About the Book
A Feminist Companion to Tobit and Judith extends the work of the hugely influential and respected Feminist Companion series, which continues to set the standard for feminist approaches to the Hebrew Bible and related texts.
In the present volume Athalya Brenner-Idan (with Helen Efthimiadis-Keith) draws together a range of scholarly commentators and addresses the core issues relating to feminist interpretations of the two texts at hand. The volume examines attitudes to gender, identities, exile, social mores, beliefs, clothing, food and drink, personal relationships, and biblical reception. The contributors are: Beverly Bow and George Nickelsburg, Athalya Brenner-Idan, Ora Brison, Helen Efthimiadis-Keith, Renate Egger-Wenzel, Beate Ego, Emma England, Jennifer Glancy, Jan Willem van Henten, Naomi Jacobs, Amy-Jill Levine, Pamela Milne, and Barbara Schmitz.
Table of Contents:
Table of Contents
Abbreviations
ATHALYA BRENNER-IDAN (University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands)
Introduction
Part I
TOBIT: ON RELIGIOUS IDENTITY, GENDER AND FOOD
1. Redrawing the Boundaries: A New Look at ‘Diaspora as Metaphor: Bodies and Boundaries in the Book of Tobit’
AMY-JILL LEVINE (Vanderbilt University Divinity School, USA)
2. Jewish self-Awareness, Religious Identity and Acts of Resistance in the Book of Tobit
RENATE EGGER-WENZEL (University of Salzburg, Austria)
3. Patriarchy with a Twist: Men and Women in Tobit
BEVERLY BOW (Cleveland State University, USA) AND GEORGE W. E. NICKELSBURG, (University of Iowa, USA)
3a. Does the ‘Twist’ point to Heterarchy? A Response to Bow and Nickelsburg
ATHALYA BRENNER-IDAN
4. The Banishment of the Demon in Tobit: Textual Variants as a Result of Enculturation
BEATE EGO (Ruhr Universität Bochum, Germany)
4a. A Self-Response to ‘Textual Variants’
BEATE EGO (Ruhr Universität Bochum, Germany)
5. Seen and Heard, but Hardly Eating: Female Consumption in the Book of Tobit
NAOMI S. S. JACOBS
6. Food and Death: an Autobiographic Perspective on Tobit according to One Woman’s Binge-Eating Disorder
HELEN EFTHIMIADIS-KEITH (University of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa)
Part II
WHAT CAN WE DO WITH JUDITH?
7. What Shall We Do with Judith? A Feminist Assessment of a Biblical 'Heroine'
PAMELA J. MILNE (University of Windsor, UK)
7a. Self-Response: What Would I Do with Judith Now?
PAMELA J. MILNE (University of Windsor, UK)
8. Judith, Feminist Ethics and Feminist Biblical/Hebrew Bible Interpretation
HELEN EFTHIMIADIS KEITH (University of KwaZulu Natal, South Africa)
9. The Function of the Speeches and Prayers in the Book of Judith
BARBARA SCHMITZ (University of Dortmund, Germany)
10. Judith: More than a Pious Widow Turned Femme Fatale?
ORA BRISON (University of Tel Aviv, Israel)
11. Judith The Slaveholder
JENNIFER GLANCY (University of Richmond, VA, USA)
12. Clothing Seduces: Did You Think It Was Naked Flesh that Did It?
ATHALYA BRENNER-IDAN (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands, and University of Tel Aviv, Israel)
13. Words and Deeds: Seduction and Power in Judith and in Death Proof
JAN WILLEM VAN HENTEN (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands)
14. Violent Superwomen: Super Heroes or Super Villains? Judith, Wonder Woman and Lynndie England
EMMA ENGLAND (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands)
14a. Second Thoughts on Female Terrorists and More: A Self-Response to ‘Violent Women’
EMMA ENGLAND (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands)
About the Author :
Athalya Brenner-Idan is Professor Emerita of Hebrew Bible at the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and is now Professor in Biblical Studies at the University of Tel Aviv, Israel.
Helen Efthimiadis-Keith teaches Hebrew Bible at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.
Review :
This collection of essays on the books of Tobit and Judith is a welcome addition to a landmark series that has put feminist criticism prominently on the map of biblical studies. It is a significant addition as well because it is the first time Tobit appears in the Feminist Companion Series. The combination of new and previously published studies—the latter either revised or accompanied by the authors’ self-responses to their earlier work (and in one case a response by Brenner-Idan)—works splendidly to give readers a sense of developments in feminist studies of Tobit and Judith. With its focus on identity—religious, gendered, individual or group, its formation or loss—and related topics such as diaspora, boundaries, the body, and food as an identity marker, this volume is relevant for the study not only of Tobit and Judith but of other biblical books as well.
An international treasure trove of articles some first published twenty years ago are here coupled with previously published essays and new essays on Judith and Tobit. What is being suggested here is programmatic counsel about radical, transformative, phase-shift change in our understanding of biblical studies. When Judith says, “let us set an example for the people” (Jdt 8:24) to the magistrates of Bethulia, they don’t get it, but perhaps we can. Patriarchy still exists, but along side it something new is emerging—a network of shared agency and identity (heterarchy). This book is highly recommended for classes on Tobit and Judith or methodology.
