Predicting the Past in the Ancient Near East

Predicting the Past in the Ancient Near East PDF Author: Matthew Neujahr
Publisher: Society of Biblical Lit
ISBN: 193067581X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 318

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Book Description
This work provides an in-depth investigation of after-the-fact predictions in ancient Near Eastern texts from roughly 1200 B.C.E.–70 C.E. It argues that the Akkadian, Aramaic, Hebrew, and Greek works discussed are all part of a developing scribal discourse of “mantic historiography” by which scribes blend their local traditions of history writing and predictive texts to produce a new mode of historiographic expression. This in turn calls into question the use and usefulness of traditional literary categories such as “apocalypse” to analyze such works.