Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Noel O'Riordan" <nor AT iol.ie>]

Jonathan

I would suggest that you be more careful in your reading of posts before
castigating me, you have misrepresented what I have said in your knee jerk
reaction, I have not claimed that writing is young or that alphabetic
writing does not precede David, what I am basically postulating is that as
the biblical stories are primarily the history of a specific people and a
specific states/states, that a certain level of Literacy has to have been in
existence, within that people/state.  Egypt, Mesopotamia, even Generic
Canaan have nothing to do with the evolution of the Israelite corpus, apart
from obvious borrowings, all of which can be argued to a late date.

Because we have a few examples of Alphabetic script, does not attest to a
level of literacy or of a national literary work.

In Egypt and Mesopotamia, writing was originally used as a commercial tool,
the beginnings of widespread literacy and of the development of a literary
tradition took a long  time.  Writing was not invented on Monday and
national histories written on Tuesday!

To postulate the formation of the state as the catalyst for the eventual
formation of 'that states' written history seems to me consistent with other
cultures.

If my post (repeated below) displayed some lack of clarity, I apologize, but
a reading of it
I feel clearly Implies that I am talking about Literacy and writing in
Israel and not the ANE in general.

Noel O'Riordan
----- Original Message -----
From: Jonathan Bailey <jonathan.bailey AT gmx.de>
To: Biblical Hebrew <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
Sent: 24 January 2000 07:41
Subject: Re[2]: "Post-Exilic" Genesis (long)

>In relation to the Evolution of texts and the theory of a Mosaic, or
>contemporary, authorship, what are the opinions about the existence or
>non-existence of a scribal school that had to have existed in order to pass
>on the words of Moses, and to continue the history as the events happened.
>in other words who wrote these texts?  For example 'during David's reign we
>have no sure evidence of either the Egyptian system or of alphabetic
>writing' (ABD vi 1005)  Surely in order to promulgate the texts then a
>literary tradition of schools etc had to have existed and this would imply
>organized state structures.  There appears to be some evidence of schooling
>in 8th-7th century B.C. but this would have been when a semblance of a
state
>existed.  What about the proceeding 700 years.  Who wrote recorded and
added
>to these stories?

>It seems logical to think that literacy is tied to state which sees a
>terminus a quo of at least the 8th century for the texts.
>.Noel O Riordan

> This is primitive Wellhausenism. We have the Hebrew Geza Calender from the
10th
> century. We have a Phonecian alphabetic tradition even earlier. We have a
13th
> century Ugaritic tradition. Alphabetic writing certainly precedes David.
And who said
> the texts had to be preserved alphabetically? We have cuneiform back to
the 3rd
> millenium. And I am no egyptologist, but I think heiroglyphics are proven
to go way
> back.
>
> The notion that writing is young, therefore government is young, therefore
the texts
> are young, is wacky 19th century fantasy born out of pure ignorance.
Writing is OLD.
> Alphabetic or otherwise. And so is government.
>
>
>
>
> "If there are many wisemen in a city, this means that the city will soon
fall."
> Babylonian proverb
>
> Jonathan Bailey
> Hochschule für Jüdische Studien
> Heidelberg
> http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Column/9707/index.html
> ---------- Original Message ----------
>
> >In relation to the Evolution of texts and the theory of a Mosaic, or
> >contemporary, authorship, what are the opinions about the existence or
> >non-existence of a scribal school that had to have existed in order to
pass
> >on the words of Moses, and to continue the history as the events
happened.
> >in other words who wrote these texts?  For example 'during David's reign
we
> >have no sure evidence of either the Egyptian system or of alphabetic
> >writing' (ABD vi 1005)  Surely in order to promulgate the texts then a
> >literary tradition of schools etc had to have existed and this would
imply
> >organized state structures.  There appears to be some evidence of
schooling
> >in 8th-7th century B.C. but this would have been when a semblance of a
state
> >existed.  What about the proceeding 700 years.  Who wrote recorded and
added
> >to these stories?
>
> >It seems logical to think that literacy is tied to state which sees a
> >terminus a quo of at least the 8th century for the texts.
>
> >Best regards
> >Noel O Riordan
>
>
>
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