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Loading... I Maccabees : a new translation, with introduction and commentary (1976)by Jonathan A. Goldstein, jonathan a. goldstein (Translator)
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Belongs to SeriesAnchor Bible (41)
"The Apocryphal book of I Maccabees (Volume 41 in the acclaimed Anchor Bible series) is an inspirational thriller." With the help of God, the aged priest Mattathias and his sons--Judas Maccabaeus, Jonathan, and Simon--dramatically lead the Jews of Judaea first to victory and then to freedom against the formidable successors of Alexander the Great. Their struggles begin in guerilla warfare, responding to the terrible persecutions decreed by King Antiochus IV, and courageously accomplish their first great triumph--still celebrated in the festival of Hanukkah. The Introduction to this volume considers not only I Maccabees, but also the parallel accounts found in II Maccabees and shows that the two authors of I & II Maccabees wrote with passionate conviction to teach two sharply opposed points of view. In some cases their convictions blinded them to the truth, but Professor Goldstein renders their teachings accessible to the modern reader and reconstructs what really happened, making valuable contributions to Greek and Roman as well as to Jewish history. Nineteen maps and diagrams set the scene of the dramatic struggle and the troubled times described in I Maccabees. No library descriptions found. |
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 Google Books — Loading...GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)220.6Religions Bible Bible Interpretation and criticism (Exegesis)LC ClassificationRatingAverage: (3.88)
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Wikipedia in English (2)
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The strength is that this is an incredibly detailed commentary on I Maccabees and on the whole Maccabean period (and Goldstein adds even more in the volume on II Maccabees). Together they supply one of the most substantial, if not the most substantial, analysis of the period, including the text of the books, the chronology, the historical background, and more.
The weakness is that Goldstein has a number of highly unusual hypotheses about the Maccabean period and about our authors. He has reconstructed some of the history of the period, and his ideas naturally influence this book.
This is, of course, a perfectly valid thing to do; Goldstein's ideas a provocative, and some may well be right, and all scholarship of the Maccabean period should take them into account. But... in a mainline Bible commentary? The new ideas would be much better in journal articles or specialty publications, not taking over a commentary. (If they are widely accepted, then they go in the commentaries.) Because the Anchor Bible volumes are (mostly) monographs, there is always the danger of someone with an unusual viewpoint being assigned a volume and running with it. As happened here.
Even with that caveat, this is a very good book. All that immense detail is incredibly useful, for the historian even more than the theologian. (Although II Maccabees in particular has a very strong theological bent.) Just be sure to check a few other histories of the period. (