Context of Scripture, The

Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, Mar 2004 by Howard, David M Jr

The archival inscriptions in volume 3 consist mostly of letters, contracts, court cases, and other legal documents. Volume 3 also contains two extensive and helpful indexes for the entire work: (1) Scripture (18 pp.) and (2) names and topics (44 pp.). The latter consists mostly of names (divine, royal, geographical, ethnic, personal, including many biblical names), but it also (unlike ANET) includes some topics (e.g. conditional law, creation, more than a dozen festivals, magic, marriage and marriage customs, scribes, and soul), and more specific items (e.g. asherah, atef-crovm, bison, haltikkuwool, irrigation canal, juniper, plow, and yoke). Another helpful feature not found in ANET is the "Register of Contributors" (3.405-6), where one can see at a glance exactly which texts each contributor has translated.

In addition to the short prefaces in each volume and the short introductions to each text, COS also contains seven useful essays on the "contextual" approach, one each in volumes 1 and 2 and five in volume 3, three by Hallo and one each by James K. Hoffmeier, Harry A. Hoffner, Jr., K. Lawson Younger, Jr., and David B. Weisberg.

The translations in COS are mostly smooth, "Niv-style" renditions. Certainly some of the "KJV" feel of ANET is done away with (e.g. "man" now replaces the archaic "seignior" for awilu(m) in the laws of Hammurapi, although losing something of the essence of awilu in the process). Originally, Hallo desired to use this project as a test of translation theory, whereby there would be "a 1:1 relation in which each word (and only that word) is rendered by an English equivalent," not only within one language but for every language (l.xxvi). Not surprisingly, this extreme formal-equivalence approach was unattainable, a fact Hallo himself admits in the end (S.xiii).

How can COS be used? Essentially in the same ways that ANET has been. COS is obviously more up to date, so we find accessible translations of all the important discoveries in recent decades, including the Kuntillet Ajrud inscriptions containing the references to "Yahweh of Teman and his asherah," the Jerusalem pomegranate, containing a likely reference to "the temple of Yahweh," the Tel Dan stele, containing the reference to "the house of David," the Ketef Hinnom amulets, containing the Aaronic blessing, the Deir Alia plaster inscriptions, containing references to Balaam, and many more, both well-publicized and more obscure. A welcome expansion in COS is the relatively larger corpus of Hittite texts included compared to ANET. The publisher intends to release COS on CD-ROM, as it did with The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (according to Younger in a personal communication), which will allow for greatly expanded uses. It is to be hoped that Brill-as Pritchard did-will also release one or two smaller paperback versions that are more suited to classroom work than the large, three-volume set.

What is the value of COS? In a word: enormous. Assembling this work in a little over a decade was a monumental task for Hallo and Younger, and they deserve much credit for the superior line-up of scholars, the fine choices of texts, and the excellent overall presentation of the work. There is much here to be explored, savored, and used. Given the fast-paced world of archaeological discovery and the advances in publishing, COS may not enjoy undisputed sway in biblical studies for close to 50 years the way ANET did, but it undoubtedly will do so for several decades. This treasure trove of texts is a true gift to the scholarly world, and we who study these texts-both biblical and extrabiblical-owe Brill, the editors, and their teams of contributors a great debt of thanks.