The Production of Prophecy ─ Constructing Prophecy and Prophets in Yehud

The Persian and Hellenistic periods saw the production and use of a variety of authoritative texts in Israel. 'The Production of Prophecy' brings together a range of influential biblical scholars to examine the construction of prophecy and prophetic books during the Persian period. Drawing on methodological and comparative research and studies of particular biblical texts, the volume explores biblical prophecy as a written phenomenon, examining the prophets of the past, setting this within the general history of Yehud. The relationship between prophetic and other authoritative, written texts is explored, as well as the general social and ideological setting in which the prophetic books emerged.

Diana V. Edelman is a senior lecturer in the Department of Biblical Studies at the University of Sheffield. Her research has focused on the King Saul in history and tradition, Israelite religion during the time of the monarchy, and now is centering on the emergence of Judaism in the Persian period with the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem. She is the author of The Origins of the 'Second' Temple Persian Imperial Policy and the Rebuilding of Jerusalem (Equinox, 2005) and King Saul in the Historiography of Judah (Sheffield Academic Press, 1991) and editor of The Fabric of History: Text, Artifact and Israel's Past (Sheffield Academic Press, 1991), You Shall not Abhor an Edomite for He is your Brother: Edom and Seir in History and Tradition (Scholars Press, 1995) and The Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms (Kok Pharos 1995; reprinted by Eerdmans). Ehud Ben Zvi is a professor (History & Classics, and Religious Studies) at the University of Alberta. A former president of the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies, his publications include, History, Literature and Theology in the Book of Chronicles (2006); Hosea (2005); Signs of Jonah: Reading and Rereading in Ancient Yehud (2003); Micah (2000) and A Historical-Critical Study of The Book of Obadiah (1996) as well as many articles on the historical books of the Hebrew Bible in which he explores the ways in which ancient Israelites construed their past and the significance of these images of the past for them. He is also a co-author of Readings in Biblical Hebrew. An Intermediate Textbook (1993). He serves as the general editor of the Journal of Hebrew Scriptures.