Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>]

Chris:

It is commonly accepted that the prophet who saw the vision attributed to his 
name, also wrote down what he saw. But besides Jeremiah and Moses, which of 
the prophets specifically mentioned the writing of their prophecies?

In Jeremiah, he records specific times where he dictated his message to a 
scribe who was named, but when he no longer had access to that scribe, that 
he wrote it himself. But as far as I know, none of the other prophets made 
such specific claims to writing their prophecies.

That they did not make specific mention of their writing their prophecies, is 
that sufficient reason to doubt their authorship? From your comment below, 
your answer seems to be “Yes”.

For example, the book of Isaiah was claimed to be a vision of a prophet 
contemporary with kings Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah. But then it 
mentions Cyrus by name and something that Cyrus did. The usual response is to 
say that the section naming Cyrus was later than Isaiah the prophet, it was 
written post exile. If you claim that chapters 40 on are post exilic, why not 
just treat it like Daniel and say that the whole book is post exilic? That 
would spare all the efforts of questionable merit that try to show on 
stylistic reasons why to conclude two different authors.

The traditional understanding is that the opening of Isaiah is a statement of 
authorship. It is the same opening as the prophecy of Obediah. There was a 
similar opening for Micah and most the other prophets. These statements are 
recognized as implied authorship in which the specific statement “I wrote...” 
becomes redundant. After all, the books were written, and who else to write 
it if not the named prophet himself? The actual statements of writing becomes 
redundant unless, as in the case of Jeremiah, he records the specifics under 
which the authorship was done.

When we look at Daniel, we see the same statements of implied authorship as 
are found in other prophetic writings. Why should we not recognize them as 
claims of authorship for a sixth century BC composition (this is just a 
stylistic question, not an argument for any idea of inspiration)? Whether we 
agree with those claims or not  is irrelevant, are they not stylistically to 
be recognized as claims of authorship?

Even modern books often don’t have the specific statement claiming “I 
wrote...” though many have an acknowledgement page where is found the only 
direct claim to authorship, yet who doubts that the “by (author’s name)” is a 
claim for writing? So why should we doubt first person claims in written 
works as pointing to authorship?

Karl W. Randolph.

Ps: I didn’t think you sounded testy or cranky.


----- Original Message -----
From: "Robert Heard" <Christopher.Heard AT pepperdine.edu>
> 
> Rolf Furuli wrote:
> > The real issue is: Why do scholars date the book of Daniel to the
> second
> > century B.C.E.? Or put differently: Why do modern scholars reject the
> claims
> > in the book of Daniel of a sixth century writing?
> 
> I chimed in at this point when this was first brought up, and the
> discussion seems to have quickly turned to issues about the origins of
> apocalyptic literature and faith claims regarding predictive prophecy.
> So let me reiterate my original question/claim: There are *no*
> authorship claims in the book of Daniel--sixth century or
> otherwise--for modern scholars to reject! The only possible hint of an
> "authorship claim" inside the book of Daniel is the use of first-person
> discourse chapters 7-12. However, as the books of Enoch, Esdras, etc.
> (not to mention scads of modern novels) clearly show, the use of
> first-person discourse cannot hold water as an authorship claim. In
> order to substantiate and uphold a claim that the book of Daniel claims
> that a historical person named Daniel wrote the book, one would have to
> show that the use of first-person discourse necessarily implied such a
> claim (since the book of Daniel nowhere says anything like "a
> historical person named Daniel wrote this book" or even "I, Daniel,
> wrote down my visions and these reflections on them"). I don't think
> that implicit claim can ever be substantiated, though I'd be more than
> willing to look at evidence in favor of it.
> 
>...
> 
> - Chris (cranky at the end of a long hot day, in case the above sounds
> a bit testy)
> 
> 
> -------------------------------
> --
> R. Christopher Heard
> Assistant Professor of Religion
> Pepperdine University
> Malibu, CA 90263-4352
> http://www.heardworld.com
> http://www.iTanakh.org\