This selection of proceedings from the twenty-seventh International Congress of Byzantine Studies (Belgrade, 2017) offers a variety of approaches to the study of the Bible in Byzantium, written in German and English. The Bible, Claudia Rapp writes, was a text which saturated medieval Greek culture and thus can be found “articulated in all aspects of Byzantine society” (7). Naturally, such an exploration begins in the study of the “churchly” Bible (liturgy and homiletics), but the great value of this collection is its expansion of the categories of biblical experience. How the Bible “was brought to life on a daily basis” (10) in its Byzantine context proves, in these essays, to be a remarkable and intriguing story.

Alexandra-Kyriaki Wassiliou-Seibt and Pinar Serdar Dincer both explore the materiality of the biblical experience in Byzantium by means of lead seals and illuminated manuscripts, respectively. Karl Klimmeck offers thoughts on the Byzantine text of the New Testament and modern attempts to produce an intra-Orthodox translation. Andreas Külzer explores the use of biblical motifs in later medieval pilgrimage accounts, while the contribution of Eirini Afentoulidou highlights the use of the Bible in public spectacle—turning the Byzantine pulpit into the judgment seat of God. Johannes Koder writes on the contest for a “biblischer Glaubeninshalte” sparked by the emergence of Islam. Enrst Gamillscheg discusses medieval use of biblical catenae, highlighting the practical aspect of the dependence of later generations on patristic interpretation.

Most fascinating are two essays concerning the Bible and Byzantine military affairs. Meredith Riedel highlights the very clever and often apposite uses which the Emperor Leo VI applied to scripture in the crafting of his manual of war, the Taktika. For his part, Yannis Stouraitis offers a forceful and eloquent critique of the concept of “holy war” in Byzantine historiography in what seems, to this reviewer, to be the most compelling contribution.