The Book of Zechariah and its Influence

This title was first published in 2003. The book bearing the title of 'Zechariah' is, in its present form, an amalgam of oracles and prophecies stemming from Zechariah himself as well as others. It became part of Jewish scripture, was revered and valued, and was a partiuclar favourite of a number of early Christian writers. Often cited by New Testament writers, this book of one of the most important of the 'minor prophets' is itself deeply indebted to earlier Jewish prophetic texts and has been an important resource for later writers, Jewish and Christian, as they sought to tap their own 'Biblical' material. The amalgam of oracles and prophecies presented in the book of Zechariah offers an ideal thematic focus for the leading scholars in this volume who explore areas of the Hebrew Bible, post-Biblical Jewish literature, and early Christian literature and history (in the New Testament and beyond). The essays examine the book of Zechariah itself as well as its subsequent interpretation by a number of other writers, Jewish and Christian. The essays raise important issues in relation to the influence of biblical texts in subsequent literature and also the broad area of 'intertextuality'' and the way in which later texts relate to and use earlier texts in their sacred tradition.

Christopher Tuckett

Contents: Preface; The guilty priesthood (Zech 3), Lena-Sofia Tiemeyer; Why is Second Zechariah so full of quotations?, Rex Mason; The literary contexts of Zechariah 9:9, Terry Collins; Bad divination in Zechariah 10:1-2, Johannes Tromp; The Septuagint of Zechariah as witness to an early interpretation of the book, Arie van der Kooij; The use of Zechariah in Matthew's gospel, Paul Foster; The cleansing of the temple in Mark 11:15 and Zechariah 14:21, Henk Jan de Jonge; Zechariah 13:7 and Mark's account of the arrest in Gethsemane, John Muddiman; Zechariah 12:10 and the New Testament, Christopher M. Tuckett; The attitude towards Christians who are doubting: Jude 22-3 and the text of Zechariah 3, Harm W. Hollander; Why would a pagan read Zechariah? Apologetics and exegesis in the 2nd-century Greek apologists, Jeremy S. Boccabello; Bibliography; Indexes.