Abstract
A Christian Reading Of Jeremiah 48
Julie Irene Woods, Jeremiah 48 as Christian Scripture (Cambridge: James Clarke & Co 2011. £20.50. pp. 356. ISBN: 978-0-227-17378-7).
This monograph, the author’s doctoral thesis from the University of Durham, proposes, as its title suggests, a way of reading Jer 48 within a Christian context and relating to it from a Christian perspective.
Chapter 1 provides a brief History of Research of the Oracles Against the Nations (henceforth OAN) in general and Jeremiah’s OAN in particular. Woods notes that most previous studies on the OAN explore their Sitz im Leben, poetic structure, and rhetoric. She further highlights the scholarly focus on Jer 50-51. Chapter 2 compares Jer 48 (MT) with the corresponding Jer 31 (LXX). Woods provides several comparative charts where she lists the MT, NRSV English translation, Ziegler’s critical edition of the LXX, and NETS English translation. She highlights the importance of the location within each version of the oracle against Moab for the overall interpretation of the material, as well as the significance of verses 40-41, attested only in MT. Chapter 3 explores the textual relationship between Jer 48 and Isa 15-16. Woods discusses the shared material and the material extant in only one version, and argues that Jer 48 depends on the Isaianic material. Chapter 4 analyzes the writings on Jer 48 and the OAN by three American Christian biblical scholars (Fretheim, Miller, Brueggemann). In the same manner, chapter 5 discusses the research by two British scholars, writing within Christian contexts (Jones, Clements). Chapter 6 proposes a reading of the gloss in Jer 48:10. Woods seeks to avoid the pitfalls of both literalistic and metaphorical interpretations, as well as the fallacy of ignoring the verse. Instead, just as the redactor preserved the surrounding text but expressed his discomfort with it, so we need to read Jer 48 yet also transform it. Chapter 7 suggests a way in which Christians today can read and relate to Jer 48. Woods proposes seeing Moab’s fate as a metaphor of an individual Christian’s walk with God as well as of the life of the church. We as Christians can or even should identify with sinful Moab and recognize that our sole hope is in God’s grace and in his redemption, brought about on the cross. Moreover, we should side with God in his weeping over sinful nations and show compassion when misfortune befalls another party.
Woods should be commended for providing a way forward for Christian readers of Jer 48. At the same time, her book suffers from ‘too little about too much’. Chapter 2 is too long, given the expressed goal of the monograph to read Jer 48 as Christian Scripture, yet it is also too short as it does not further the research on the relation between the LXX and the MT. Likewise, the discussions in chapter 3 are not immediately relevant to the topic at hand, yet also not detailed enough to shed new light upon the relationship between Jer 48 and Isa 15-16.