New JPS Book Explores the Book of Genesis as Family Psychology: Understanding Biblical Family Dynamics as Case Studies in Trauma, Growth, and Transformation

Philadelphia, June 2026 – The Jewish Publication Society is proud to announce the publication of God and the First Families: Parenting, Trauma, and Healing in the Book of Genesis by Stephen Spector.

God and the First Families offers a novel exploration of God’s role as a parent in the book of Genesis. Compellingly, author Stephen Spector introduces Americans’ four main perceptions of God and their four most common styles of parenting as lenses through which we can reckon with God’s own methods of parenting in the first biblical book.

God begins as an authoritarian parent who demands obedience and submission to authority, but shifts in striking ways. Next, God’s parenting seems entirely benevolent. Stunningly, God reverts to authoritarianism during the near sacrifice of Isaac—but then invents a new parenting style focused on guiding the characters’ moral and emotional growth. Many psychologists consider this the most successful childrearing method. Genesis reached that conclusion two and a half millennia ago!

Throughout, Spector engages with familiar stories—sibling rivalries, family ruptures, traumas—from unexpected angles. He dramatizes how parental love in Genesis builds resilience against trauma, another idea validated by modern psychology. Surviving trauma, healing from parental favoritism, repairing broken relationships, earning forgiveness, possibly even reconciling after injury—Genesis offers wisdom on all.

“This wise, compassionate, learned guide to trauma and love in Genesis enables us to better understand both the biblical book and the dynamics in our own fractured families.”—Rabbi David Wolpe, author of Teaching Your Children About God

“Keen observer Stephen Spector brings a wealth of learning and original insight to this lively rereading of familiar family stories. Readers will gain greater appreciation of the wounds and blessings that come with being part of a family—and useful tips on how to cope and heal.”—Arnold M. Eisen, chancellor emeritus of the Jewish Theological Seminary

“For those wishing to bring their contemporary understandings of God into line with biblical depictions of the divine, the interpretive strategy employed in the book will provide significant food for thought.”—Danna Nolan Fewell, editor of The Oxford Handbook of Biblical Narrative

Dr. Spector is available for media interviews and book talks. The book is available to order at https://jps.org/books/god-and-the-first-families/.

About the author:

Stephen Spector is an award-winning professor emeritus of English at Stony Brook University. He has taught the Bible to undergraduate and graduate students for fifty years. Spector was a visiting scholar at Hebrew University and a senior research fellow at the National Humanities Center and the Wesleyan Center for Humanities. He is the author of Operation Solomon: The Daring Rescue of the Ethiopian Jews and Evangelicals and Israel: The Story of American Christian Zionism, among other volumes.

About JPS:

The Jewish Publication Society (JPS) is a leading nonprofit publisher of works on Jewish thought. Since 1888, our mission has been to produce rigorous, inspiring Jewish books from scholars and writers across denominations, and to make that scholarship accessible to readers around the world.

Contact:

Deena Schoenfeld, Director of Marketing and Communications The Jewish Publication Society

dschoenfeld@jps.org

jps.org

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