Reprint: “And They Shall Be Joined unto Thee”

Matthew L Bowen

Part of our book chapter reprint series, this article originally appeared in The Temple: Symbols, Sermons, and Settings, edited by Stephen D. Ricks and Jeffrey M. Bradshaw. For more information, go to https://interpreterfoundation.org/books/the-temple-symbols-sermons-and-settings/.

“In a study, David Calabro describes the divine handclasps that constitute one aspect of ancient Israelite covenant ritual. He additionally observes that the Hebrew verbs used to designate these handclasps were two verbs of contact: ʾḥz—“seize,” “grasp,” “hold on to,” or “take hold of”—and ḥzq, which in its causative stem means to “seize,” “grasp,” “keep hold of,” “lay hold [on],” or “catch hold on.” In this chapter, I will extend these observations to additional idioms and explore the ways in which several Hebrew verbs of interpersonal contact constitute terms of covenant entry or reentry, all in the context of the temple.”

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About the Interpreter Foundation Book Chapter Reprint Series

The purpose of this reprint series is to make individual chapters from books published by The Interpreter Foundation more accessible to readers. Although in some instances the formatting and pagination may have been changed, the content of this chapter, like others in this reprint series, is identical to what appeared in its original book publication. It has not been updated to incorporate research that has appeared subsequently nor to reflect the current practice of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to use the full name of the Church and to avoid terms such as “Mormon” and “LDS.”

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