149 - Sinai and Zion: An Entry into the Jewish Bible

Sinai and Zion:
An Entry into the Jewish Bible
By Jon D. Levenson
Minneapolis, Winston, 1985. 227 pp. $16.96.

In this book, Levenson, who teaches at the Divinity School of the University of Chicago, treats two vital symbols of the Hebrew Bible: the Torah, represented by Mount Sinai, and the Temple, symbolized by Mount Zion. With an engaging literary style, Levenson takes the reader through the ancient world of the Hebrew Bible with an eye on the relevance of the symbols for faith communities in the present.

This book is important for the simple reason that it is written from a Jewish perspective by a creative biblical theologian. Levenson contends that "Old Testament theology," as the name suggests, has belonged essentially in the Christian domain, with all the biases that Christian exegesis brings. He sets out to explicate the meaning and centrality of the Sinaitic covenant, challenging among other things the conventional misconceptions about the observance of commandments. In the second part of the book, the author explores the meaning of Zion in terms of ancient cosmogonies. Finally, he addresses the question of the relationships between Sinai and Zion in the Hebrew Bible. Here he argues that the two symbols were not regarded as incompatible. Rather, they existed in harmony in ancient Israel.

This book will be a welcome addition to the libraries of clergy and academics alike.

C. L. Seow
Princeton Theological Seminary
Princeton, N.J.