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This is the second of five chapters on the Old Testament and the reader, and presents an analysis of the Bible in Qumran (the site occupied by the early Jewish monastic community who lived near the shores of the Dead Sea) and early Judaism. The first part gives an account of the rediscovery of Midrash—a term initially borrowed from rabbinic literature, where it denotes the specifically rabbinic tradition of Bible exegesis—the commentary created in dialogue with the scared Scripture in early Judaism. The rediscovery of Midrash was prompted in particular by the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls (1947–1956), and the finding of the Codex Neofiti 1 in the Vatican library in 1953; these and other examples of Midrash have given rise to numerous monographs and articles over the last thirty years of the twentieth century. The second part discusses the use of the Scripture and the Dead Sea sect of Qumran, and the third analyses the use of Scripture among other Jewish rabbinical groups in late antiquity. The last two sections look at the Scripture in the Alexandrian schools and among the early Christians, and at the emergence of Judaism and Christianity as ‘Religions of the Book’.

This is the third of five chapters on the Old Testament and the reader, and discusses canonical criticism and Old Testament theology. Canonical criticism can be understood as a relatively recent proposal for reordering exegetical priorities, while Old Testament theology is usually seen as a summarizing discipline as old as modernity itself. The two areas of research could be treated separately but the juxtaposition is instructive: both are in some sense orientated towards the readers of biblical texts, both have been charged with under‐valuing historical research, both are involved in seemingly intractable arguments about the relationship between descriptive and normative claims in biblical studies, and both are implicated in debates about the role of biblical research within the larger religious traditions of Christianity and Judaism. The discussion in this chapter highlights only the most important issues addressed in these overlapping programmes of research setting out to provide only an orientation to the key issues in current research. The chapter is arranged in three sections: Canonical criticism; Old Testament theology and readers’ commitments; and Biblical studies and theology.

The novels of three female Victorian novelists are compared in this chapter: George Eliot’s Adam Bede; Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South; and Margaret Oliphant’s Kirsteen. From different religious perspectives (agnosticism, Unitarianism, and a broad orthodoxy) each connects to the Prodigal Son in different ways as they seek to explore the conflict in their characters between family responsibilities and the drive for independence. The role of the Bible, and of parables in particular, in each novel is discussed, before the identification of characters with figures in the parable of the Prodigal Son is compared. It is argued that each novelist reads the motivation behind the Prodigal’s leaving differently, and raises the question of whether or not his departure was justified.