Biblical Hebrew Forum

["L.M. Barre" <barre AT c-zone.net>]

Dear List,

In my arguments against a Maccabean dating of Psalm 2, I am advancing 
evidence from Ben Sira.  I am afraid that I was in error on one point and so 
wish to restate my argument.  On the dating of this work and its translation 
I quote from the introductory notes of the New Jerusalem Bible:

"In a Forward, vv 1-35, the grandson of the author tells how he translated 
the book when he went to settle in Egypt in the 38th years of King Euergetes, 
v 27.  This can only be Ptolemy VII Euergetes (170-117), and the date 
corresponds to 132 BC.  Ben Sira himself presumably lived and wrote some 
sixty years before his grandson, about 190-180 BC.  A passage in the book 
confirms this date: Ben Sira's eulogy of the High Priest Simon, 50:1-21 is 
based on personal reminiscence.  This was Simon II, who died shortly after 
200."

Since the grandson translator claims that his grandfather knew a tripartite 
division of Scripture, we have a terminus ad quem for the Law, the Prophets 
and "the others that followed them" (v. 1) also called "the other books" (v. 
25).  An internal examination of Ben Sira's books shows that of the Writings 
he knew Proverbs, Job, Qoheleth and the Psalter.  A look at the cross 
references to the Psalms provided by the editors of the New Jerusalem Bible 
lists allusions to the following Psalms: 22, 37, 145, 131, 41, 12, 40, 33, 
34, 139, 18, 104, 8, 147, 111, 51, 90, 141, 132, 19, 35, 7, 9, 31, 115, 1, 5, 
63, 79, 68, 110, 21, 22, 89, 147, 29, 96, 16, 120, 103, 88, 25, 26, 4.  
Clearly Ben Sira knew a completed Psalter, which of course would include 
Psalm 2.  Accordingly, Psalm 2 could not have been written during the 
Maccabean period.

If Ben Sira provides the ad quem for the existence of a tripartite scripture, 
we may look to for its ad quo from Ezra's Commonwealth, c. 400 BCE. Of Ezra 
we read that he "devoted himself to the study of the Law of Yahweh, to 
practicing  it and to teaching Israel its laws and customs" (7:10).  It is 
further stated that "This is a copy of the document which King Artaxerxes 
hand to Ezra, the priest-scribe, the scribe who was especially learned in the 
text of Yahweh's commandments and his laws relating to Israel: 'Artaxerxes, 
king of kings, to the priest Ezra, scribe of the Law of the God of heaven, 
perfect peace'" (7:11-12)  These data and others show that the process of 
canonization had began at least with Ezra, a process that produced the 
tripartite canon that Jesus Ben Sira knew no later than c. 200 BCE.  The 
midpoint between our ad quo and ad quem would be c. 300 BCE.  We also have 
the tradition that the LXX was commissioned around 250 BCE which seems 
entirely reasonable.  Ac!
cordingly, it is not possible to assign the composition of the most of our 
Old Testament to the third century or later.  Only an addition to the 
Writings can be permitted, such as the book of Daniel.  Internal evidence of 
the editing of smaller compositions that were incorporated into the 
Pentateuch, the Former Prophets, the Latter Prophets, the Proverbs, the 
Psalms and so on demand dating well into the pre-exilic period.  The 
contention of the Minimalists that the entire OT is post-exilic is, as I have 
said, impossible.  Thus, the fallacious "dichotomous data" methodology of the 
Minimalists has not surprisingly produced impossible results.

                                                    


L. M. Barre, Ph.D.

barre AT c-zone.net
www.angelfire.com/ca2/AncientIsrael