Leviticus : A Translation with Commentary

by Robert Alter

Genres: Judaism

96 pages, Unknown Binding

About the author

Robert Bernard Alter is an American professor of Hebrew and comparative literature at the University of California, Berkeley, where he has taught since 1967, and has published many acclaimed works on the Bible, literary modernism, and contemporary Hebrew literature.

Reviews

[Jason Friedlander · Rating 3 out of 5]

"And if through these you do not take chastisement by Me, and you come in encounter against Me, I on My part will come in encounter against you and I Myself will strike you sevenfold for your offenses. And I will bring against you the avenging sword of the covenant's vengeance, and you shall gather into your towns, and I will send pestilence in your midst, and you shall be given into an enemy's hands. When I break your staff of bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven and dole out your bread by weight, and you shall eat and not be sated. And if despite this you do not heed Me and you come in encounter against Me, I will come against you in wrathful encounter and I on My part will chastise you sevenfold for your offenses. And you shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters you shall eat. And I will destroy your cult-places and cut off your incense stands, and I will put your corpses on top of the corpses of your fetishes, and I will loathe you. And I will turn your towns into ruins and lay waste your sanctuaries, and I will not smell your fragrant odors. And I Myself will lay waste to the land, and all your enemies who settle in it shall be appalled by it. And you I will scatter among the nations, and I will unsheath the sword after you, and your land shall be a desolation, and your towns a ruin." - Leviticus 26:23-33

This is an excerpt of the punishment for the Israelites if they break God's covenant. Honestly I enjoyed reading these last chapters of Leviticus the most, it was the first 75% that I found incredibly dull. This is probably sacrilegious to even say, but know that none of my opinions on this matter at all and that this rating is for personal enjoyment.

[Jamie Huston · Rating 3 out of 5]

I gave Genesis and Exodus each five stars, but after those epic masterpieces, Leviticus is a bit of a dry slog. I actually have a lot of respect for this ambitious series of proscriptions for a community endeavoring to become holy, but the nearly total lack of narrative here--replaced by blueprints for rituals and schematics for laws--is hardly a page turner. Alter's footnotes continue to delight, though--fraught with etymology, wordplay, insight, and humane connections that bring this text to full life. Still a great experience!