Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Jonathan Bailey <jonathan.bailey AT gmx.de>]

---------- Original Message ----------

>Dear Jonathan,
>What do you do with Gen. 36 31,  "And these are the kings that reigned
>in Edom before there reigned a king of/over Israel"? Even Rashi
>attributed this king-list to the time of King Jehoshafat, leading Ibn
>Ezra to proclaim that his book should be burned. What do you do with all
>the other verses indicating late authorship of the Pentateuch?

Gen 36,31 is a matter of interpretation. I interpret the verse as Moses 
basically saying
"Edomites have already had a slew of Kings, and we haven't even had one yet."

Now remember, this is after Jacob had gotten the birthright, yet there had 
already
been a slew of Edomite kings, and none for Israel. The theme is that the 
temporal
things of the world get their glory first, but only for a while, while the 
things of God
have to wait for a time, but then they get their glory. At least this is how 
I interpret the
passage from my pauline lense.

Now we know that Israel conceived itself of Israel far before the monarchy, 
and
expectations of a king were probably common. After all, everybody else, even 
fleshly
Esau, had them. The use of the infinitive here may indicate that the author 
was not
speaking from the perspective of an author in the far future about an already
completed event. Therefore I see it somewhat like 'they already have all 
these kings
and we haven't even gotten one yet'. Such would be an attidute of the Jews in 
Egypt,
wondering about what it means to get the birthright and be slaves in Egypt 
while the
fleshly brother loses his birthright and becomes the founder of a great 
nation. This
statement is a good indicator of a tradition or a source that Moses would have
incorporated into Genesis.

But about your other question concerning ALL the verses, I would just have to 
say
that many, many of them are like this one, that is, requiring a difference of
understanding. I am certain that there are some that would challenge me, so 
let me
say that I do not hold the extreme (and completely uninformed) position that 
the bible
has somehow been immune to the necessary processes of textual transmission in
this imperfect world which results in occasional alterations to the text. 
Though I do
stick conservatively to the MT (no crime in that, it is actually in vogue 
these days), I
am not above the understanding that certain alterations have been made in the 
text
since the days of Moses, though I am inclined to believe these are small, 
usually the
products of copyist errors in insignificant passages, or if any true 
redaction was done,
then it was not without the will of God, who I believe to have his hand on the
preservation of the text as well as on its revelation. In other words, I am 
capable of
believing that our textus receptus is faithfully the word of God, even with 
the
occasional mistake or redaction, and am therefore not above resorting to
emendations, and if pressed, could see certain verses as post Mosaic 
redactions,
though I have not yet run into any at this point.

But as I said above, many, many, many of these verses that indicate late 
authorship
are simply misinterpreted, or inordinately unwilling to allow Moses the 
privelege of
using an odd style.

Lastly, I would like to say that if the thread that Peter (are you happy now, 
Ian!?)
started about whether Genesis is a redaction or a composition by a single 
author is
over (we seem to have milked it for all that it is worth), and we are going 
to shift over
to a broader topic of whether Torah is early or late, or had Moses as its 
author, I would
like to enlist the aid of, if not turn these questions completely over to, 
list members
such as PETER Kirk, Dave Washburn, Baruch Alster, and others who have shown a
willingness to represent the opinion that the Torah may be older, or written 
by Moses.
For me, a lowly grad student, to answer all of these questions demands that I
research most of them anew, a task that I do not have time for at the moment. 
I came
on here to read about the research of others who were further along than I, 
yet it
seems that I am one of the primary contributors to the list, and have to say 
that I am
devoting more time to my daily e-mails than I had originally expected. It 
does seem to
me, though, that the question of Mosaic authorship is one that has been 
argued to
death for centuries at this point, and it doesn't seem like the question is 
likely to be
solved any time soon. Or conversely, the question has already been solved in 
the
minds of the proponents of the opposed views for quite some time. 
Furthermore, it
seems to me that before my entry onto the list, those that believed in Mosaic 
or early
authorship of the Torah took pains not to mention that fact in order to avoid 
ridicule
and insults at the hands of those who don't, a phenomenon with which I am 
becoming
aquainted thanks to the kind words of Dr. Lemche. Perhaps further discussion 
of the
matter should be avoided on these grounds.




Jonathan Bailey
Hochschule für Jüdische Studien
Heidelberg