(DOWNLOAD) "Job's Wives in the Testament of Job: A Note on the Synthesis of Two Traditions." by Journal of Biblical Literature # eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Job's Wives in the Testament of Job: A Note on the Synthesis of Two Traditions.
- Author : Journal of Biblical Literature
- Release Date : January 22, 2008
- Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines,Books,Professional & Technical,Education,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 194 KB
Description
When it comes to biblical heroes, biographical details fall into two categories. On the one hand, there are the few details provided explicitly in the biblical text. On the other hand, there are the many facts, episodes, and events that may be deduced from those few explicit details. In the case of Job, his biography is essential to his significance in biblical and subsequent religious tradition. That is, it is his life story taken as a whole that matters--and not merely his role or words in this or that affair (as with many judges and prophets, for example). With Job, then, the interest in biographical details would seem to be that much keener. One especially important yet under-reported figure is Job's wife. She appears briefly in Job 2:9 only to pose one question ("Are you still holding on to your integrity?") and to offer one bit of advice ("Curse God and die."). (1) Moreover, the presence of a wife (where one might expect her) among Job's second family in Job 42:12-17 is never indicated and is, at most, only implied. As a response to this paucity of information, a number of interpretive traditions grew up around the figures of Job and Job's wife. There were, among ancient interpreters, two rather divergent traditions about the identity of Job's wife. One tradition--known from rabbinic commentary, the Targum of Job, and Pseudo-Philo--identifies the wife of Job with Dinah, the daughter of Jacob. A second tradition, witnessed principally in the Septuagint, identifies Job's wife with a wretched Arabian woman. The author of the Testament of Job, a Jewish composition from the first century B.C.E. or C.E., creatively combined both traditions in an attempt to offer a clearer understanding of Job's background, to provide a solution to lingering questions concerning his relation to ethnic Israel, and to elaborate on themes in the book of Job in a way that vindicates the role of women in Job's own moral athleticism.