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SBL Press
@sblpress.bsky.social
1.5K followers 400 following 290 posts
SBL Press simultaneously publishes hardcover, paperback, and ebook editions of essential research in the fields of biblical studies and related disciplines.
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sblpress.bsky.social
Read “Recognizing the Gen(i)us of Animals: Jeremiah 8–9 as a Test Case” by Jaime L. Waters in Ask the Animals: Developing a Biblical Animal Hermeneutic edited by Arthur W. Walker-Jones and Suzanna R. Millar buff.ly/DPWpFlt #BlackHistorySBL26
“Recognizing the Gen(i)us of Animals: Jeremiah 8–9 as a Test Case” This chapter uses an animal-focused ecological hermeneutic to broaden ways of reading biblical texts, add detail and depth to ideas about animals in the Bible, and inform modern discussions of ecological crises and their impact on animals. —Jaime L. Waters
February 2, 2026 at 2:36 PM
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Read the essay "The Incarnation of the Word in the Johannine Situation: Reframing the Historical Jesus" by Kenneth L. Waters Sr. in John, Jesus, and History, Volume 4: Jesus Remembered in the Johannine Situation. buff.ly/m8aCTbe #BlackHistorySBL26
“The Incarnation of the Word in the Johannine Situation: Reframing the Historical Jesus” On one hand, this incarnational thrust emphasizes the humanity of Jesus, with implications for understanding more fully the Jesus of history, not simply the Christ of faith. On the other, John’s emphasis on the fleshly humanity of Jesus is not without theological implications. —Kenneth L. Waters
February 1, 2026 at 7:44 PM
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Check out “The Text of 1 Peter in Polycarp and Irenaeus” by Stephen C. Carlson in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55.
Quote: “Although their own manuscripts are late and beset with problems, their transmission is independent of the continuous Greek manuscripts of 1 Peter, and their testimony, to the extent it can be recovered, can represent important second-century witnesses to the text of this catholic epistle.” —Stephen C. Carlson
January 31, 2026 at 10:01 PM
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Check out “The ‘Teachings of Demons’ as ‘Magical' Practices in 1 Timothy 4:1” by Holly Beers in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55.
Quote: “In this article I make the case that the language of “teachings of demons” in 1 Tim 4:1 is a reference to the Watchers traditions of the Book of the Watchers (1 En. 1–36; cf. Gen 6:1–4).” —Holly Beers
January 31, 2026 at 5:02 PM
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Check out “Revisiting Sabbath Observance during the Great Jewish Revolt (66–73/74 CE)” by Jonathan (Yonatan) Bourgel in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55.
Quote: “This case study is particularly compelling, not only because it provides adistinct wartime setting spanning a specific period, but also because of the detailed accounts provided by Josephus in his Bellum judaicum, which form the primary foundation of this research.” —Jonathan (Yonatan) Bourgel
January 30, 2026 at 8:45 PM
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Check out “Responsibility for Murder: The Background of Judith’s Legal Argumentation” by Joseph Scales in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55.
Quote: “Judith uses a legal concept of responsibility in her address to the leaders of Bethulia. She claims that, should Bethulia surrender, her audience will be responsible for the murder of those in Jerusalem. This is based on a legal notion that can be summarized thus: a person has a degree of responsibility to prevent the murder of others." —Joseph Scales
January 30, 2026 at 6:02 PM
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Check out “Always Two There Are? The Combined Dragon in Job 40:15–41:26 LXX” by James Wykes in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55.
Quote: “Scripture is full of paired figures: Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Sodom and Gomorrah. In the same category, we find the megamonsters Behemoth and Leviathan in Job 40–41. But are Behemoth and Leviathan a pair in every version of Job?” —James Wykes
January 30, 2026 at 1:01 PM
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Check out “Exegeting God: Prophetic Sign Acts and Inner-Biblical Interpretation in the Book of Jeremiah” by Olga Fabrikant-Burke in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55.
