R24. Th. W. Franxman, Genesis and the ‘Jewish Antiquities’ of Flavius Josephus, in: Bibliotheca Orientalis 39 (1982): 644–47. (original) (raw)

The study is very wide-ranging and competent. It is a significant opening up of very important questions. We may hope that it will be followed by further investigation of the related probleffis, some few of which have been indicated here, which such a discussion inevitably raises. de la fertilidad-fecundidad. Aportacion al conocimiento de la Fe de Israel a su entraCa en Canaan. Valencia, Instituci6n San Jer6niffio, 6, 1976 (24 cm., pp. 3AT. 850 ptas. ISBN 84 400 2Ai94 5. This detailed study of Psalm 29 can be seen as a sequel to the author's Cuondo los Angeles eran Dioses (Salam anca, 1976) in which an important section is devoted to an examination of this psalm and also a matter which hardly appears here of what Cunchillos aptly calls its relectura in Ps. 96 and 1 Chron. 16. It is perhaps to be regretted that this aspect of the psatrm is not given a place here, since the ccmparative study of these texts helps to illuminate the general therne with which the present discussion is concerned, namely the relationship of the psalrn and its thought to the whole question of the position of Yahweh and of Israel's religion in regard to the Canaanite deities and beliefs. This issue is here based on a very close discussion of the details of the psalm; the whole of the first and main chapter of the book (pp. is devoted to a philological study of the words and phrases of the psalm. A wider context of discussion is provided for one particular theme in a major appendix which deals with qil yhwh (pp. 199-256), a study already published previously as an article in 1972. The consideration of the psalm in this way provides both a careful and critical study of the wide variety of interpretations offered for particular words a good example is hdrt qdi (v. 2) and a basis for the series of short discussions which follow dealing with form and literary type, structure, literary unity, metrical and poetic form, literary relationship which includes a defining of the psalm's independente of Zech. g, Sitz im Leben, and a concluding summ ary. The result is a sound critical appraisal of the view that this psalm is virtually a Canaanite psalm modified for Israelite use : the closeness of linguistic links with Ugaritic is recogn rzed but balanced with the distinguishing of features which have no such parallels. This provides a much more cautious assessment of the relationship, and indeed provides a model for handling the question of such connections. The balance is assessed as indicating an early date for the psalm, closely connected with Canaanite ideas, and providing evidence of the ways in which Israel's religion needed to come to terms with Canaan. The arguments for date are by no means conclusive. Thus, the fact that v. 1 1 refers to 'peopXe' rather than to 'king' (p. 190) does not necessarily. impl,, an early date, since the psalms provide numerous examples of the intimate relationship between king and people, oiie n rnaking difficult the assessrnent of where the emphasis really lies if indeed a distinction needs always to b'e made. Moreover, the book of Hosea provides ample evidence that the problem of the relationship between what are regarded as genuine Israelite religious ideas anC those of Can aan is much more fully articulated at a later date, and this raises questions much wider than those which this study is concerned to handle, questions regarding the degree to which the contrast between an Israelite religion belonging to the pre-conquest period and the religion of the settled Canaanite community is to b,e regarded as a historical reality or is, at least in pari.