Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Heard, Christopher" <Christopher.Heard AT pepperdine.edu>]

The phrase "intended to exclude" in Peter's post below isn't  
particularly helpful, in my opinion, because canonical labels aren't  
usually keyed to what they _exclude_, but what they _include_. As a  
reminder, there's a big debate still unresolved about the canonical  
process that led to the Tanakh, and at what stage that process was  
when the gospel writers put pen to parchment. My own view, based on  
research that I haven't revisited in the last couple of years, is  
that the Kethuvim was still in flux around the edges during this  
period (a few books in question), but of course there's a lot of  
reasoning and data behind that, which I don't really care to type  
here at this point. ;-)

I guess my point is that "we can't be sure" is the most solid thing  
we can say about the status of the Kethuvim in the early 1st century  
CE and even a bit later. When some of the "later" (e.g., 3rd-4th  
century CE) Christian "fathers" wanted to compile lists of Jewish  
scripture, their presumably Jewish informants gave them varying  
information. On the other hand I do think that references to "the Law  
and the Prophets" already basically mean the same thing we mean by  
Torah and Nevi'im, and already in the days of Ben Sirah.

Best wishes,

Chris

On Aug 17, 2005, at 4:21 PM, Peter Kirk wrote:
> ell, I would tend to assume that "beginning with Moses and all the
> prophets ... all the scriptures" in Luke 24:27 refers to the same  
> books
> as "the law of Moses and the prophets and the psalms ... the  
> scriptures"
> in Luke 24:44-45. I doubt if this is intended to exclude Proverbs,  
> Job,
> Chronicles, Ezra-Nehemiah and the Megillot. And the same may be  
> true of
> e.g. Luke 16:31, although the reference here to "*hear* Moses and the
> prophets" may be an explicit allusion to what was read in the  
> synagogue
> (and so be relevant to the thread on Haftarot). But as you say we  
> can't
> be sure.

--
R. Christopher Heard
Assistant Professor of Religion
Seaver Fellow in Religion
Pepperdine University
Malibu, California 90263-4352
Professional Web Page: http://faculty.pepperdine.edu/cheard
Internet Resource Index: http://www.iTanakh.org
Personal Web Page: http://www.heardworld.com