Understanding Genesis: The Heritage of Biblical Israel Paperback – March 12, 2015

I got it due to Christine Hayes's Introduction to the Hebrew Bible course. She just doesn't shut up about this author and now I know why. If you love Hayes's work and you want to broaden your knowledge even wider this is it. This guy is amazing, this book changes all of your paradigms, you will not be the same jew after reading this.

I learned of this book through Prof. Christine Hayes' free Introduction to the Hebrew Bible video lecture series on the Yale University web site. I trusted Prof. Hayes' recommendation despite the book being more than forty years old. I was not disappointed. The late Nahum Sarna wrote well. His thought process was impressive. The book was intended to make sometimes complex analysis accessible to general readers and it does that. The subject matter embraces an accumulation of discoveries made and conclusions arrived at over more than a hundred years by a collective many whom Sarna represents well.The context Sarna provided through comparisons with other ancient texts and elucidation of the original Hebrew was beneficial. More impressive to me was what logical thinking has been able to elicit from the plain English text. From what I have seen from searching the internet on respectable sites and in key databases, I would guess the material in this book has not been overturned or dramatically challenged by discoveries since it was written. What I gained most from this book and the context it placed familiar biblical figures in was knowledge of men and women who began to feel like ancestors.

Some people believe the bible appeared by magic. This book provides a more grounded way of understanding where it came from and what made it's revelation it such an incredible turning point for humanity.

This book is deeply fascinating, filled with information and insight I had never been exposed to before. I you love studying all aspects of Genesis, this author is brilliant, learned, and very accessible.

Sarna brings a wealth of historical and current knowledge into the reading of Genesis. He presents each story in its historical and cultural context. For example on creation "Not science ... It should be obvious that by the nature of things, none of these stories can possible be the product of human memory, not in any modern sense of the word scientific accounts of the origin ...". Many of the insights seem obvious when first heard, but I hadn't thought of them. For example when discussing Cain and Abel "it must be remembered ... no one alive had yet known the experience of death, so that Cain had no way of determining that his blow again Abel could extinguish his life.". Sarna draws clear contrast between the Noah flood and the Mesopotamian flood stories.As Sarna moves into the Patriarchal period, his number harmony and genealogy tables are useful . The geographic information on "the problem of Ur", and "Sodom and Gomorrah" as well as presented maps, are also helpful. Sarna however does more than just present background information, and discusses how the doctrines and "moral" of the stories are presented. I did perhaps think his chapter on Binding of Isaac, could have been a little stronger and the Joseph story is about a fourth of Genesis and just 1 chapter is devoted here to it.

This book was one of a number of books listed as "Essential Reading" for a course I just completed on the Book of Genesis. I'm so glad I had the opportunity to read it - This was an exceptional book - Impressive scholarship, insightful and well written. I learned a lot from reading "Understanding Genesis" that I probably wouldn't have found elsewhere.

I'm about two thirds of the way through and I am really enjoying this book. I appreciate Nathan's melding of the histories of Israel and its neighbors. The insights are outstanding.

