Thesis Posted

I am making my recently defended master’s thesis available in PDF format at this link. The title and an abbreviated abstract are below.

“You Will Be Like the Gods”: The Conceptualization of Deity in the Hebrew Bible in Cognitive Perspective

This thesis has two primary goals: (1) to analyze the contours and extent of the generic category of deity in the Hebrew Bible, and (2) to propose a semantic base for the term. It begins with a description of the fields associated with cognitive theory, and particularly cognitive linguistics. Chapter 2 examines the cognitive origins of notions of deity and discusses how this heritage is reflected within the biblical texts. The third chapter examines the conceptualization of Israel’s prototypical deity, YHWH, beginning from the earliest divine profiles detectable within the text. In Chapter 4 the discussion returns to the generic notion of deity, highlighting references within the biblical text to deities other than YHWH. The conclusion synthesizes the different sections of the thesis, sketching the origins and development of the Hebrew Bible’s representation of both prototypical and non-prototypical notions of deity. Implications for further research are then briefly discussed.

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Master’s Thesis Online

I’ve put a PDF of my Oxford master’s thesis, “Anti-Anthropomorphism and the Vorlage of LXX Exodus,” online (here). I’d like to revise and publish it in the future, so I’d love to hear whatever feedback y’all have to offer.