Reviews Of Books -- By: Anonymous

Journal: Westminster Theological Journal
Volume: WTJ 66:2 (Fall 2004)
Article: Reviews Of Books
Author: Anonymous


Reviews Of Books

Norman K. Gottwald, The Politics of Ancient Israel. Library of Ancient Israel. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001. Pp. 366. $44.95, cloth.

When they chose Norman Gottwald to write a Politics of Ancient Israel, the editors of the Library of Ancient Israel series could hardly have done better. Gottwald placed himself at the center of discussion about ancient Israel’s political life with his Tribes of Yahweh (1979), and in his new book he emphasizes his own general sense that politics represent an “inevitable dimension of life” in every age (p. 30). Moreover, Gottwald is a scholar of stature, whose work is consistently interesting and thorough. This book also is very good, sure to be useful, especially for students who are looking for a broad introduction to Israelite society. At the same time, I have hesitations. For all of Gottwald’s theoretical sophistication, the application to Israel is less innovative than his reading of the biblical evidence itself. For me, Gottwald’s understanding of individual and collective power is unsatisfying, and this understanding undergirds the entire work. In the end, I recommend the book as an important synthesis. The author sees power in ancient state-type societies as entirely centralized and opposed to the community of subjects, in something like the class divisions of his earlier work. I find this opposition inadequate to the evidence but leave the reader to his or her preference. The book is not written for any community of faith, and it works with critical approaches that are not embraced in all circles. At every point, however, Gottwald grants the biblical lore considerable respect, and his discussion will be illuminating to readers with a range of differing perspectives.

Gottwald organizes his treatment of Israelite politics around three well-chosen axes: general questions about power and politics, the nature of political life in the larger Near East, and ancient Israel itself. He develops the interplay of these in four main chapters. As always, Gottwald exhorts us to be more self-conscious about method, and he begins with a chapter on “Conceptualizing Politics.” Working from Michael Mann’s useful idea of power networks, he proceeds to define two essential types of political power. “Decentralized” power cannot prevent dissenters from withdrawing, while “centralized” power can perpetuate its own authority in what is usually called the state. Gottwald invites us to look beyond the king and the state to consider a larger political picture. We should “situate the offices and functions of Israel’s political institutions in the historical vortex of corporate life where all the contending and cooperating networks of power met in varying patterns of collaboration, competition, and conflict” (...

You must have a subscription and be logged in to read the entire article.
Click here to subscribe
visitor : : uid: ()