Online Articles & Reviews
by James W. Watts

Articles by Jim Watts:

On iconic books and comparative scripture studies:

• "Desecrating Scriptures" (2009)
• "The Three Dimensions of Scriptures" (2006/2008)
• “Ten Commandments Monuments and the Rivalry of Iconic Texts” (2004)

On ritual rhetoric:

• “Ritual Legitimacy and Scriptural Authority” (2005)

On the rhetoric of the Pentateuch:

• "Reader Identification and Alienation in the Legal Rhetoric of the Pentateuch" (1999)
• "The Legal Characterization of Moses in the Rhetoric of the Pentateuch" (1998)
• "Public Readings and Pentateuchal Law" (1995)
• "Rhetorical Strategy in the Composition of the Pentateuch (1995)

On inset psalmody:

• "Biblical Psalms Outside the Psalter" (2005)
• "Psalmody in Prophecy: Habakkuk 3 in Context" (1996)
• "`This Song': Conspicuous Poetry in Hebrew Prose" (1993)

Miscelaneous biblical topics:

• “The Unreliable Narrator of Job” (2001)
• "Text and Redaction in Jeremiah's Oracles Against the Nations" (1992)

Reviews of Jim Watts's books:

• Ritual and Rhetoric in Leviticus: From Sacrifice to Scripture (2007) reviewed by:
  • Mark Leuchter in Hebraic Political Studies (2008)
  • Mark McEntire in the Review of Biblical Literature (2008)
  • Hanna Liss in the Review of Biblical Literature (2008)
  • Bernon P. Lee in the Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 8 (2008)
• (Editor) Persia and Torah: The Theory of Imperial Authorization of the Pentateuch (2001), reviewed by R Christopher Heard in the Review of Biblical Literature (2003)
• Reading Law: The Rhetorical Shaping of the Pentateuch (1999), reviewed by Christopher L. K. Grundke in the Review of Biblical Literature (2000)

Reviews by Jim Watts:

• Memory and Tradition in the Book of Numbers, by Adriane B. Leveen, in the Review of Biblical Literature (2008)
• Human Sacrifice in Jewish and Christian Tradition, edited by Karin Finsterbusch, Armin Lange and K.F. Diethard Römheld, in the Review of Biblical Literature (2008)
• Les systèmes sacrificiels de l'Ancien Testament by Alfred Marx, in the Review of Biblical Literature (2007)
• Washing in Water: Trajectories of Ritual Bathing in the Hebrew Bible and Second Temple Literature by Jonathan D. Lawrence, in the Review of Biblical Literature (2007)
• Sacrifice and Symbol: Biblical Šelamîm in a Ritual Perspective by Martin Modéus, in the Review of Biblical Literature (2006)
• Studies in the Semiotics of Biblical Law by Bernard S. Jackson, in the Review of Biblical Literature (2003)
• The Pentateuch in the Twentieth Century: The Legacy of Julius Wellhausen by Ernest Nicholson, in the Journal of Biblical Literature 120 (2001) 348 = the Review of Biblical Literature (2000)
• Song and Story in Biblical Narrative: The History of a Literary Convention in Ancient Israel by Steven Weitzman, in Theology Today 55/4 (1999) 586-88.
• The Pilgrimage Pattern in Exodus by Mark S.Smith, in the Journal of Biblical Literature 118 (1999) 128-28 = Review of Biblical Literature (1999)
• The Pentateuch: A Liberation-Critical Reading by Alice L. Laffey, in the Review of Biblical Literature (1999)
• Merveilles à nos yeux: Etude structurelle de vingt psaumes dont celui de 1 Ch 16,8-36 by PierreAuffret, in the Journal of Biblical Literature 116 (1997) 541-43 = Review of Biblical Literature (1997)