Appendixes: Appeal to Ideal Figures Moses and Elijah (4:4–6)

Horeb (4:4). The place name Horeb functions as an alternative designation for Mount Sinai (cf. Ex. 33:6; 1 Kings 19:8) or it may refer to the desolate region bordering Mount Sinai (e.g., Ex. 17:6; Deut. 1:19). The dual names for the “mountain of God” where Moses received the Decalogue may represent two separate traditions of the Exodus narrative (one employing the Semitic term “Horeb,” with “Sinai” the name used by another people group?) or the twin peaks of a single mountainous complex.43 The precise location of Mount Horeb/Sinai remains uncertain, and scholars have posited at least four possible locations for the mountain: Jebel Musa, Ras es-Safsafeh, Jebel Serbal, and a peak near al-Hrob. Early Christian tradition associated Mount Horeb/Sinai with Jebel Musa in the southern Sinai Peninsula.44

Mt. Horeb (Jebel Musa)

Amie Gosselin

Bibliography

Berquist, J. L. Judaism in Persia’s Shadow. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995. Especially pp. 23–104 on the influence of imperial politics on the province of Yehud.

Briant, P. From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire, trans. P. T. Daniels. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2002. Especially pp. 388–471 on the topics of tribute and tribute economy.

Hill, A. E. Malachi. AB 25D. New York: Doubleday, 1998. Especially pp. 15–76 on the literary and historical background of the book.

Hugenberger, G. P. Marriage as a Covenant: Biblical Law and Ethics as Developed from Malachi. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998 (= VTSup 52, 1994). Especially pp. 13–123 on the subjects of covenant, marriage, and divorce.

Meyers, C. L., and E. M. Meyers. Zechariah 9–14. AB 25C. New York: Doubleday, 1993. Especially pp. 15–28 on the historical context, political development, and economic and demographic conditions of the early postexilic period.

Williamson, H. G. M. “Exile and After: Historical Study.” Pages 236–65 in The Face of Old Testament Studies: A Survey of Contemporary Approaches, ed. D. W. Baker and B. T. Arnold. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1999. Includes annotated bibliography pertinent to the discussion of the reconstruction of Israelite history during the Persian period.

Yamauchi, E. M. Persia and the Bible. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1990. Especially pp. 129–85 on the reign of King Darius I.

_____. “The Exilic and Postexilic Periods.” Pages 201–14 in Giving the Sense: Understanding and Using Old Testament Historical Texts, ed. D. M. Howard and M. A. Grisanti. Grand Rapids: Kregel, 2003. Includes annotated bibliography pertinent to the discussion of current developments in Second Temple studies.

Chapter Notes

Main Text Notes

1. On the language typology of the postexilic prophets see A. E. Hill, Malachi (AB; New York: Doubleday, 1998), 15–51, 395–401.

2. C. Westermann, Basic Forms of Prophetic Speech, trans. H. C. White (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1991), 169–76.

3. Ibid, 18. On the lament tradition in the Psalms see B. W. Anderson, The Psalms Speak For Us Today, 3d ed. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2000), 49–65; on lament and lamentation in the ancient Near East see J. H. Walton, Ancient Israelite Literature in Its Cultural Context (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1989), 140–56; and W. W. Hallo, “Lamentations and Prayers in Sumer and Akkad,” CANE, 1871–77.

4. D. L. Petersen, Zechariah 9–14 and Malachi (OTL; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1995), 31–32.

5. W. Brueggemann, The Creative Word: Canon as a Model for Biblical Education (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1982), 71–76; on rhetorical strategies in Hebrew wisdom literature see J. Crenshaw, Education in Ancient Israel (New York: Doubleday, 1998), 133–37.

6. On rhetorical speech in Malachi see Hill, Malachi, xxxvi–xxxix, 34–41.

7. D. N. Freedman, “The Original Name of Jacob,” IEJ 13 (1963): 125–26; H. B. Huffmon, Amorite Personal Names in the Mari Texts (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1965), 203; H.-J. Zobel, “ yaʿ ^aqôb,” TDOT, 6:188–90; R. de Vaux, The Early History of Israel, trans. D. Smith (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1978), 199.