"Understanding Genesis Through Rabbinic Tradition and Modern Scholarship "I bought the book expecting more rabbinic tradition.IMO, the purpose of the book is polemical: monotheism is superior to polytheism, creation account in Genesis is "not science" yet "non-mythological", "Man" is "the pinnacle of Creation" and more. The book is 5-stars in describing the stories and beliefs of surrounding peoples. The notes at end of each chapter and bibliography provide means to verify claims and seek more knowledge. Citation of rabbinic sources such as commentary by Rashi (Rabbi Shlomoh ben Yitzchak of medieval [10th century] France) and the Talmud, is oddly missing (1-star). I hope to correct this in a small way.First, how and what you interpret the Creation story should affect how you interpret the remainder of the Torah. It is important and deserves thorough examination and thought. I recommend the first volume of The Torah: With Rashi's CommentaryTranslated, Annotated, and Elucidated, The Sapirstein Edition, by Rabbi Yisrael Isser Zvi Herczeg in collaboration with others, part of The ArtScroll Series published by Mesorah Publications.Next, learn a little biblical Hebrew. Originally vowels were not written down. Words were jammed together without spaces. Words you should expect were often not used, such as "of", "is" and "a/an". "The" is used, but its absence may indicate a proper noun (name) instead of implying "an" item. "And" word doubles as a tense reverser (conversive vav). It is a puzzle.Example: Genesis 1:3, "va-yomer elohim yihi or va-y'hi or" literally says "and will say gods/authorities will be light and will be light" but the "and" converts the future tense to past tense, and the plural "im" in "elohim" is ignored, thus "and said God will be light and was light." Finally, why this conversive vav thing? Is it shorthand for both tenses, the cyclic repeating nature of life? "God said and will say [again and again]..."?Example: from Genesis 2:17, "[vav]ooh-may-aytz hada'at tov va-ra" literally says "and from [the] tree the knowledge good and evil" (“[the]” assumes missing letter for “the” was dropped when letter for “from” was added, as usual). Is it the knowledge about good and evil, or is it the knowledge of everything, both good and evil? Is this knowledge inherently good and evil at the same time, as in the Chinese Tao understanding?

I bought this after reading Sarna’s ‘On the book of Psalms’ which I was delighted with. What I was looking for – I am not Hebrew, was some kind of commentary on the Psalms, was free of Christian evangelical dogma; for did not the Old Testament exist before the New? Equally, anything written with the Judaic Liturgy as its context would have also been inappropriate, particularly with reference to the terminology. Understanding Genesis was in fact written before ‘On the Psalms’, but the approach is the same: to take ‘full account of the numerous correspondences between the Hebrew Bible and the literature of Israel’s earlier and contemporary civilisations in the Near East.’ The first challenge to any stereotyping I may have imbibed, was the implications that Israel was heir to a variety of cultures as a historical fact, in much the same way that I appreciated as an ex-English teacher, that the English are also heirs to a variety of cultures, which has implications for the veracity of proto-nationalistic mythologizing of the concept of ‘purity.’As might be expected, the account is chronological, but it will raise questions in the mind of the reader. For example in the opening chapter, the significance of man being made in ‘the image of God’, and the significance of the two trees in Eden? Possible answers are adroitly side-stepped; Sarna avoids historical and literary speculation, in much the same way that he avoids theological speculation outside of the traditionally accepted wisdom. This is also evident in the next two chapters dealing with the Flood story and the building of the Tower of Babel; both embody factual material pertaining to the wider area – the flood plain between the Ur and Euphrates, and the Ziggurats which dominated ancient Mesopotamia – the building techniques observed with some incredulity by Herodotus – using burnt brick and bitumen. But these two major episodes serve the function of explaining the profusion of humanity – the ‘go forth and multiply’, and the increasingly consistent anti-pagan polemic of the early writers. The remaining parts of Genesis (ch. 12 – 50) deal with the Patriarchs and their descendants. Sarna raises the question of whether we should take the lifetimes proposed as literal – he does provide key inconsistencies between different accounts – such as Sarah having a child at 90 when it also says she was beyond childbearing age, or symbolic – 480 years between Exodus and the Temple building [480 = 12 x 40]. Then there is the mystery of Ur and the origins of Abraham. For the reader familiar with the Biblical account of the events that followed, the historical, archeological, philological evidence presented by Sarna will make fascinating reading; my familiarity I admit, only really goes as far as the Tower of Babel perhaps aptly the profusion of tongues episode – or should I say, confusion of tongues episode. I understand that one has been written on Exodus, and if the writer maintains the same integrity, and the scholarship is as sound, then I would give it five stars in advance of reading. It has left me with lots and lots of questions, about a text, and my response to them, which is part of the culture I have inherited and that can be no bad thing.

Great service and well worth a read it f you want to get a balanced approach to Biblical scholarship

Excellent insights into the accounts of Genesis and their relation and distinction from Ancient Near Eastern traditions and folklore.

I bought this book used - good and I was very disappointed to see that it was highly annoted and highlighted, some paragraphs are even hard to read because there is writing all over.This is a really good book, no complaints about what the author wrote, just about the false description of the state of the book.

V.Good