Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

b-hebrew - Re: Methods in biblical scholarship

b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Biblical Hebrew Forum

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: peter_kirk AT sil.org
  • To: <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: Methods in biblical scholarship
  • Date: Fri, 24 Dec 1999 23:30:25 -0500


See my comments below.

Peter Kirk


______________________________ Reply Separator
_________________________________
Subject: Methods in biblical scholarship
Author: <npl AT teol.ku.dk> at Internet
Date: 24/12/1999 10:23


Trying to get the 'subject' right.

PK: Thank you, that's a good idea.


> From: peter_kirk AT sil.org [SMTP:peter_kirk AT sil.org]
>
....

> To oversimplify, there are three main hypotheses around for the
> composition of the bulk of the Hebrew Bible as we know it:
>
> 1) The Copenhagen approach, if I may correctly so call it, that most
> was written in the 2nd century BCE, or not long before;
>
> 2) The traditional scholarly approach of dating books over a range
> from roughly the 8th to the 4th century;
>
> 3) The evangelical approach, attributing the Pentateuch to Moses and
> dating other books as more-or-less contemporary records.
>
> Approach 2) has been rightly criticised as lacking real evidence.
[Niels Peter Lemche]
Just the case that proposal cover more than 500 years (as a matter
of fact from 10th century BCE to 4th or 3rd centirues BCE) tells us that
there is no hard evidence available. The tendency has been also outside of
my circle to downdate to the exilic post-exilic periods. This may because of
lack of hard data change tomorrow, as it has done before.
>
> The
> problem to me is that I have not seen any real evidence for approach
> 1) (but then I have not read your books, I am afraid).
[Niels Peter Lemche]
The hard data is first of all the age of the oldest manuscript, the
discovery (not really new) that the text tradition was not finally settled
in the 1st century BCE (DSS evidence)...

PK: Surely it takes some time, quite a few manuscript generations, for
text traditions to diverge, and that is good evidence that the texts
were written several centuries before the DSS period?

.. More recently we have started asking questions about what I call the
profile of the authors of biblical literature: What did they know, what
stuff did they use, and does this say anything about their education or
place of living?

PK: Good questions, but the problem is that if we don't know anything
(except for a very limited amount from archaeology - of course we can
presuppose nothing from the books we are trying to date) about life in
Canaan before the 1st or 2nd century, then we have no way of knowing
what the authors might have been expected to know, use, what their
education might have been etc. during these periods. Even if the
picture fits Hellenistic times, there is no way of being sure that it
does not fit just as well earlier times. There may be a few clues of
course, see my posting just now about brickmaking. Other possible
clues would include the authors' knowledge of Egypt: is the picture we
find in the biblical books closer to the reality of the 2nd century or
to that of much earlier times?

> I know that
> approach 3) cannot be proved, but at least it has the possible
> evidence of the self-attribution of the books and of ancient
> tradition, and also some support from the archaeological record
> (although that is of course also dubious). So I see no good reason to
> abandon approach 3), though I have to admit that one reason for
> preferring it is the presuppositions of my personal faith.
>
[Niels Peter Lemche]
Right, there is no other defense of such a view than personal
beliefs.

PK: That's not what I said. I accept that personal beliefs hold a
place. But there is other evidence or potential evidence. One can
argue, I'm not sure how soundly, that the self-attestation of a book,
its internal evidence of authorship and dating, should be taken at
face value unless good reason is shown why a particular inaccurate
attestation has been given - and also how a recently written book
could become accepted as ancient scripture. (Yes, I know that there
are demonstrably pseudonymous books from Hellenistic times e.g. Enoch,
but they were never taken as canonical.) Then there is potential
evidence from agreement with archaeology and accurate picturing of
ancient times and customs. (Yes, I know the evidence is equivocal on
this one, but for example the Tel Dan inscription seems to tell us
that David really existed, or at least that the traditions about him
are very much older than the 2nd century.)

PK: Here is what I consider to be strongest evidence for taking the
books to be what they claim to be. I would challenge anyone to explain
why writers in Hellenistic times (or even in earlier post-exilic
times) would have portrayed their ancient patriarchs and kings (e.g.
Abraham, Moses, David) in such equivocal terms, certainly not as
heroes, but not as out-and-out villains either, rather as very
fallible men (and women e.g. Sarah). Is there any precedent in other
literature of the period or earlier for such ambiguous portrayals of
main characters? On the other hand, we know that real people are like
that. So I consider this to be good evidence that the narratives are
based on accurate reports of these people's real lives.

Peter Kirk





Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page