This article compares the history of scholarship on violence in anthropology in the past one hundred years to major approaches to studying violence in the ancient Near East and ancient Near Eastern sources, including ancient Israel and Israelite literature. The article demonstrates that anthropology and ancient Near Eastern studies have diverged widely in their approaches to violence. In the past two to three decades, the concept of structural violence and new materialist approaches have dominated the study of violence in anthropology, while in Assyriology and the study of ancient Israel/Israelite literature, studies of violence have repeatedly turned to an order and chaos framework. The article ends by suggesting that scholars of ancient West Asia incorporate new materialist approaches more concertedly in studies of violence and either rethink or jettison the simplistic order/chaos dyad.
AndersonC.B.2016 ‘Biblical Interpretation as Violence: Genesis 19 and Judges 19 in the Context of HIV and AIDS’, in ScholzS.AndiñachP.R. (eds.), La Violencia and the Hebrew Bible: The Politics and Histories of Biblical Hermeneutics on the American Continent (Semeia, 82; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature Press) 121-36.
2.
ArmstrongK.2014Fields of Blood: Religion and the History of Violence (New York: Anchor).
3.
AsadTalal (ed.) 1973Anthropology and the Colonial Encounter (New York: Humanity Books).
4.
BahraniZ.2008Rituals of War: The Body and Violence in Mesopotamia (New York: Zone Books).
5.
BallentineD.2015a ‘What Ends Might Ritual Violence Accomplish? The Case of Rechab and Baanah in 2 Samuel 4’, in OlyanS.M. (ed.), Ritual Violence in the Hebrew Bible: New Perspectives (New York: Oxford University Press) 9-26.
6.
BallentineD.2015b The Conflict Myth in the Biblical Tradition (New York: Oxford University Press).
7.
BattoB.1992Slaying the Dragon: Mythmaking in the Biblical Tradition (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox).
8.
BattoB.2017 ‘The Combat Myth in Israelite Tradition Revisited’, in ScurlockJ.BealR.H. (eds.), Creation and Chaos: A Reconsideration of Hermann Gunkel’s Chaoskampf Hypothesis (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns) 217-36.
9.
BlythC.ColganE.EdwardsK.B. (eds.) 2018Rape Culture, Gender Violence, and Religion: Biblical Perspectives (New York: Palgrave).
10.
BoerR.2015The Sacred Economy of Ancient Israel (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox).
11.
BourdieuP.1977Outline of a Theory of Practice (trans. NiceR.; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [orig. 1972]).
12.
BourgoisP.2009 ‘Recognizing Invisible Violence: A Thirty-Year Ethnographic Retrospective’, in Rylko-BauerB.WhitefordL.FarmerP. (eds.), Global Health in Times of Violence (Santa Fe, NM: School for Advanced Research Press) 17-40.
13.
CésaireA.1955Discours sur le colonialisme (Paris: Présence Africaine).
14.
ChapmanC.R.2004The Gendered Language of Warfare in the Israelite-Assyrian Encounter (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns).
15.
ClaasensL.J.M.2016Reclaiming Her Dignity: Female Resistance in the Old Testament (Collegeville, MN: Michael Glazier).
16.
CooleD.FrostS. (eds.) 2010New Materialism: Ontology, Agency, Politics (Durham, NC: Duke University Press).
17.
CrouchC.2009War and Ethics in the Ancient Near East: Military Violence in Light of Cosmology and History (Berlin: de Gruyter).
18.
DandamaevM.A.1984Slavery in Babylonia: From Nabopolassar to Alexander The Great (626–331 B C) (trans. PowellV.A.; ed. PowellM.A.WeisbergD.B.; DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press [orig. 1974]).
19.
DiakonoffI.1982 ‘The Structure of Near Eastern Society before the Middle of the 2nd Millennium B.C.’, Oikumene3: 7-100.
20.
DolphijnR.van der TuinI.2012New Materialism: Interviews and Cartographies (Ann Arbor, MI: Open Humanities Press).
21.
DouglasM.1966Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul).
22.
DouglasM.1970Natural Symbols: Explorations in Cosmology (New York: Pantheon).
23.
EliadeM.1959The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion (trans. TraskWillard R.; New York: Harcourt).
24.
FanonF.1952Peau noire, Masques blancs (Paris: Éditions du Seuil).
25.
FanonF.1961Les Damnés de la Terre (Paris: Maspero).
26.
FarmerP.2004 ‘An Anthropology of Structural Violence’, Current Anthropology45.3: 305-25.
27.
FarmerP.2010Partner to the Poor: A Paul Farmer Reader (ed. SaussyHaun; Berkeley: University of California Press).
