Rainey Brian. Religion, Ethnicity and Xenophobia in the Bible. A Theoretical, Exegetical and Theological Survey

Routledge, 2019. — 446 p.Religion, Ethnicity and Xenophobia in the Bible (Routledge Studies in the Biblical World) by Brian Rainey looks at some of the Bible’s most hostile and violent anti-foreigner texts and raises critical questions about how students of the Bible and ancient Near East should grapple with "ethnicity" and "foreignness" conceptually, hermeneutically and theologically. The author uses insights from social psychology, cognitive psychology, anthropology, sociology and ethnic studies to develop his own perspective on ethnicity and foreignness. Starting with legends about Mesopotamian kings from the third millennium BCE, then navigating the Deuteronomistic and Holiness traditions of the Hebrew Bible, and finally turning to Deuterocanonicals and the Apostle Paul, the book assesses the diverse and often inconsistent portrayals of foreigners in these ancient texts. This examination of the negative portrayal of foreigners in biblical and Mesopotamian texts also leads to a broader discussion about how to theorize ethnicity in biblical studies, ancient studies and the humanities. This volume will be invaluable to students of ethnicity and society in the Bible, at all levels. Religion, Ethnicity and Xenophobia in the Bible - A Theoretical, Exegetical and Theological Survey is a thoroughly researched, multidisciplinary monograph which
utilises a wide range of scholarship in order to trace portrayals of the ‘foreigners’ in biblical texts, and a variety of other relevant primary evidence. Rainey writes thoughtfully and brings strong theoretical foundations into dialogue with incisive analysis of texts. The monograph illustrates and highlights the various nuances of the enduring, and never more topical, nature of xenophobia, ethnicity, and religion.ContentsAcknowledgments
AbbreviationsBiblical scholarship and “the Other”
Birds of a feather: explaining ethnic foreignness
“Brood of destruction”: Mesopotamian caricatures of foreigners
“He fixed the boundaries of the earth”: some biblical idioms of ethnicity
“A non-people, a foolish nation”: caricatures of foreigners in Deuteronomistic texts
“I was repulsed by them”: caricatures of foreigners in holiness texts
“Foolish by nature”: the reverberations of ethnic polemics in the Bible
“In order that i might horrify them”: a theological appraisalBibliography
Index