Quote: “At the micro level— the level of individual linguistic elements—the focus of attention of our authors often falls especially on the verbs that express divine activity; they are carefully and strategically chosen and creatively transformed.” —Olga Fabrikant-Burke
January 29, 2026 at 8:01 PM
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Check out “Creative Imitation in the Story of Josiah” by J. Jona Schellekens in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55.
Quote: “The many elements that both stories share strongly suggest that they are not accurate accounts of historical events, but more likely are a literary convention.” —J. Jona Schellekens
January 29, 2026 at 5:02 PM
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Read "Abigail and Her Honor Culture Wisdom" by Joshua Berman in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55
Quote: “The distinctive features of the Gen 24 betrothal scene—especially its focus on the woman’s initiative and symbolic actions—help illuminate how the author of 1 Sam 25 casts Abigail’s journey to David not merely as an act of peacemaking but as an honor-laden, self-conscious betrothal overture." —Joshua Berman
January 29, 2026 at 1:00 PM
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Check out "The Origins of 'In the Beginning . . .': Genesis 1:1 in Light of the Biblical Hebrew Reading Traditions" by Benjamin Kantor in #JBL144.4 . Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55
Quote: “In recent decades, however, there has been a growing trend in Hebrew scholarship to consider the rich diversity of Biblical Hebrew traditions attested from antiquity, the Middle Ages, and even into modern times.” —Benjamin Kantor
January 29, 2026 at 1:00 AM
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Read "Legal Thinking and Notions of the Self: Why Biblical Studies Needs an Anthropology of Law" by Phillip M. Lasater in #JBL144.4. Access the article online using your SBL username and password. tinyurl.com/a6cbyh55
Quote: “In studies of the Hebrew Bible and ancient Judaism, law and selfhood should be taken as conceptually interrelated, despite their alleged separateness in much of the history of research.” —Phillip M. Lasater
January 28, 2026 at 11:28 PM
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The SBL Press AM Book Sale ends tomorrow. Use code AM2025 for 30% off. buff.ly/QJ0ty7f
SBL Press AM Book Sale. Use code AM2025 for 30% off. Ends 31 Dec 2025.
December 31, 2025 at 4:13 PM
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Purchase volumes in the WGRW Supplement Series for 30% off through 31 Dec. Use code AM2025 at checkout. buff.ly/0s1HaCc
Covers: Interpreting the Gospel of John in Antioch and Alexandria by Miriam DeCock, Food and Transformation in Ancient Mediterranean Literature by Meredith J. C. Warren, and Religious Competition in the Greco-Roman World edited by Nathaniel P. Desrosiers and Lily C. Vuong
December 30, 2025 at 4:13 PM
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Purchase the paperback of Philo of Alexandria, On the Contemplative Life: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary by Joan E. Taylor and David M. Hay for 30% off between now and 31 December. Use code AM2025 at checkout. buff.ly/F0eQaso
Review: “The commentary is rich, detailed, almost line by line....This is without doubt the best commentary ever written on this text.” --Pieter van der Horst, Utrecht University, Bryn Mawy Classical Review
December 29, 2025 at 4:03 PM
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Brown Judaic Studies volumes are 30% off with code AM2025 through 31 Dec. buff.ly/PsV6Y1o
Covers: Adventures of Rabbah and Friends: The Talmud's Strange Tales and Their Readers by James Adam Redfield, Aramaic Incantation Bowls in Their Late Antique Jewish Contexts by edited by Alexander W. Marcus and Jason S. Mokhtarian, and Studies in Rabbinic Narratives, Volume 2 edited by Jeffrey L. Rubenstein
December 26, 2025 at 12:40 PM
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Semeia Studies volumes are 30% off now through 31 Dec with code AM2025. buff.ly/YAl7Oje
Covers: Bridging the Interpretive Abyss: Reading the New Testament after the Cultural Studies Turn by Luis Menéndez-Antuña, Ask the Animals: Developing a Biblical Animal Hermeneutic edited by Arthur W. Walker-Jones and Suzanna R. Millar, Reading with Feeling: Affect Theory and the Bible edited by Fiona C. Black and Jennifer L. Koosed
December 25, 2025 at 6:30 PM
