This commemorative publication for the Old Testament scholar Herbert Niehr (Tubingen) brings together 23 contributions that deal with the texts of the Old Testament from an exegetical or religious-historical perspective, as well as contributions that go "beyond the Old Testament" and examine the West Semitic cultural area philologically, iconographically and archaeologically and take a look at the so-called "environment of the Old Testament". This takes into account Herbert Niehr's broad professional focus, whose research focuses on philology, history, literary history and religious history of ancient West Semitic cultures.