Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Reading Utopia in Chronicles

Reading Utopia in Chronicles Review of Books / Journal for the Study of Judaism 41 (2010) 366-438 433 Reading Utopia in Chronicles . By Steven James Schweitzer. (Library of Hebrew Bible / Old Testament Studies 442). New York and London: T&T Clark, 2007. Pp xii, 205. Paperback. £24.99. ISBN paperback: 978-0-567-36317-6. ISBN hardback: 97800-567-02792-4. No doubt the most astonishing aspect of the book of Chronicles is that it is con- cluded at a much unexpected moment: the summons to rebuild the temple. The book just ends where one might have expected to find a report on the construc- tion of the second temple. To my mind this means that it is not the rebuilding of the temple in itself that the Chronicler wanted to bring to the fore, neither the existence of the second temple as such. What did the Chronicler intend to achieve with his circumstantial document? Maybe an answer to this intriguing question is to be found in this monograph, an abridged and revised doctoral thesis submitted to Notre Dame University in March 2005. It is an impressive study in which Schweitzer argues that the book of Chronicles should be read as utopian literature , as Roland Boer had already advocated for a small section of the book (“Utopian Politics in 2 Chronicles 10-13,” in The Chronicler as Author: Studies in Text and Texture [eds. M. P. Graham, and S. L. McKenzie; JSOTSup 371; Sheffield 1999], 360-394). The book has four chapters. In the introduction, the author informs his audi- ence about the current state of Chronicles scholarship, and, of course, presents the methodology of utopian literary theory. Schweitzer’s approach can best be described by quoting some final lines from the Introduction: “. . . Chronicles pro- vides an excellent source for looking once more at the problems and ideological struggles of the late Persian or early Hellenistic period, rather than at a text pro- duced by those elite who are advocating a continuation of the status quo . . . . Chronicles presents its utopian future as an idealized portrayal set in Israel’s past” (30). This way of interpreting the Chronicler’s text is demonstrated with the help of three clusters: “A Genealogical Utopia” (Chapter 2), “A Political Utopia” (Chapter 3), and “A Cultic Utopia” (Chapter 4). Schweitzer is absolutely right that there is no solid proof to argue with certainty that the book of Chronicles indeed does reflect the historical situation during the Second Temple period. On the other hand, however, there is also no possibility to falsify that statement. Would it be impossible indeed that some aspects of the Chronicler’s historical situation became part of a new—utopian—concept? In my view, this especially applies to the overwhelming attention the Chronicler paid to the Levites. Is there any necessity to label this remarkable attention as pure utopian, i.e. that it only exists in the author’s mind and does not, or can not, reflect some historical situation, which in its turn is transposed into the utopian past? P. C. Beentjes University of Tilburg © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2010 DOI: 10.1163/157006310X503982 http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal for the Study of Judaism Brill

Reading Utopia in Chronicles

Beentjes
Journal for the Study of Judaism , Volume 41 (3): 433 – Jan 1, 2010
Download PDF
1 page

Loading next page...
 
/lp/brill/reading-utopia-in-chronicles-VHGxUxVNC7

References

References for this paper are not available at this time. We will be adding them shortly, thank you for your patience.

Publisher
Brill
Copyright
© 2010 Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
ISSN
0047-2212
eISSN
1570-0631
DOI
10.1163/157006310X503982
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Review of Books / Journal for the Study of Judaism 41 (2010) 366-438 433 Reading Utopia in Chronicles . By Steven James Schweitzer. (Library of Hebrew Bible / Old Testament Studies 442). New York and London: T&T Clark, 2007. Pp xii, 205. Paperback. £24.99. ISBN paperback: 978-0-567-36317-6. ISBN hardback: 97800-567-02792-4. No doubt the most astonishing aspect of the book of Chronicles is that it is con- cluded at a much unexpected moment: the summons to rebuild the temple. The book just ends where one might have expected to find a report on the construc- tion of the second temple. To my mind this means that it is not the rebuilding of the temple in itself that the Chronicler wanted to bring to the fore, neither the existence of the second temple as such. What did the Chronicler intend to achieve with his circumstantial document? Maybe an answer to this intriguing question is to be found in this monograph, an abridged and revised doctoral thesis submitted to Notre Dame University in March 2005. It is an impressive study in which Schweitzer argues that the book of Chronicles should be read as utopian literature , as Roland Boer had already advocated for a small section of the book (“Utopian Politics in 2 Chronicles 10-13,” in The Chronicler as Author: Studies in Text and Texture [eds. M. P. Graham, and S. L. McKenzie; JSOTSup 371; Sheffield 1999], 360-394). The book has four chapters. In the introduction, the author informs his audi- ence about the current state of Chronicles scholarship, and, of course, presents the methodology of utopian literary theory. Schweitzer’s approach can best be described by quoting some final lines from the Introduction: “. . . Chronicles pro- vides an excellent source for looking once more at the problems and ideological struggles of the late Persian or early Hellenistic period, rather than at a text pro- duced by those elite who are advocating a continuation of the status quo . . . . Chronicles presents its utopian future as an idealized portrayal set in Israel’s past” (30). This way of interpreting the Chronicler’s text is demonstrated with the help of three clusters: “A Genealogical Utopia” (Chapter 2), “A Political Utopia” (Chapter 3), and “A Cultic Utopia” (Chapter 4). Schweitzer is absolutely right that there is no solid proof to argue with certainty that the book of Chronicles indeed does reflect the historical situation during the Second Temple period. On the other hand, however, there is also no possibility to falsify that statement. Would it be impossible indeed that some aspects of the Chronicler’s historical situation became part of a new—utopian—concept? In my view, this especially applies to the overwhelming attention the Chronicler paid to the Levites. Is there any necessity to label this remarkable attention as pure utopian, i.e. that it only exists in the author’s mind and does not, or can not, reflect some historical situation, which in its turn is transposed into the utopian past? P. C. Beentjes University of Tilburg © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2010 DOI: 10.1163/157006310X503982

Journal

Journal for the Study of Judaism – Brill

Published: Jan 1, 2010

There are no references for this article.