Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

F. E. Peters is Professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at New York University. His books include The Children of Abraham: Judaism, Christianity, Islam: A New Edition and the forthcoming The Creation of the Quran: The Making of Muslim Scripture (both Princeton).

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"The Voice, the Word, the Books is an important new work on the authoritative texts of the Abrahamic religious traditions. It amounts to a comparative study of the three major Western faiths by looking through a window--in this case the window of scripture. Frank Peters is preeminently qualified to write such a work."--Richard C. Martin, Emory University

"This is a thorough and rich book, the remarkable work by one of the great authorities of our time on the three Abrahamic monotheistic religions. It examines scripture--Jewish, Christian, and Muslim--from every conceivable angle. It is written in Peters's engaging prose and accessible to any intelligent reader."--Mark R. Cohen, Princeton University

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"The Voice, the Word, the Books is an important new work on the authoritative texts of the Abrahamic religious traditions. It amounts to a comparative study of the three major Western faiths by looking through a window--in this case the window of scripture. Frank Peters is preeminently qualified to write such a work."--Richard C. Martin, Emory University

"This is a thorough and rich book, the remarkable work by one of the great authorities of our time on the three Abrahamic monotheistic religions. It examines scripture--Jewish, Christian, and Muslim--from every conceivable angle. It is written in Peters's engaging prose and accessible to any intelligent reader."--Mark R. Cohen, Princeton University

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THE VOICE, THE WORD, THE BOOKS

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS

Contents

Introduction. The Voice from Sinai........................................................1Chapter 1. Sacred Words, Sacred Book......................................................5"Thus Spake Yahweh": What Is the Bible?...................................................7"Then the Lord Said": What Is the New Testament?..........................................17"Recite! in the Name of God": What Is the Quran?..........................................28Chapter 2. Book Shaping: The Making of a Canon............................................38From Biblia to Book: The Making of the Bible..............................................41The Making of a "New" Testament...........................................................51The "Old" and the "New" in the Covenant...................................................61The Collection of the Quran...............................................................67Chapter 3. Reciters, Rhapsodes, and Scribes: How the Bible Reached Us.....................80The Matter of Authorship..................................................................81The Higher Criticism of the Bible.........................................................83Composing and Performing..................................................................85The Scribes...............................................................................87From Recitation to Writing................................................................88Authors behind the Authors................................................................90Enter J, E, and Company...................................................................92The Writing Begins........................................................................94Jeremiah..................................................................................95Who "Wrote" the Books?....................................................................96Writing in Scripture......................................................................98The Levites...............................................................................100The Masoretes.............................................................................101Chapter 4. The Reporters: The Good News and How We Got It.................................105Jesus: The Setting........................................................................105The Gospels...............................................................................106Extracting Q..............................................................................107Dating the Gospels........................................................................108John......................................................................................109The Gospels as Documents..................................................................109From Aramaic to Greek.....................................................................110New Approaches............................................................................111Community Authorship......................................................................113Paul and the Rest.........................................................................114The Apocryphal Gospels....................................................................115Thomas and His Twin.......................................................................117Chapter 5. The Poet in Performance: The Composition of the Quran..........................120The Revelations...........................................................................120Biography and the Quran...................................................................122Approaching the Quran.....................................................................126The Cultural Environment..................................................................127Writing and the Quran.....................................................................128Writing in Arabia.........................................................................130Oral Poetry and the Quran.................................................................132Muhammad, Poet and Performer..............................................................133The Bible in the Quran....................................................................135The Mantic Seer...........................................................................137The Oral Performance......................................................................139A Change in Style.........................................................................140The Writing Down of the Quran.............................................................141Other Possibilities.......................................................................143Uthman or Later?..........................................................................147In Sum....................................................................................150Chapter 6. The Book in Mortal Hands.......................................................152The Word Made Flesh: Books and Bookmaking in the Ancient World............................152Scrolls and Books.........................................................................153Searching the Scriptures..................................................................155From Notebooks to Books...................................................................157The Christians Adopt the Codex............................................................159Toward a Standard Edition?................................................................160The Shape of the Page: Chapter and Verse..................................................164Dividing the Text.........................................................................164Marking the Text..........................................................................167Suras and Ayas............................................................................169The Sacramental Text......................................................................172Sefer Torah: Torahs and Their Arks........................................................174Washing Their Hands of the Christians.....................................................180A Matter of Etiquette: The Book in Our Hands..............................................182Chapter 7. In Other Words.................................................................189The Loss of God's Tongue..................................................................190Targums and Methurgemans..................................................................192Scripture for the Hellenized: The Septuagint..............................................195Origen: Multitasking the Bible............................................................198From Old Latin to the Vulgate.............................................................200Hebraica Veritas and the Latin West.......................................................203The Polyglot..............................................................................208Enter the Humanists.......................................................................210Translating the Untranslatable Quran......................................................214Chapter 8. Picturing the Word.............................................................219The Rabbis and the Second...