28.
FoucaultM.1977Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison (trans. SheridanA.; New York: Pantheon [orig. 1975]).
29.
FoxN.J.AlldredP.2017Sociology and the New Materialism: Theory, Research, Action (Los Angeles: Sage).
30.
GaltungJ.1969 ‘Violence, Peace, and Peace Research’, Journal of Peace Research6: 167-91.
31.
Garcia-VenturaA. forthcoming ‘Entre la asiriología y la historia de las religiones: acerca de la influencia de Mircea Eliade en el pensamiento de Yvonne Rosengarten’, in Gil FuensantaJ.Martin MederosA. (eds.), Orientalistica en tiempos dificiles. Actas del 7 Congreso Nacional del CEPO, celebrado en la UAM del 12 al 16 de Diciembre de 2016 (Madrid: Cepo/Librería Tipo).
32.
GodelierM.1986The Making of Great Men: Male Domination and Power among the New Guinea Baruya (trans. R. Swyer; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press [orig. 1982]).
33.
GunkelH.2006Creation and Chaos in the Primeval Era and the Eschaton: A Religio-historical Study of Genesis 1 and Revelation 12 (trans. WhitneyK.W.Jr.; Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans [orig. 1895]).
34.
HeinzM.2007 ‘Sargon of Akkad: Rebel and Usurper in Kish’, in HeinzM.FeldmanM.H. (eds.), Representations of Political Power: Case Histories from Times of Change and Dissolving Order in the Ancient Near East (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns) 67-88.
35.
IadicolaP.ShupeA.2013Violence, Inequality, and Human Freedom (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 3rd edn [orig. 2003]).
36.
KalyvasS.N.ShapiroI.MasoudT. (eds.) 2008Order, Conflict, and Violence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
37.
KelleB.E.2014 ‘Post-War Rituals of Return and Reintegration of Warriors’, in KelleB.E.AmesF.R.WrightJ.L. (eds.), Warfare, Ritual, and Symbol in Biblical and Modern Contexts (SBL Ancient Israel and Its Literature, 28; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature Press) 205-42.
38.
KelleB.E.2015 ‘Moral Injury and the Interdisciplinary Study of Biblical War Texts: The Case of King Saul’, in LemosT.M.CollinsJ.J.OlyanS.M. (eds.), Worship, Women, and War: Essays in Honor of Susan Niditch (Brown University Judaic Studies, 357; Providence, RI: Brown University) 147-72.
39.
KelleB.E.2020The Bible and Moral Injury: Reading Scripture alongside War’s Unseen Wounds (Nashville: Abingdon).
40.
KesslerG.2019 ‘Teaching Rape, Slavery, and Genocide in Bible and Culture’, in GraybillR.MinisterM.LawrenceB. (eds.), Rape Culture and Religious Studies: Critical and Pedagogical Engagements (London: Lexington) 55-72.
41.
KidderT.SaussyH. (eds.) 2010Partner to the Poor: A Paul Farmer Reader (Berkeley: University of California).
42.
LambekM.StrathernA.1998 ‘Introduction: Embodying Sociality: Africanist-Melanesianist Comparisons’, in LambekM.StrathernA. (eds.), Bodies and Persons: Comparative Perspectives from Africa and Melanesia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) 1-28.
43.
LemosT.M.2015 ‘Dispossessing Nations: Population Growth, Scarcity, and Genocide in Ancient Israel and Twentieth-century Rwanda’, in OlyanS.M. (ed.), Ritual Violence in the Hebrew Bible: New Perspectives (New York: Oxford University Press) 27-66.
44.
LemosT.M.2017Violence and Personhood in Ancient Israel and Comparative Contexts (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
Lévi-StraussC.1963Structural Anthropology (trans. JacobsonC.SchoepfB.G.; New York: Basic [orig. 1958])
47.
LiveraniM.1979 ‘The Ideology of the Assyrian Empire’, in LarsenM.T. (ed.), Power and Propaganda: A Symposium on Ancient Empires (Copenhagen: Akademisk Forlag) 297-318.
48.
LiveraniM.2014The Ancient Near East: History, Society, and Economy (trans. TabatabaiSoraia; London: Routledge [orig. 1988]).
49.
ManderP.1998 ‘60 Anni di “Cosmologia e alchimia babilonesi”’, in ArcellaL.PisiP.ScagnoR. (eds.), Confronto con Mircea Eliade: architipi mitici e identità storica (Milan: Jaca) 219-38.
50.
ManderP.2014 ‘L’Assiriologia ed Eliade’, in CasadioG.ManderP. (eds.), Le Forme della Tradizione e del Sacro (Rome: Edizioni Mediterranee) 67-81.
