A comprehensive analysis of the ritual dimensions of biblical mourning rites, this book also seeks to illuminate mourning's social dimensions through engagement with anthropological discussion of mourning, from Hertz and van Gennep to contemporaries such as Metcalf and Huntington and Bloch and Parry. Olyan presents us with a clear and convincing phenomenology of biblical mourning rites. The book is lucidly written and organized, the evidence is judiciously interpreted, and the argument is easily followed. It is a joy to read.