Biblical scholarship today is divided between two mutually exclusive concepts of the emergence of monotheism: an early-monotheistic Yahwism paradigm and a native-pantheon paradigm. This study identifies five main stages on Israel's journey towards monotheism. Rather than deciding whether Yahweh was originally a god of the Baal-type or of the El-type, this work shuns origins and focuses instead on the first period for which there are abundant sources, the Omride era. Non-biblical sources depict a significantly different situation from the Baalism the Elijah cycle ascribes to King Achab. The novelty of the present study is to take this paradox seriously and identify the Omride dynasty as the first stage in the rise of Yahweh as the main god of Israel. Why Jerusalem later painted the Omrides as anti-Yahweh idolaters is then explained as the need to distance itself from the near-by sanctuary of Bethel by assuming the Omride heritage without admitting its northern Israelite origins. The contribution of the Priestly document and of Deutero-Isaiah during the Persian era comprise the next phase, before the strict Yahwism achieved in Daniel 7 completes the emergence of biblical Yahwism as a truly monotheistic religion.

The book of Hosea is a labyrinth of juxtaposed images for God and God’s people, with such disparate metaphors as God the devouring lion and God the reviving dew. In Hosea’s God: A Metaphorical Theology, Mason D. Lancaster demonstrates that recent advances in metaphor theory help untangle these divergent portrayals of God. He analyzes fifteen metaphor clusters in Hosea 4–14 individually, then discerns patterns and reversals between the clusters. Finally, respecting the ancient value for emphasizing individual aspects of a depiction over a homogenized picture of the whole, the book identifies five characteristics of God prominent among the metaphors of Hosea. Based on this analysis, Lancaster asserts that Hosea’s metaphorical depiction of Yahweh ultimately derives from the primacy of Yahweh’s fidelity to Israel.

The Old Testament is no ordinary text; it is a revelation of God’s will, character, purpose, and plan, inspired by the Spirit of God. That same Spirit continues to work within God’s people today as they read the Bible, even when the meaning is difficult to discern. In The Law, the Prophets, and the Writings, eighteen evangelical scholars analyze the Old Testament through a historical, literary, and theological hermeneutic, providing new insights into the meaning of the Scriptures. This festschrift in honor of Duane A. Garrett seeks to help Christians faithfully read and understand the Old Testament Scriptures.

In this history of the development of monotheism, the author explains how Israel's religion evolved from a cult of Yahweh as a primary deity among many to a fully defined monotheism with Yahweh as sole god. Repudiating the traditional scholarly premise that Israel was fundamentally different in culture and religion from its Canaanite neighbors, he shows that the two cultures were fundamentally similar.

This study explores the four narratives regarding prophetic conflicts in the Deuteronomistic History via three steps: first, examining the narratives with a synchronic approach; second, discussing the date of the narratives as revised by the Deuteronomists in the Persian period; last, considering religious settings and rhetorical purposes of the narratives. The Deuteronomists were more interested in the theological questions of the "true Israel," "true YHWH," and the "true worship place" than the prophetic conflicts. The conflicts reflect the difficulty to distinguish between true and false prophecy, and the Deuteronomists sought to answer their questions by using the conflict narratives. Their answers aimed for the postexilic community to protect their ethnic identity and to worship YHWH alone, exclusively in Jerusalem.

According to the Bible, ancient Israel's neighbors worshipped a wide variety of gods. In recent years, scholars have sought a better understanding of this early polytheistic milieu and its relation to Yahweh, the God of Israel. Drawing on ancient Ugaritic texts and looking closely at Ugaritic deities, Mark Smith examines the meaning of "divinity" in the ancient near East and considers how this concept applies to Yahweh.

Yahweh is the proper name of the biblical God. His early character is central to understanding the foundations of Jewish, Christian, and Islamic monotheism. As a deity, the name appears only in connection with the peoples of the Hebrew Bible, but long before Israel, the name is found in an Egyptian list as one group in the land of tent-dwellers, the Shasu. This is the starting-point for Daniel E. Fleming's sharply new approach to the god Yahweh. In his analysis, the Bible's 'people of Yahweh' serve as a clue to how one of the Bronze Age herding peoples of the inland Levant gave its name to a deity, initially outside of any relationship to Israel. For 150 years, the dominant paradigm for Yahweh's origin has envisioned borrowing from peoples of the desert south of Israel. Fleming argues in contrast that Yahweh was not taken from outsiders. Rather, this divine name is evidence for the diverse background of Israel itself.