Deuteronomy - (Wisdom Commentary) by Johanna W H Van Wijk-Bos (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

Deuteronomy, the final book of the Torah, is ostensibly addressed to males but it does not mean it lacks a concern for women. In this commentary on Deuteronomy, Johanna W. H. van Wijk-Bos provides serious feminist engagement with the complete text, paying specific attention to the effect it may have on women's perspectives, and considers ways the text highlights female presence or absence.

In this commentary, Wijk-Bos encourages readers to question not only the patriarchal practices reflected in Deuteronomy, but also modern misogynist and androcentric assumptions that they may bring to the world of the text. Divided into eleven sections, Deuteronomy offers insight for our present time, as well as an opportunity to hear new voices, examine cultural and gender-biased interpretations, and draw other conclusions to open up new avenues of understanding God and ourselves.

Review Quotes

"Biblical commentaries, tend to present textual perspectives that are either Christian or Jewish, based on the religious orientation of the scholar. Johanna W. H. van Wijk-Bos breaks this mold by offering an indispensable perspective on the book of Deuteronomy. Written by a Christian biblical scholar who engages with a variety of Jewish sources, this commentary is truly one of a kind! This commentary fills a gap that has existed for too long."
Tamar Kamionkowski, professor of biblical studies at the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College

"Just as multiple, often contradictory, voices and traditions were woven together two and a half millennia ago to create the extended sermonic text that came to be called Deuteronomy--or, in Hebrew, Devarim' / 'Words'--we now have an extended polyphonic act of homage, interrogation, and interpretation fit for twenty-first century readers, scholars, preachers, and religious institutions. Anyone with a curiosity about the multiple dimensions of biblical texts will relish the wealth and depth of scholarship on display: the original Hebrew text is offered in a contemporary translation and is accompanied on the page by mini-essays and excurses composed by a formidable range of modern commentators, many offering fresh insights from a feminist perspective. The footnotes that accompany the text on every page--opening up avenues for further research-- come from a dazzling range of traditional and contemporary sources. This is multi-vocal biblical scholarship at its best: discursive, erudite, and seriously committed to helping the reader listen in afresh to the 'Words' of old."
Howard Cooper, psychoanalyst and rabbi

About the Author

Johanna W. H. van Wijk-Bos, a native of The Netherlands, taught as professor of Old Testament at Louisville Presbyterian Seminary from 1977 to 2017. She serves the Presbyterian Church as an ordained pastor and is deeply engaged with issues of equity in terms of gender and race. Born in occupied Europe during the Shoah, she is committed to an analysis of Christian-Jewish relations and improvement of these relations, especially in terms of a Christian reading of Scripture. Her commentaries on the Former Prophets appeared in 2021. She assists Rabbi David Ariel-Joel in teaching Torah at the Temple in Louisville and is co-writing a volume with him: Set Apart: Josef and His Family (Smyth & Helwys, forthcoming).