Daniel Studies and Commentary
Much of my recent research has focused on the Book of Daniel, the latest of the biblical books. This investigation produced a series of studies on the book, which formed the basis of a monograph on Daniel, entitled Dreams, Riddles and Visions: Textual, Intertextual and Exegetical Studies of the Book of Daniel, published in the BZAW series (De Gruyter). The volume contains seven studies, each of which focuses on a different chapter or central passage in Daniel and offers a new interpretation or reading of the passage in question. The studies are all based on careful textual analysis, and, in each case, the larger arguments are built upon solid philological foundations. Many of the insights proposed in this volume are based upon the realization that the authors of Daniel were frequently interpreters of earlier biblical books, and that the identification of these intertextual clues is often the key to unlocking the meaning of these texts. In this sense, Daniel is similar to other contemporaneous works, such as Jubilees and Qumran literature, but the extent of this phenomenon has not been fully appreciated by scholars of the book.
Many of my recent text-critical studies have focused specifically on the book of Daniel, in particular with respect to Daniel 4–6 and the Additions to Daniel, in which the Masoretic text (and/or the Greek translation attributed to Theodotion) and Old Greek version differ significantly. I have also assessed the textual edition(s) of Daniel preserved in Qumran biblical and parabiblical manuscripts. In addition to these text-critical analyses, I recently published an article that investigates the differences between the varied chronological data in Daniel 7-12, offering an original interpretation of the earliest of these sources (Daniel 7:25), and consequently a new assessment of the interrelationships of the various dates in the Danielic apocalypses. Furthermore, this study suggests that a combination of interpretive, calendrical and historical insights regarding these chronological elements offers a potential key towards tracing the process of literary development of the apocalyptic section of Daniel as a whole.
Following the completion of the monograph and these studies, I have now turned towards researching and writing a new comprehensive commentary on Daniel and its Apocryphal Additions for the Yale Anchor Bible series.
Hebrew University Bible Project (Joshua)
I currently serve as Editor of the Hebrew University Bible Project, the most comprehensive scientific edition of the Hebrew Bible. (I previously served as Associate Editor from 2005–2010, and succeeded the late Prof. S. Talmon.) After a decade of research, we have completed the preparation of the Twelve Prophets volume, which will appear during the 2018-2019 academic year, under the joint editorship of Talmon and myself. Since 2010 I have had the overall responsibility for the Bible Project in all of its aspects, overseeing a team of experts from various fields, including Hebrew Bible and Language, Classics, Semitic, Rabbinics and Masoretic studies. I was also directly in charge of the research team responsible for the preparation of the first textual apparatus (Ancient Translations), and personally responsible for its formulation. This apparatus is the most methodologically complex aspect of the volume, due to the unique character and technique of each of the translations (Greek, Latin, Syriac, Aramaic), and is accompanied by extensive explanatory notes.
While the Twelve Prophets volume is in production, we have already commenced work on the HUBP Joshua volume, and are almost halfway through the book (as of December 2018).