Research Profile
Prof. Jonker’s research focuses mainly on three interests: (i) Intercultural Bible Reading: In this research, exposure to intercultural Bible reading is used to facilitate a move from multiculturality to interculturality in the South African society. (ii) Chronicles as “Reforming history”: The hermeneutical dynamics of reinterpretation that produced the Books of Chronicles in the Late Persian province of Yehud, are explored. This research rests on an interdisciplinary basis in which insights from text-pragmatical analysis, socio-cultural studies, social psychology (on identity formation), post-colonial criticism (on power relations in an imperium) and reception-theological studies (on contemporary interpretations) are utilized. (iii) Literature formation processes in the late Persian and early Hellenistic periods: This research focuses on the interaction among (inter alia) the developing Pentateuchal material (including the Deuteronomic, priestly and holiness materials), Chronicles, Ezra-Nehemiah, the Deuteronomistic history, and prophets like Ezechiel and Haggai.
Teaching Profile
Graduate teaching is done with a view to theological education for the ministry (in Protestant churches). He teaches courses in Pentateuch, on the Historical Books, Archaeology, and Hermeneutics in Old Testament studies. Postgraduate level students are free to pursue their own specific research interests within these wider areas.
Selected Publications
Josiah in the Chronicle’s Mirror: Late Stages of the Josiah Reception in II Chr 34f. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlag, 2003.
“The Rhetorics of Finding a New Identity in a Multi-Cultural and Multi-Religious Society,” in Verbum et Ecclesia 24 (2003): 396-416.
“The Cushites in the Chronicler’s Version of Asa’s Reign: A Secondary Audience in Chronicles?” in Old Testament Essays 19 (2006): 863-881.
“Reforming History: The Hermeneutical Significance of the Books of Chronicles,” in Vetus Testamentum 57 (2007).
“The Disappearing Ne–ushtan: The Chronicler’s Reinterpretation of Hezekiah’s Reformation Measures,” in I. Cornelius/L. C. Jonker, eds. Syro-Palistinian Religions and the Hebrew Bible. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2007.
From Adequate Biblical Interpretation to Transformative Intercultural Hermeneutics. Chronicling a Personal Journey, Intercultural Biblical Hermeneutics Series 3 (Elkhart: Institute of Mennonite Studies, 2015).
Defining All-Israel in Chronicles: Multi-Levelled Identity Negotiation in Late Persian Period Yehud, Forschungen zum Alten Testament I 106 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016).
“Chronicles and Judges: Any Relationship?,” in Jeremia, Deuteronomismus und Priesterschrift. Beiträge zur Literatur- und Theologiegeschichte des Alten Testaments. Festschrift für Hermann-Josef Stipp zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. Andreas Michel and Nicole K. Rüttgers, vol. 105, ATSAT (St. Ottilien: EOS Verlag, 2019), 179–200.
“Numbers and Chronicles: False Friends or Close Relatives?,” in Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel 8, no. 2 (2019): 332–77.
“Holiness and the Levites. Some Reflections on the Relationship between Chronicles and Pentateuchal Traditions,” in Eigensinn und Entstehung der hebräischen Bibel. Erhard Blum zum siebzigsten Geburtstag, ed. Joachim J. Krause, Wolfgang Oswald, and Kristin Weingart (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2020), 457–74.
“Melting Pots and Rejoinders? The Interplay among Literature Formation Processes during the Late Persian and Early Hellenistic Periods,” in Vetus Testamentum 70, no. 1 (2020): 42–54.
Contact
Theology Faculty
Stellenbosch University
171 Dorp Street
7600 Stellenbosch, South Africa
Fax: +27 21 808 3268
Email: lcj@sun.ac.za
Homepage: http://www.sun.ac.za/english/faculty/theology/Pages/ProfLJonker.aspx
