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<p>Unusually for the Hebrew Bible, the book of Jeremiah contains a high number of
references to writers, writing, and the written word. Written during the exilic period,
the book demonstrates a key moment in the ongoing integration of writing and the written
word into ancient Israelite society. Yet the book does not describe writing in the
abstract. Instead, it provides an account of its own textualization, thereby blurring
the line between the narrative and the audience that receives it and connecting the
text of Jeremiah to the words of the prophet and of YHWH. </p><p> To authenticate
the book of Jeremiah as the word of YHWH, its tradents present a theological account
of the chain of transmission from the divine to the prophet, and then to the scribe
and the written page. Indeed, the book of Jeremiah extends the chain of transmission
beyond the written word itself to include the book of Jeremiah and, finally, a receiving
audience. To make the case for this chain of transmission, this study attends in
each of three exegetical chapters to writers (including YHWH, prophets, and scribes),
the written word, and the receiving audience. The first exegetical chapter describes
the standard chain of transmission from the divine to the prophet to the scribe, demonstrating
that all three agents in this chain are imagined as writers and that writing was a
suitable conduit for the divine word. The narrative account of Jeremiah's textualization
is set forth, with special attention to the way in which the narrative points beyond
itself to the text of Jeremiah itself. The second exegetical chapter builds upon
this argument by attending to the written word in Jeremiah, pointing especially to
Jeremiah's self-references (e.g. "in this book," "all these words") as a pivotal element
in the extension of the chain of transmission beyond the words in the text to the
words of the text. Finally, the third exegetical chapter considers the construction
of the audience in the book of Jeremiah, concluding that the written word, as Jeremiah
imagines it, is to be received by a worshipping audience through a public reading.</p>
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