Description

This history of the Kingdom of Jerusalem and Judah is quite different from the usual narratives of biblical history. It parallels the same author's History of the Kingdom of Israel (OLA 275) and is mainly based on information provided by epigraphic sources dating from the 19th/18th century B.C. on, when Jerusalem and its rulers are first mentioned. The book is divided in seven chapters. The first one deals with the proto-history of Jerusalem in Bronze Age and Iron Age I. The second one concerns the Davidic dynasty whose lineage is followed until the mid-ninth century. Chapters III and IV continue the history of the kingdom until the destruction of Jerusalem by Babylonians in 587. After ca. 800 B.C. the name of the kingdom was changed from Beth David in Judah following internal dynastic problems. Chapter V examines some questions concerning religion in Jerusalem and Judah, especially the alleged "sacred prostitution" and the "molk-sacrifices". Chapter VI discusses the special case of the relations between the Yahwistic sanctuary of Bethel, annexed to Judah by king Josiah, and the theonym Bethel, attested in Jewish-Aramaean ambiences of the Persian period. Chapter VII deals with burial customs and the conception of the netherworld or Sheol, mainly from the monarchic period on.