Puns and Pundits: Wordplay in the Hebrew Bible and Ancient Near Eastern Literature
Bethesda, MD: CDL Press, 2000

This book brings together seventeen international scholars whose works encompass some of the most important languages and literatures of the ancient and late antique Near East. The scholars who appear in this volume have been selected because of their prior interest in word play phenomena, as seen in their many important articles and monographs, and for their willingness to provide further insight into the subject beyond that which may be found in their already published works. These scholars represent diverse disciplines, fields, and approaches, and thus, the hermeneutical aspects of this volume are as broad as the material and time spans that the essays cover. Languages examined in this book include: ancient Egyptian, Sumerian, Babylonian and Akkadian, Ugaritic, biblical Hebrew, Aramaic, Midrashic Hebrew, Arabic, and Medieval Hebrew.

Contributors include: Bill T. Arnold, Moshe Garsiel, Sheldon W. Greaves, Victor Avigdor Hurowitz, Anne Draffkorn Kilmer, Jacob Klein, Antonio Loprieno, Zvi Malachi, Fedwa Malti-Douglas, Scott B. Noegel, Alphons S. Rodrigues Pereira, Gary A. Rendsburg, Stefan Schorch, David S. Segal, Al Wolters, and Wilfred G. E. Watson.

To order a copy, click here.

Reviews:

  • J. E. J., Old Testament Abstracts 63 (2001), 371.
  • A. Frisch, Beit Mikra 45 (2000), 374-377 (in Hebrew).