GUD ÄR ETT VERB: TANKAR OM GAMLA TESTAMENTET OCH DESS IDÉHISTORIA

("GOD, THE VERB: MUSINGS ON THE OLD TESTAMENT AND ITS HISTORY OF IDEAS")

A collection of essays on the historical-critical study of the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible, serving both as a sort of popular introduction to the field and as a set of thoughts on specific issues, such as views of history in HB, the relationship to the greater Ancient Near Eastern milieu, views of prophecy from The First Isaiah to Aleister Crowley, historical exegesis of the Hebrew divine name, etc. Oh, and it has Hittite and Akkadian, too.

I DÖDA SPRÅKS SÄLLSKAP: EN BOK OM VÄLDIGT GAMLA SPRÅK (2006, later published as a paperback)

("DEAD LANGUAGES' SOCIETY/IN THE COMPANY OF DEAD LANGUGES: A BOOK ON VERY OLD LANGUAGES")

This book was my major breakthrough, as it were. It is a popular introduction to the study of ancient languages, and, specifically, to eleven of them. It includes chapters on, among others, Akkadian, Hittite, Classical Hebrew, Gothic, Old English, Sumerian, Old Persian, Oscan, and Etruscan. The book was highly successful and was shortlisted for the August Prize, one of Sweden's most prestigious literary awards. It was published in Norway in 2009.

ORDEN OCH EVIGHETEN: TANKAR OM SPRÅK, RELIGION OCH HUMANIORA (2010)

("WORDS AND ETERNITY: THOUGHTS ON LANGUAGE, RELIGION AND HUMANITIES"

A popular-style essay collection on matters linguistic, religio-historical and exegetical, partly based on text published in various magazines and journals. The essays discuss the role of classical humanities in today's society, the Hurrian language, Japanese video gaming, pseudoscholarly ideas about Mesopotamia, and much more.

KANAANEISKA MYTER OCH LEGENDER (2003)

My translation – the first ever into Swedish – of the major epics and myths from Ugarit in Bronze Age Syria. The Ugaritic language is my speciality, and this was my first major published work, which saw the light of day when I was 21 years old.  The stories cover the adventures of the god Baal and his friends, his struggles against the gods of Sea and Death, but also of his sister, the violent goddess Anat and various human heroes (and not-so-heroic characters). The volume contains copious linguistic and religio-historical comments, as well as introductory essays.

DE KALDEISKA ORAKLEN (2008)

My Swedish translation from Ancient Greek of the extant fragments of the so-called Chaldean Oracles, a collection of fragments of a Hellenistic mystery-poem from what has been referred to the "Underworld of Platonism", the sort of intellectual milieu that gave rise to Hermetic and Gnostic speculation, but here from an unabashedly non-Christian perspective. The fragments became classics in the esoteric movements of later years, and grant a view into a poetic and bewildering form of theurgical mysticism.

ENUMA ELISH: DET BABYLONISKA SKAPELSEEPOSET (2005)

The Babylonian so-called creation epic Enuma Elish ("When on high"), which I translated from Akkadian into Swedish; the story tells of the Babylonian national god Marduk and his exploits, defeating the "chaos mother" of the god, Tiamat, and building the world (and, not least, Babylon). The epic is to a large extent a specimen of Babylonian nationalism, and ends with the other gods majestically proclaiming the fifty names of Marduk, de facto declaring him to be the greatest of all gods.