Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Harold Holmyard <hholmyard AT ont.com>]

Dear Yigal,

> Here's a basic difference between Christian and Jewish views. In (Rabbinic) 
> Judaism, God is considered to have given the Law (written and Oral) once, at 
> Sinai (of course, this was an ongoing process which took 38 years). In his 
> omniscient wisdom, God made His Torah such, that it would have solutions for 
> any possible situation "built in", so that the Torah would NEVER have to be 
> "ammended".

HH: I want to clarify that this is not strictly a Jewish-Christian 
issue, because the Roman Catholic Christians have a similar view to the 
mainstream Jewish view. It is a claim that tradition is equally 
authoritative as the written word.

> A major componant of the Oral Torah is the "codes" by which the 
> Torah itself is to be interpreted, and these were passed down from Moses to 
> Joshua and on to the elders, the members of the Great Assembly, and from 
> them to what we now call "rabbis".

HH: Is there anything internal to the Scriptures that would indicate the 
existence of these codes? I can think of nothing offhand.


> Both preists and prophets are outside 
> this "chain of command".

HH: Then there is no chain of command, is there, for who else is there 
besides priests and prophets who are God- ordained? The "scribes" are 
not God-ordained as a special authority-bearing group outside the 
priests and prophets. If there is such a chain of command, the Law 
itself ought to instruct us of that fact.

> The function of Priests, that is, decsendants of 
> Aaron, is to perform the perscribed rituals in the Temple.

HH: The function of priests was also to teach and to judge. You are 
greatly circumscribing the role of priests.

> The function of 
> Prophets, that is, people who receive "direct" messages from God, is to warn 
> the people of their transgressions or to give them hope for the future, NOT 
> to interpret the Law.
> Of course, there were individuals who were either both priest and prophet, 
> priest and rabbi, or prophet and rabbi. Ezra was all three, which gives him 
> a lot of clout in Jewish tradition. But the functions themselves are 
> seperate.
> The Talmud recounts several stories of rabbis discussing a point of Law, 
> when suddenly either a heavenly voice or a prophet (even Elijah!) appeared 
> and gave "God"'s view on the matter, to which the rabbis replied "It [the 
> Law] is not in heaven" (Deut. 30:12) - once the Torah was given to us, we 
> have sole authority over its interpretation.
>  

HH: The rabbis, as a group distinct from prophets and priests, have no 
special God-given authority that I can recall from Scripture. I 
certainly don't see any "chain of command" in Scripture. There are the 
"wise men" in Scripture, but  these are a group that culturally 
functioned in every nation, simply those looked to as wise. There are 
the elders, who were heads of the various families. That is certainly a  
divinely-approved position of authority, but it is based  in culture and 
family and gives no special authority in the handling of Scripture.

> Of course, historically speaking, this interpretation has not been held by 
> all Jews throughhout history. The Sadducees, who were mostly priests, both 
> denied the authority of the Oral Torah and of the rabbis who considered 
> themselves to be its stewards. But this has become the "mainstream" view of 
> post-Destruction Rabbinic Judaism.
>  

HH: Thanks.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard