Jeremiah 48 as Christian Scripture. By JULIE IRENE WOODS. Foreword by WALTER MOBERLY.

Abstract

The provision of a foreword by Walter Moberly reflects this monograph’s origin as a Durham dissertation written under his supervision, and it manifests three of his own characteristics—a willingness to engage with challenging texts, a close and careful attention to the chosen text (Jeremiah’s Moab prophecy) such as will satisfy the most rigorous textual scholar, and an interest in what Dr Woods calls a “Christian reading” of it. The monograph begins with a survey of work on the prophecies about foreign nations in the Prophets and in Jeremiah in particular (I regret that it retains the expression ‘oracles against the nations’, since the preposition at least oversimplifies the prophecies’ nature). While such a survey is a required part of a dissertation, this particular survey is useful in the light of the paucity of that work, because it encourages a wide perspective on this scholarly study over more than two centuries and a perceptive breakdown of the angles that scholars have adopted. Two fine, detailed technical chapters follow in which Dr Woods analyses the differences between the MT and LXX texts and compares Jeremiah’s Moab prophecy with related prophecies in Isaiah and elsewhere. Both studies help to establish the profile of Jeremiah 48 MT.