Humanities

The deaths and deportations that accompanied the destruction of the Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 587 BCE mark the turning point in the arc of biblical narrative. The book of Ezra-Nehemiah describes the reconstruction of life in Judah in the aftermath that catastrophe. It is the only book in the Hebrew Bible to depict this period. For over a century, scholars neglected Ezra-Nehemiah and the period it describes. But the pendulum swung at last, and in recent decades the book became a focal point for several reasons; among them is the growing consensus that the Pentateuch received its decisive shape...