Dissertation project
The Hebrew Bible contains various representations of disabilities that contrast with its understanding of a normative model of human beings. The research will analyze the roles that the Biblical texts assign to God when they speak of disabilities and compare them to similar or contrasting views in the ancient Near Eastern religions. The focus is on the main literal representations of the deity: the punishing deity, the disabling deity, the protecting deity, the worshipped deity, and the disabled deity. The aim of the study is to deepen the understanding of the nexus between disability and religion in the ancient Near East.