Throughout the past three decades, Nadav Na'aman has repeatedly proved that he is one of the most careful historians of ancient Canaan and Israel. With broad expertise, he has brought together archaeology, text, and the inscriptional material from all of the ancient Near East to bear on the history of ancient Israel and the land of Canaan during the second and first millenniums B.C.E. Many of his studies have been published as journal articles or notes and yet, together, they constitute one of the most important bodies of literature on the subject in recent years, particularly because of the careful attention to methodology that Na'aman always has brought to his work. Collected here are 23 essays on the Hurrians, the Egyptians and their presence in the Levant during the second millennium B.C.E., Canaanite city-states, the Amarna Letters, and the neighbors of Canaan in the north, such as Alalakh and Damascus. The essays range over such topics as scribes and language, archaeology, cultural influences, and the interrelations of the great powers during this period. The volume includes indexes of ancient personal names, place-names, and biblical references.

Celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Albright Institute of Archaeological Research, this collection of erudite essays concentrates on the archaeology of ancient Israel, Canaan, and neighboring nations.

In this companion volume to his bestselling Ancient Israel: What Do We Know and How Do We Know It? Lester L. Grabbe provides the background history of the main ancient Near Eastern peoples and empires: Babylonia, Assyria, Urartu, Hittites, Amorites, Egyptians. Grabbe's focus is on Palestine/Canaan and covers the early second millennium, including the Middle Bronze Age and the Second Intermediate Period and Hyksos rule of Egypt. Grabbe also addresses the question of a 'patriarchal period'. The main focus of the book is on the second half of the second millennium: Late Bronze and early Iron Age, the Egyptian New Kingdom, the Amarna letters, the Sea Peoples, the question of 'the exodus', the early settlements in the hill country of Palestine, and the first mention of Israel in the Merenptah inscription. Archaeology and the contribution of the social sciences both feature heavily, as does inscriptional and iconographic material. As such this volume provides a fascinating portrayal of ancient Israel and this definitive work by one of the world's leading biblical historians will be of interest to all students and scholars of biblical history.

Ancient Israel is widely regarded as having been set apart from the nations, representing a unique sociopolitical entity in the ancient world. United by a common tribal identity and a commitment to worshiping the God who delivered them from Egypt exclusively, the Israelites established an egalitarian community that stood in contrast to the hierarchical polities of their polytheistic. In spite of these traditions, modern scholarship for the most part has recognized the points of continuity between Canaanite religion and Israelite religion and concluded that the two religious systems largely developed from the same cultural milieu. However, scholars continue to contend that the Canaanites’ and Israelites’ social and political structures were distinct. Most scholars agree that the Israelites were geographical, economic, and/or political outsiders. The Land before the Kingdom of Israel responds to this modern perspective by contributing an original reconstruction of the sociopolitical landscape of the Late Bronze Age Levant that exposes points of continuity between the polities and populations that inhabited the land and those that were later identified with Israel. By examining multiple sources, Brendon Benz isolates and accounts for complex social and political realities that have gone unnoticed. In so doing, he sets the stage for viewing premonarchic Israel and the Bible’s depiction of it in a new way. In addition to shedding light on historical memories embedded in the books of Judges and Samuel that do not conform to conventional wisdom regarding Israel’s early history, Benz demonstrates that a contingent of the early Israelites was heir to the social and political structures of their Late Bronze Age Levantine predecessors.

This volume provides a series of contributions on the crucial aspects relating to the Bible and the Late Bronze Age period. The volume is introduced with a background essay surveying the main areas of history and current scholarship relating to Late Bronze Age Palestine and to the Egyptian New Kingdom (Dynasties 18-20) domination of the region, as well as the question of the biblical account of the same geographical area and historical period. Specific chapters address a range of key concerns: the history of Egypt's dealing with Canaan is surveyed in chapters by Grabbe and Dijkstra. The Amarna texts are also dealt with by Lemche, Mayes and Grabbe. The archaeology is surveyed by van der Steen. The Merenptah Stela mentioning Israel is of considerable interest and is discussed especially by Dijkstra. This leads on to the burning question of the origins of Israel which several of the contributors address. Another issue is whether the first Israelite communities practised egalitarianism, an issue taken up by Guillaume, with a response by Kletter.

In this companion volume to his bestselling Ancient Israel: What Do We Know and How Do We Know It? Lester L. Grabbe provides the background history of the main ancient Near Eastern peoples and empires: Babylonia, Assyria, Urartu, Hittites, Amorites, Egyptians. Grabbe's focus is on Palestine/Canaan and covers the early second millennium, including the Middle Bronze Age and the Second Intermediate Period and Hyksos rule of Egypt. Grabbe also addresses the question of a 'patriarchal period'. The main focus of the book is on the second half of the second millennium: Late Bronze and early Iron Age, the Egyptian New Kingdom, the Amarna letters, the Sea Peoples, the question of 'the exodus', the early settlements in the hill country of Palestine, and the first mention of Israel in the Merenptah inscription. Archaeology and the contribution of the social sciences both feature heavily, as does inscriptional and iconographic material. As such this volume provides a fascinating portrayal of ancient Israel and this definitive work by one of the world's leading biblical historians will be of interest to all students and scholars of biblical history.

Lester L. Grabbe provides a comprehensive history of the main ancient Near Eastern peoples and empires, drawing on insights from archaeology, iconography and the social sciences.