8. K. G. Hoglund, “Edomites,” in Peoples of the Old Testament World, ed. A. J. Hoerth, G. L. Mattingly, and E. M. Yamauchi (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1994), 347.

9. See R. Cohen and Y. Yisrael, “Smashing the Idols,” BAR 22/4 (1996): 41–55, 65; I. Beit-Arieh, “Edomites Advance into Judah,” BAR 22/6 (1996): 29–36; Z. Zevit, The Religions of Ancient Israel (New York: Continuum, 2001), 142–49.

10. See J. R. Bartlett, Edom and the Edomites (JSOTSup 77; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1989), 157–61.

11. See P. Bienkowski, “New Evidence on Edom in the Neo-Babylonian and Persian Periods,” in The Land That I Will Show You: Essays on the History and Archaeology of the Ancient Near East in Honor of J. Maxwell Miller, ed. J. A. Dearman and M. P. Graham (JSOTSup 343; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 198–213. Bienkowski (p. 200) suggests that the intent of Nabonidus was subjugation and not annihilation of the Edomites and that Edomite settlements continued to exist under direct Neo-Babylonian rule. Based on archaeological data from Buseirah he concludes that some sort of political entity called Edom survived through the Persian period (pp. 211–13).

12. M. C. A. MacDonald, “North Arabia in the First Millennium BCE,” CANE, 1359, 1366–67.

13. In addition to the works of Bartlett, Edom and the Edomites, and Bienkowski, “New Evidence on Edom,” see further J. R. Bartlett and B. MacDonald, “Edom,” ABD, 2:287–301; Hoglund, “Edomites,” 2:335–47; and P. K. McCarter, “Obadiah 7 and the Fall of Edom” in Essays in Honor of George Ernest Wright, ed. P. K. McCarter and R. Boling (Missoula: Scholars Press, 1976), 87–92.

14. Cf. IVPBBC-OT, 810.

15. See P. Briant, From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire, trans. P. T. Daniels (Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 2002), 584–86, for a discussion of a similar situation later during Nehemiah’s governorship of post-exilic Judah.

16. D. J. McCarthy, Treaty and Covenant, 2d ed. (AnBib 21A; Rome: Biblical Institute, 1981), 253–54.

17. Hill, Malachi, 241–42; see further B. Glazier-McDonald, “Intermarriage, Divorce, and the Bat-ʿĒl Nēkar: Insights into Mal 2:10–16,” JBL 106 (1987): 603–11; J. J. Collins, “Marriage, Divorce, and Family in Second Temple Judaism,” in Families in Ancient Israel, ed. L. G. Perdue et al. (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1997), 104–62.

18. Cf. J. H. Walton, “The Place of the HUTQATTĒL within the D-Stem Group and Its Implications in Deuteronomy 24:4,” HS 32 (1991): 7–17, suggests that the law forbidding remarriage to a previous spouse seeks to protect the woman who has been publicly humiliated by her first husband since she was forced to declare herself “unclean” in a public way.

19. J. J. Collins, “Marriage, Divorce, and Family in Second Temple Judaism,” in Families in Ancient Israel, 107–27. On the Elephantine papyri see further B. Porten, “Elephantine Papyri,” ABD, 2:445–55; idem, Archives from Elephantine: The Life of an Ancient Jewish Military Colony (Berkeley: Univ. of California Press, 1968); A. E. Cowley, Aramaic Paypri of the Fifth Century B.C. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1923); E. G. Kraeling, The Brooklyn Museum Aramaic Papyri (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1953). On the marriage covenant in Malachi see, G. P. Hugenberger, Marriage as a Covenant (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998 [earlier publ. as VTSup 52; Leiden: Brill, 1994]).

20. On royal messengers see S. A. Meier, The Messenger in the Ancient Semitic World (HSM 45; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988). On the divine messenger, including the messenger role of the Hebrew prophets, see E. T. Mullen, The Assembly of the Gods (HSM 24; Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1980); idem, “Divine Assembly,” ABD, 2:214–17.

21. C. L. Meyers and E. M. Meyers, Zechariah 9–14 (AB; New York: Doubleday, 1993), 394–95.

22. R. J. Forbes, Studies in Ancient Technology (Leiden: Brill, 1964), 119–20; cf. F. V. Winnett, “Metallurgy,” IDB, 3:366–68.

