Monday, 19 January 2015

Judaism, the First Phase: the Place of Ezra and Nehemiah in the Origins of Judaism,
Joseph Blenkinsopp, Eerdmans, 2009, page 37

So, Blenkinsopp sums up where he has got to so far:

Taking all this together, the terminology in Ezra-Nehemiah for the group in whose name and on whose behalf the book was composed implies a collective self-understanding without precedent. The claim to be the Israel which inherits the promises, the commitments and privileges to which the traditions testify was now limited to members of the 'golah' who subcribed to its theology, its interpretation of the laws, and its religious practices. All other claims, including those of the inhabitants of Samaria, the Judeans who had never left the land, and presumably thoses elsewhere in the diaspora whose religious beliefs and practices differed from those of the 'golah' leadership, were excluded.

Blenkinsopp thinks he sees a takeover!