The Open Book and the Sealed Book: Jeremiah 32 in its Hebrew and Greek Recensions (review)

Hebrew Studies 45 (2004) 331 Reviews flect classical pronunciation (which ought to be the basis of a Biblical commentary ) given the use of the letter to mark the long vowels o and u. Again, he claims in note a on page 291 that √ê-zeh at 66:1 can mean “what kind of” by appeal to 1 Kgs 22:24 and 2 Chron 18:32. Neither these nor any other references seem to me to justify this, and it would be better to retain the usual sense of “where (then)?” and to interpret the result as indicating sharp disapproval of the temple building project without necessarily suggesting that it was wrong per se (1 Kgs 8:27 is not dissimilar). Again, the suggestion that at Isa 61:3 (p. 219, n. c) the overloaded first line should be eased by deleting ltt lhm seems perverse in view of the far more plausible proposal that lśwm l√bly s .ywn (= “to be applied to those who mourn in Zion”) should be read as an explanatory gloss on the preceding “all who mourn”; compare K. Koenen, Biblica 69 (1988): 567–568. Other examples could be given. It is clear, however , that readers will not turn to Blenkinsopp for serious text-critical or linguistic work; his strength lies elsewhere. And that is a considerable strength. It is astonishing to learn from the Preface that the whole volume was written in twelve months to the day; even allowing for the fact that Blenkinsopp has written on these chapters before, that represents a remarkable feat of sustained application. We shall not find here the kind of reference detail that one looks for in the more substantial commentaries, but we have a firmer grasp of many aspects of Isaiah, both as a whole and in its parts, as a result of the series to which this volume provides a fitting conclusion. H. G. M. Williamson University of Oxford Oxford, England hugh.williamson@orinst.ox.ac.uk THE OPEN BOOK AND THE SEALED BOOK: JEREMIAH 32 IN ITS HEBREW AND GREEK RECENSIONS. By Andrew G. Shead. JSOTSup 347. Pp. 316. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002. Cloth, $95.00. £,50,00. Andrew G. Shead is a lecturer in Old Testament at Moore Theological College in Newtown Australia. This text-critical study, a revision of the author’s 1998 doctoral thesis at the University of Cambridge, is a detailed verse-by-verse study of a small segment of Jeremiah (44 verses), using a specific and narrow line of questioning “in the hope that this will provide a baseline for text-critical sightings” (p. 7). This is not a general study of text critical issues in Jeremiah 32. Instead, Shead follows “the textlinguistic contours of Hebrew Studies 45 (2004) 332 Reviews one feature of Jeremiah—its markers of direct discourse,” because he thinks that this kind of analysis can “objectify the process” of text-critical work, which he says has been too often controlled by “literary considerations”(p. 7). Shead’s work engages previous scholarship, especially the works of Janzen (Studies in the Text of Jeremiah [HSM 6; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University, 1973]), Stipp (Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches [OBO 136; Freiburg: Universitätsverlag; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994]), and Migsch (Jeremias Ackerkauf: Eine Untersuchung von Jeremia 32 [ÖBS 15; Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1996]). The book’s argument is laid out in following manner: Chapter 1, “Introduction” to the problems and argument (pp. 15–25); Chapter 2, “The Boundaries of Jeremianic Discourse,” which considers the various introductory formulae of direct speech in the book of Jeremiah generally and specifically in chapter 32 (pp. 26–66); Chapter 3, “Jeremiah 32.1–15” (pp. 67–124); Chapter 4, “Jeremiah 32.16–25” (pp. 125–164); Chapter 5, “Jeremiah 32.26–35” (pp. 165–195); Chapter 6, “Jeremiah 32.36–44” (pp. 196–241); Chapter 7, “Conclusions and Discussion,” which suggests text-critical lessons to be learned for the study of Jeremiah 32 and beyond (pp. 242– 263). At the end, Shead has included an appendix (pp. 264–269) of side-by-side Hebrew and Greek texts of Jeremiah 32, a bibliography, and useful indices. Overall, his writing is...