51.
ManderP.2016 ‘War in Mesopotamian Culture’, in UlanowskiK. (ed.), The Religious Aspects of War in the Ancient Near East, Greece, and Rome (Leiden: Brill) 5-22.
52.
MemmiA.1965The Colonizer and the Colonized (trans. H. Greenfield; New York: Orion [French orig. 1957]).
53.
NoegelS.2007 ‘Dismemberment, Creation, and Ritual: Images of Divine Violence in the Ancient Near East’, in WellmanJ. (ed.), Belief and Bloodshed: Religion and Violence across Time and Tradition (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield) 13-28.
54.
NoegelS.2016 ‘Corpses, Cannibals, and Commensality: A Literary and Artistic Shaming Convention in the Ancient Near East’, Journal of Religion and Violence4.3: 255-303.
55.
OlyanS.M. (ed.) 2012 ‘Theorizing Violence in Biblical Ritual Contexts: The Case of Mourning Rites’, in OlyanS.M. (ed.), Social Theory and the Study of Israelite Religion: Essays in Retrospect and Prospect (Resources for Biblical Study; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature) 169-80.
56.
OlyanS.M. (ed.) 2015Ritual Violence in the Hebrew Bible: New Perspectives (New York: Oxford University Press).
57.
OrtnerS.B.WhiteheadH. (eds.) 1981Sexual Meanings: The Cultural Construction of Gender and Sexuality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).
58.
PelsP.SaleminkO. (eds.) 1999Colonial Subjects: Essays on the Practical History of Anthropology (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press).
59.
PennerT.2016 ‘La Violencia and the Return of the Monstrous: A Response’, in ScholzSusanneAndiñachPablo R. (eds.), La Violencia and the Hebrew Bible: The Politics and Histories of Biblical Hermeneutics on the American Continent (Semeia, 82; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature Press) 237-48.
60.
Pongratz-LeistenB.2015Religion and Ideology in Assyria (Berlin: de Gruyter).
61.
Ramírez-KiddJ.E.2016 ‘The Culture of Fear: About Internalized Violence in Ancient Near Eastern and Biblical Literatures’, in ScholzS.AndiñachP.R. (eds.), La Violencia and the Hebrew Bible: The Politics and Histories of Biblical Hermeneutics on the American Continent (Semeia, 82; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature Press) 83-104.
62.
RichesD. (ed.) 1986 ‘The Phenomenon of Violence’, in RichesD. (ed.), The Anthropology of Violence (Oxford: Basil Blackwell) 1-27.
63.
RichesD. (ed.) 1991 ‘Aggression, War, Violence: Space/Time and Paradigm’, Man26:2: 281-98.
64.
RiegerJ.WaggonerE.2016Religious Experience and New Materialism: Movement Matters (New York: Palgrave).
65.
Rylko-BauerB.FarmerP.2016 ‘Structural Violence, Poverty, and Social Suffering’, in BradyD.BurtonL.M. (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of the Social Science of Poverty (Oxford: Oxford University Press) 47-74.
66.
Scheper-HughesN.1992Death without Weeping: The Violence of Everyday Life in Brazil (Berkeley: University of California Press).
67.
Scheper-HughesN.2004 ‘Ishi’s Brain, Ishi’s Ashes: Anthropology and Genocide’, in Scheper-HughesN.BourgoisP. (eds.), Violence in War and Peace: An Anthology (Malden, MA: Blackwell) 61-68.
68.
Scheper-HughesN.BourgoisP. (eds.) 2004 ‘Introduction: Making Sense of Violence’, in Scheper-HughesN.BourgoisP. (eds.), Violence in War and Peace: An Anthology (Malden, MA: Blackwell) 1-32.
69.
ScurlockJ.BealR.H. (eds.) 2013Creation and Chaos: A Reconsideration of Hermann Gunkel’s Chaoskampf Hypothesis (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns).
70.
SkerratL.2018 ‘For Precious Girls Everywhere: HIV, Lamentations, and Precious’, in BlythC.ColganE.EdwardsK.B. (eds.), Rape Culture, Gender Violence, and Religion: Biblical Perspectives (New York: Palgrave) 13-30.
71.
SternP.D.1991The Biblical Herem: A Window on Israel’s Religious Experience (Atlanta: Scholars Press).
72.
StrathernA.LambekM. (eds.) 1998 ‘Introduction: Embodying Sociality: Africanist-Melanesianist Comparisons’, in LambekM.StrathernA. (eds.), Bodies and Persons: Comparative Perspectives from Africa and Melanesia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) 1-28.
