Laments and Penitential Prayers in Yehud: a social and literary development in Exilic e Post-Exilic Judahite community

• Grant number: 22/14356-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Master's degree
• Effective date (Start): March 10, 2023
• Effective date (End): June 09, 2023
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - History - Ancient and Medieval History
• Principal Investigator: Marcelo Aparecido Rede
• Grantee: Samuel de Barros Gandara
• Supervisor: Peter Dubovsky
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Research place: Pontificio Istituto Biblico, Italy
• Associated to the scholarship: 21/13962-1 - Jerusalem, resilient city: remembering and rebuilding in exilic and post-exilic narratives, BP.MS

Abstract

This research project investigates the development of laments into penitential prayers during the end of the Neo-Babylonian Period to the end Late Persian Period in the province of Yehud. The historical experiences of destruction were incorporated into the literary corpus of Lamentations and of Ezra-Nehemiah by a process of trauma and memory. The biblical authors elaborated the social experience from destroyed spaces and transformed the way Judeans identified themselves with the city of Jerusalem. For this, I will analyze the biblical evidence in Lamentations, Ezra 7-10, Nehemiah 1, and Nehemiah 8-10. I aim to demonstrate that Ezra-Nehemiah and Lamentations are closely related, not only as a historical development of a literary genre, but especially because these books privilege the spatial relation of the Judean community within the city of Jerusalem