Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period

When the Persian Empire held sway over the whole ancient Near East, the small province of Judah lived through the fifth and early fourth centuries BCE under its rule. These papers come from the working group that met at the University of Heidelberg in July 2003 to examine that land and its people, gathering scholars such as Joseph Blenkinsopp, Lester Grabbe, Sara Japhet, Gary Knoppers, André Lemaire, David Ussishkin, Ephraim Stern and Oded Lipschits himself.

The Heidelberg meeting was the second of three. The first, at Tel Aviv in 2001, produced Judah and the Judeans in the Neo-Babylonian Period, and a third, on the Hellenistic era, followed at Münster in 2005. Together they trace Judah across successive empires. This is a substantial scholarly reference for students and researchers of the Hebrew Bible, ancient Israel and the Persian world.