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Purchase Plant Metaphors in Prophetic Condemnations of Israel and Judah by Tina M. Sherman for 30% off using code AM2025 between now and 31 December. buff.ly/wvAgzUu
“At the heart of the study is the innovative use of ‘national identity theory’ to consider how the plant metaphors rhetorically constructed national identity (especially a collective past, present, and future, and a distinctive national character) in particular ways.” –Brad E. Kelle, Religious Studies Review
December 24, 2025 at 1:30 PM
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Check out SBL Press volumes on Enoch, including the most recent 1 Enoch: An Ethiopic Reader’s Edition by Vladimir Olivero. SBL Press volumes on Enoch and much more are on sale for 30% off through 31 Dec using code AM2025. buff.ly/Ubdc0Ej
Covers: Enoch and the Synoptic Gospels: Reminiscences, Allusions, Intertextuality edited by Loren T. Stuckenbruck and Gabriele Boccaccini,  Apocalyptic Sheep and Goats in Matthew and 1 Enoch by Elekosi F. Lafitaga, and 1 Enoch: An Ethiopic Reader’s Edition by Vladimir Olivero
December 23, 2025 at 2:58 PM
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Both How John Works edited by Douglas Estes and Ruth Sheridan and the followup What John Knows are 30% off with code AM2025 through 31 Dec. buff.ly/CM6BihG
“This volume is an outstanding collection of fifteen essays that address the issue of ‘how John works.’” —R. Alan Culpepper, RBL
December 22, 2025 at 7:30 PM
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Writings from the Greco-Roman World provides introductions, the original text and/or English translation, notes, a bibliography, and indices for both scholars and students of religion, culture, and philosophy in late antiquity. Use code AM2025 for 30% off all volumes through 31 Dec. buff.ly/FZYP23t
Covers of Life of Aesop the Philosopher by Grammatiki A. Karla with translation by David Konstan, John Chrysostom, Homilies on Titus and Philemon by Pauline Allen, and Jewish Fictional Letters from Hellenistic Egypt: The Epistle of Aristeas and Related Literature by L. Michael White and G. Anthony Keddie
December 19, 2025 at 4:13 PM
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Writings from the Ancient World provides teachers, historians, and students an introduction to the writings, the original text and English translation, notes, and a bibliography. Use code AM2025 for 30% off all volumes through 31 Dec. buff.ly/BtuxIa5
Writings from the Ancient World covers for The Ancient Egyptian Netherworld Books by John Coleman Darnell and Colleen Manassa Darnell, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, Second Edition by James P. Allen, and Biographical Texts from Ramessid Egypt by Elizabeth Frood
December 18, 2025 at 1:45 PM
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Billie Jean Collins's The Hittites and Their World is 30% now through 31 Dec. Use code AM2025 to receive 30% all SBL Press and BJS titles. buff.ly/o5ng897
As the protegé of the national deity, the Storm-God or, later, the Sun-Goddess of Arinna, the king acted as his or her chief priest. The Sun-Goddess was said to run before the king in battle, thus ensuring his victory.” —Billie Jean Collins
December 17, 2025 at 10:49 PM
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Hélène Sader's The History and Archaeology of Phoenicia is 30%. Use code AM2025 before 31 December to receive the discount on all Archaeology and Biblical Studies volumes. buff.ly/50UI6yg
“While it is obvious why the Phoenicians never referred to themselves as Phoenicians—since this term was coined and used by the Greeks—they also never used a generic term of their own to speak of the inhabitants of all four city-states and never referred to all these inhabitants as one people.” —Hélène Sader
December 17, 2025 at 4:13 PM
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Purchase Edom at the Edge of Empire: A Social and Political History by Bradley L. Crowell for 30% off between now and 31 December. Use code AM2025 at checkout. buff.ly/qCievOV
“The economy of the region is particularly important for understanding the development of the Edomite polity. Assyria did not annex or occupy Edom, and its impact on the material culture was minimal.... Assyria did, however, play a significant role in stimulating the economy, and this mode of indirect impact influenced the social and political organizational structures in Edom.” —Bradley L. Crowell
December 17, 2025 at 1:15 PM