; changing conceptions of the literal sense and its importance vis-à-vis non-literal senses, such as the figurat…
Poetry and Prophecy
The idea that poetry and prophecy are intimately related has been a central motif in Western literary history. Since the Renaissance, the connections perceived between biblical prophecy and poetry have frequently been invoked to elevate poetry to the highest level of human accomplishment. Poetry and Prophecy illuminates the sources of this tradition, ranging over a number of literatures and cultures.
Art (15 works) · Philosophy (15 works) · Biblical Studies and Interpretation (14 works) · Literature (13 works) · History (11 works) · Archaeology and Historical Studies (6 works) · Historical and Linguistic Studies (6 works) · Poetry (5 works) · Theology (5 works) · Biblical studies (4 works)