Israel in Kanaan: Zum Problem der Entsehung Israels.
Miller, J. Maxwell
This thin volume (fewer than ninety pages of text) consists of eleven
short chapters and two excursus which combine to support Rosel's
view of Israel's origins, which he summarizes in a concluding
chapter. Essentially ancient Israel emerged from the heterogenous population of Canaan during the opening centuries of the Iron Age,
according to Rosel, although the catalyst for this development, and the
source of Israel's most distinctive traditions (including the
worship of Yahweh), was a group which entered the land from outside and
preserved that memory. The patriarchal stories in Genesis reflect a very
early stage of this development; the conquest account in the book of
Joshua reflects the end of the development, which occurred on the eve of
the establishment of the monarchy and apparently involved military
actions. The narrator of the Joshua account, living during the time of
the monarchy and thus relatively soon after the military actions,
assumed that the whole thing had been a military conquest. Rosel thinks
that the term "Israel" probably referred originally to a group
associated with the cultic shrine at Shiloh. Later the term came to be
used more inclusively for tribal elements in the north-central hill
country, and eventually for the Israelite-Judean monarchy.
On the whole, Rosel's view of Israel's origins comes close
to that advanced by G. E. Mendenhall in 1962, although Rosel is less
inclined to think in terms of a violent "peasant's
revolt." Regarding the possible details of its occurrence, Rosel
comes close on many points to the depictions advanced in the three most
recent English-language treatments of Israelite history: J. A.
Soggin's A History of Ancient Israel (Philadelphia: Westminster
Press, 1984), J. M. Miller's and J. H. Hayes' A History of
Ancient Israel and Judah (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1986) and G.
W. Ahlstrom's A History of Ancient Palestine (Sheffield: JSOT
Press, 1993). A major weakness of Rosel's study, however, is his
spotty coverage of recent literature on the topic, especially
publications in English. A glaring example is Rosel's seeming
ignorance of the three histories mentioned above, while using editor H.
Shanks' more popular Ancient Israel (Washington, D.C.: Biblical
Archaeology Society, 1988). Furthermore, in his concluding chapter,
Rosel quotes at some length from J. A. Callaway's chapter in the
Shanks volume, which Rosel recognizes as presenting a position similar
to his own. However Callaway made it entirely clear in the paragraphs
leading up to the segment quoted by Rosel that he was paraphrasing my
position on Israel's origins, as set forth in the Miller-Hayes
history.
In short, while I agree with the general thrust of Rosel's study
as well as with many of the specifics, it is nevertheless bothersome to
read a book which fails to engage other recent publications dealing with
the same issues or to acknowledge those which have already advanced
similar positions.
J. MAXWELL MILLER EMORY UNIVERSITY