How Repentance Became Biblical

In How Repentance Became Biblical: Judaism, Christianity, and the Interpretation of Scripture, David Lambert comprehensively investigates the idea of repentance in the Hebrew Bible, in addition to those biblical rites, exhortations, and narratives that have frequently been interpreted as evidence for a thoroughgoing concept of individual penitence in Israelite religion. In short, Lambert’s convincing intervention is to argue that that which is read as penitential in biblical texts—that is, intending to change the hearts and minds of ancient followers of the Israelite God—can alternatively be read as being materially effective in the realms beyond the individual: the community, and the community’s relationship with God. To these ends, Lambert takes three approaches: to identify the “ontological underpinnings” of “dominant penitential modes of reading the Bible”; to provide “alternative readings of so-called penitential phenomena”; and to provide a genealogy of “a discourse around repentance” that developed through and after the biblical eras (10). Specifically, Lambert focuses on a wide range of texts that have typically been read as calling for or effecting personal repentance, from fasting, prayer, confession, and prophecy, along with apocalyptic expectations in the Late Second Temple period. Lambert argues “that there was a time before repentance” (10) and that a concerted exploration of alternatives to repentance will expand our understanding of the material, literary, narrative, and philosophical forms of biblical expression. This volume is a valuable resource for specialists and interested scholars alike for rethinking fundamental assumptions about the origins of penitence, including the rituals of fasting and mourning, and the exhortations of the prophets.

Art · Biblical studies · Christianity · Confession (law) · Hebrew Bible · Interpretation (philosophy) · Judaism · Linguistics · Literature · Narrative · Penitential · Prayer · Repentance · Second Temple period · Theology · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · Historical and Linguistic Studies · History · Philosophy