From Biblical Theology to Biblical Criticism: Old Testament Scholarship at Uppsala University, 1866-1922

REBECCA G. S. IDESTROM, From Biblical Theology to Biblical Criticism: Old Testament Scholarship at Uppsala University, 1866-1922 (ConBOT 47; Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 2000). Pp. xv + 250. Paper SEK 238.

The interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Sweden has long been considered of minimal interest in comparison with influences emanating from the larger European countries. There were only two institutions in Sweden that offered doctoral level studies in theology, and much of the scholarship written was in a language inaccessible to most historians of biblical exegesis. With the publication of the present volume, that has changed. Limiting her data to Uppsala University, Idestrom presents an analysis of seventy-six years of research and politics there; but she also traces the history of the incursion of German ideas of biblical scholarship into Sweden. She concentrates on five main actors in the drama: 0....