Ancient Israel

Catalog description

Ancient Israel names the land and people of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament), and it provides important background for the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim traditions. Yet, ancient Israel remains difficult to approach historically, perceptible in biblical texts received only through centuries of later transmission and archaeological data often lacking names, voices, and stories. This course will explore the history, society, and culture of ancient Israel in its West Asian context from ca. 1200-330 BCE through a variety of evidence types, with the goal of probing what everyday life was like for people. Attention will be given to such issues as: social and historical setting, archaeology, comparative ancient Near Eastern sources, gender and sexuality, law, ritual, historiography, scribalism, ethics, Israelite religion, food, political ideology, post/de-colonialism and empire, apocalypticism, race and ethnicity, disability, death and afterlife, and more.