The Bible in Review

The Old Testament and Related Topics

Leslie J. Hoppe, OFM

Debra Band and Menachem Fisch, Qohelet: Searching for a Life Worth Living.

Waco, TX: Baylor University Press (www.baylorpress.com), 2023. Pages, 208.

Hardcover, $59.99.

Some people find the book of Qohelet(h) [Ecclesiastes] engaging, refreshing, and stimulating. Others find it depressing and frustrating, wondering what it is doing in the Bible. Readers belonging to the second category will find that the work of Band and Fisch leads them to give Qohelet another chance. The authors collaborate in producing a book that offers a fresh look at Qohelet along with a stunningly beautiful illuminated text of Qohelet in both Hebrew and English. The illuminations are the work of Debra Band, an American artist who specializes in illuminating ancient texts. Menachem Fisch, an Israeli philosopher, offers a fresh commentary approach to the book of Qohelet. Rather than seeing the book as a statement of the futility of life, Fisch asserts that Qohelet recognizes human limitations but does not call for abandoning hope. Qohelet suggests that people ought to live life as fully and joyfully as possible, given the limitations of human existence. The volume Band and Fisch have produced is both visually beautiful and intellectually stimu­ lating. Its illustrations are reproduced in full color on thick stock. The cost of the volume is reasonable, given the quality publication that it is.

Richard J. Barry IV, Jewish Temple Theology and the Mystery of the Cross: Atonement and the Two Goats of Yom Kippur. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press (www.cuapress.org), 2024. Pages, 450.

Hardcover, $75.

How best to understand and explain what Jesus accomplished by his death on the cross: that is the task of the theological subdiscipline of soteriology (the study of salvation). Barry chooses to offer his understanding of Jesus' salvific work by examining biblical and later Jewish thought about Yorn Kippur (the Day of Atone-

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