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Women And The Law In Ancient Israel

The importance of marriage to the Ancient Israelites is clear enough in the Bible, but nowhere is there any information on the ceremony itself and it is likely that custom varied from one locale to another. In Leviticus 18 there is a list of prohibited relationships (a man cannot marry his sister, etc.). These appear less concerned with the dangers...

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Schools and Literacy in Ancient Israel

Schools and Literacy in Ancient Israel and Early Judaism. As a literary corpus, the birth and the transmission of the Hebrew Bible are directly linked to the use and the spread of writing among the people from whom it is born. The study of the role of writing, as well as that of the function and training of scribes in the society of ancient Israel...

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Education in Ancient Israel

In this groundbreaking new book, distinguished biblical scholar James L. Crenshaw investigates both the pragmatic hows and the philosophical whys of education in ancient Israel and its surroundings. Asking questions as basic as "Who were the teachers and students and from what segment of Israelite society did they come?" and "How did instructors in...

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Family Life and Relations

The Old Testament. In Western societies individuals are often considered the societal units, brought together by some commonly felt need (commerce, industry, mutual defense, etc.). In contrast, Israel's social structure was tribal and therefore corporate (solidary) in its internal relationships, generating tightly structured communities. Whatever t...

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Family and Household in Ancient Israel

The idea "Family" in ancient Israel was a more expansive concept than our modern conception of the idea. "Family" existed at three basic levels: First, there was the bayit, or the household. This was similar to our nuclear family of parents with probably two to four children, as well as multiple generations, but it also might include debt servants,...

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Canaan & Ancient Israel

Daily Life Home & Family. Education, work and leisure were concentrated in and around the home. According to the Bible, the ideal family in Ancient Israel was large and patriarchal. The extended family or beit 'av (father's house) consisted of three generations (father, married sons, grandchildren) living together. Excavated houses from the Bro...

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Jewish Education in Ancient Times

The importance of education in ancient Judaism is clearly seen in the attitude passed down in the rabbinic dictum that the world is poised on the breath of schoolchildren. Rabbinic law still obligates the father to teach his sons Torah, as well as a trade. The duty to instruct the people has its roots in the Torah with such precepts as Deuteronomy ...

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Daily Life In Ancient Israel

As it did everywhere else in the Ancient World, an Israeli woman's life was centered in the home. For the majority this was a small wattle-and-daub or baked clay and straw brick house in a village constructed around a spring or well. There were walled towns but apart from Jerusalem these were not that much bigger. An outside staircase to a flat roo...

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History of Education in Ancient Israel and Judah

Education is defined as, "teaching and learning specific skills, and also something less tangible, but more profound: the imparting of knowledge, positive judgement and well-developed wisdom. Education has as one of its fundamental aspects the imparting of culture from generation to generation (see socialization)", then first formal education can b...

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Everyday Life in Ancient Israel

It is somewhat difficult for the average modern Catholic to transport himself back, in imagination, to the life of the Jewish race as it must have been lived in Old Testament times. Following the universal tendency of men to think that things must always have been as they are now in our own lives, we can only too easily think that the people of the...

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