23. Ibid., 172–74; on the process of refining and smelting of silver, see pp. 226–39. On the amalgamation method as an alternative process for smelting silver, see pp. 233–34.

24. B. Glazier-McDonald, Malachi: The Divine Messenger (SBLDS 98; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1987), 147–48; Petersen, Zechariah 9–14 and Malachi, 207 (n. b.); cf. Forbes, Studies in Ancient Technology, 232–33, on the use of salt in the desilverization of lead.

25. P. D. Redditt, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi (NCBC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995), 177; cf. G. André, “ kāšap,” TDOT, 7:360–66; J. A. Scurlock and J. K. Kuemmerlin-McLean, “Magic,” ABD, 4:464–71.

26. G. Frantz-Szabo, “Hittite Witchcraft, Magic, and Divination,”CANE, 2007.

27. Scurlock and Kuemmerlin-McLean, “Magic,” 4:465; see further W. Van Binsbergen and F. Wiggermann, “Magic in History. A Theoretical Perspective, and Its Application to Ancient Mesopotamia,” in Mesopotamian Magic, ed. T. Abusch and K. van der Toorn (Groningen: Styx, 1999), 1–34.

28. See M. T. Roth, Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor (SBLWAW 6; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995), 81, 172, 223, 230, 233, 234.

29. See the discussion in Hill, Malachi, 305–7.

30. Cf. J. F. Borghouts, “Witchcraft, Magic, and Divination in Ancient Egypt,” CANE, 1775–76 on an Egyptian cultic book from the Ptolemaic era (Papyrus Jimilhac), linking agricultural abundance with the quantity of offerings left at the temple to care for the services of Osiris.

31. On produce levies in the Persian period see Briant, From Cyrus to Alexander, 439–42; cf. H. G. M. Williamson, “Palestine, Administration of (Persian),” ABD, 5:85, who suggests that the Persian royal grants extended by Darius for the funding of temple (re)construction projects were likely nothing more than “tax rebates.”

32. J. L. Berquist, Judaism in Persia’s Shadow (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995), 94–95 (who dates Malachi to the reign of Xerxes, 486–465 B.C.).

33. E.g., Glazier-McDonald, Malachi: The Divine Messenger, 196–97; Petersen, Zechariah 9–14 and Malachi, 217–18.

34. Ibid., 217; cf. W. Horowitz, Mesopotamian Cosmic Geography (Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1998), 262–63; L. J. Stadelmann, The Hebrew Conception of the World (AnBib 39; Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1970), 46–47, 121, 124.

35. Shalom M. Paul, “Heavenly Tablets and the Book of Life,” JANES 5 (1973): 345–53.

36. Ibid., 348–50; Glazier-McDonald, Malachi: The Divine Messenger, 220–21; see the discussion of “heavenly books” in H. Haag, “ kātab,” TDOT, 7:380.

37. Cf. Yasna 31:14 in the Zend-Avesta as cited in Glazier-McDonald, Malachi: The Divine Messenger, 221 (n. 68); on similar types of divine “tablets of deeds” in earlier Mesopotamian literature see Paul, “Heavenly Tablets and the Book of Life,” 345–46.

38. See Petersen, Zechariah 9–14 and Malachi, 222.

39. Cf. D. Deuel, “ ‘Book of Remembrance,’ or Royal Memorandum,” MSJ 7 (1996): 107–11.

40. F. I. Andersen and D. N. Freedman, Hosea (AB; New York: Doubleday, 1980), 456; cf. P. J. King and L. E. Stager, Life in Biblical Israel (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001), 67.

41. ANF, 5:217; cf. ACCS, 14:310.

42. M. S. Smith, “The Near Eastern Background of Solar Language for Yahweh,” JBL 109 (1990): 29–39; O. Keel, The Symbolism of the Biblical World, trans. T. J. Hallett (New York: Seabury, 1978), 28, 215–17; idem, Gods, Goddesses, and Images of God in Ancient Israel, trans. T. H. Trapp (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1998), 248–62; ANEP, 180.

43. R. K. Harrison and J. K. Hoffmeier, “Sinai,” ISBE, 4:527.

44. O. Kaiser, “ ḥārab,” TDOT, 5:150–54; G. I. Davies, “Sinai, Mount,” ABD, 6:47–49.