Edition of the commentary on the Psalms by Gottfried Quell (1896–1976)

The unpublished estate of Gottfried Quell (1896–1976), a professor of Old Testament studies who taught at the universities of Leipzig, Rostock, and Berlin, includes a commentary on the biblical Psalms comprising over 1,000 typewritten pages. The typescript was compiled by Helgalinde Staudigel (1919–2007), Gottfried Quell's long-time assistant and Hebrew teacher at the Faculty of Theology at Humboldt University in Berlin, on the basis of handwritten notes. Quell had worked throughout his life on a commentary on the Psalms, which was to be published in the series Kommentar zum Alten Testament (Gütersloher Verlagshaus). This never came to fruition. A review of the typescript shows that publication would be very worthwhile both in terms of the history of psalm research, as Quell was very critical of Hermann Gunkel's (1862–1932) and Sigmund Mowickel (1884–1965), and also in terms of theological exegesis, as Quell urgently pursues the understanding of God and religious experience in the individual psalms. The project now aims to produce the first edition and contextualize Gottfried Quell's commentary on the Psalms in terms of research history.