Papers

at Pollock Halls of Residence, University of Edinburgh

Professor Bernard Jackson (Manchester): Human Law and Divine Justice in the Methodological Maze of the Mishpatim, Or: Why Is God Interested in Goring Oxen?

Professor Hans Barstad (Oslo): Has a Paradigm Shift Taken Place in Old Testament Studies?

Dr David Reimer (Edinburgh): The Quality of Mercy: Law and Forgiveness in the Hebrew Bible

Professor Kirsten Nielsen (Aarhus): Metaphors and Biblical Theology

Dr Charlotte Hempel (Birmingham): Maskil(im) and Rabbim: From Daniel to Qumran

Published as: ‘Maskil(im) and Rabbim: From Daniel to Qumran’, in C. Hempel and J. M. Lieu (eds),
Biblical Traditions in Transmission: Essays in Honour of Michael A. Knibb (JSJSup 111; Brill: Leiden), 2006, 133-56.

Dr Diana Lipton (Cambridge): Bezalel in Babylon? Anti-Priestly Polemics in Isaiah 40-55

Ms Kristin Joachimson (Tromsø): Steck’s Five Stories of the Servant in Isaiah 53, and Beyond

Professor Terje Stordalen (Oslo): Dialogue and Dialogism in the Book of Job

Dr Elie Assis (Bar-Ilan): The Unity of Lamentations

Dr Anne Gardner (Melbourne): Decoding Daniel: The Four Beasts of Daniel 7 with the Second Beast in Close Focus

Dr Edgar Conrad (Brisbane): Looking into Vision: See-sawing in Prophetic Books

Abstracts

Professor Bernard Jackson (Manchester): Human Law and Divine Justice in the Methodological Maze of the Mishpatim, Or: Why Is God Interested in Goring Oxen?

The history of the Mishpatim of Exodus 21:1-22:16 is often seen as a movement from secular to covenantal law. But what evidence is there of an original secular legal system in ancient Israel? This paper argued that the metaphor of divine justice served as a means to remedy some of the institutional weaknesses of secular law. In this context, we may distinguish different forms of divine justice: direct, institutional, charismatic and delegated. Charismatic divine justice (guiding the intuitions of royally appointed judges) appears to have been the earliest form, followed by institutional divine justice, whereby religious officials consulted the deity through specialised means such as the oracle, leading finally to delegated divine justice (through the revelation of covenantal law), the form in which the divine metaphor finally returned to its human source and remedied its institutional weaknesses. A similar model may be used to explain the growth of jurisdiction. Finally, some examples were considered of the impact of the transition from customary ‘Wisdom-Laws’ to covenantal law on the meaning attributed to the content of the laws: why did God become interested in goring oxen?

Professor Hans Barstad (Oslo): Has a Paradigm Shift Taken Place in Old Testament Studies?

Major changes in the humanities during the last third of the 20th century led to a shift from ‘historicism’ to ‘textuality’, as well as to completely new and different views of the role of the reader when it comes to creating meanings in texts. Other, related important developments followed the raised hermeneutical awareness in the wake of the publications of philosophers like Gadamer and RicÏur. It has been claimed, following Kuhn, that biblical studies have undergone major changes during recent decades. However, it represents a major over-simplification to claim that biblical studies have gone through any radical changes. The truth is rather that the ways and methods of biblical scholarship have changed very little, and that much of what is going on in the field must be characterized as fundamentally rooted in historicist categories and mentalities of the 18th and 19th centuries. It will be a major task for the future to replace Gunkel’s genres with new ways of relating text-internal reality to text-external reality. In addition to familiarity with classical Hebrew, genre knowledge represents the most important asset to present-day students of the Hebrew Bible who want to change the field in accordance with recent developments in academia.

Dr David Reimer (Edinburgh): The Quality of Mercy: Law and Forgiveness in the Hebrew Bible

Law and forgiveness are usually considered to be incompatible, so in what ways does it make sense to talk about biblical law in relation to forgiveness, or forgiveness in terms of biblical law? The strategy taken in this paper was to look for cues in current legal theory, much as literary theory has been suggestive for readings of biblical narrative or poetry. Three strands were developed. First, the seminal work of Jeffrie G. Murphy and Jean Hampton (Forgiveness and Mercy [Cambridge University Press, 1988]) was described. Their association of forgiveness with foreswearing resentment points towards such elements in biblical law (e.g. the lex talionis, or aiding an enemy, in Exodus 23:3-4). The second strand attends to punishment theory, since punishment is often thought to preclude forgiveness. Here, biblical evidence remains difficult to square with forgiveness, in spite of nuancing capital punishment formulae. The observation that punishment pertains to perpetrators, while forgiveness belongs to victims, points to a third strand. ‘Restorative justice’, especially as developed by Howard Zehr (Changing Lenses: A New Focus for Crime and Justice [Herald Press, 1990]), takes a victim orientation and places resolution of crimes in a personal or community context. Among other texts, Exodus 21:18-19, the law concerning men who quarrel, was read with such a legal framework in mind. While the task of relating forgiveness to biblical law remains problematic, attempts to make such a connection in modern legal theory suggest that the project is not futile, and that the ‘restorative justice’ framework in particular holds promise for further thought.

Professor Kirsten Nielsen (Aarhus): Metaphors and Biblical Theology

Studies in personal and non-personal metaphors have provided the background for the presenter’s interest in Biblical Theology. This paper dealt with two non-personal metaphors: Yahweh as a lion and Yahweh as a rock. Both metaphors were analyzed in their literary context, where it is clear that Yahweh is described not only as a lion but also as a shepherd and as a pasture for Israel; and not only as a rock that Israel can rely on but also as a rock that gives birth (cf. Mother Earth). The point of origin was therefore the images of God in the Bible, with emphasis on the plural (images), but it was also noted that images have a history: they can be reapplied with the possibility of new meaning, since an image does not contain an a priori fixed meaning. Biblical Theology, in the presenter’s view, therefore consists of studies in central Old Testament metaphors and their reuse in the New Testament. The following definition of Biblical Theology was put forward: ‘Biblical Theology is a construction that is based on the premise that together the Old and New Testaments constitute a unity in the use of the Christian Church.’

Dr Charlotte Hempel (Birmingham): Maskil(im) and Rabbim: From Daniel to Qumran

This paper addressed the much-discussed issue of the relationship of the book of Daniel to the Dead Sea Scrolls. The standard textbook account of the relationship of the Maskilim in Daniel 11-12 and the Qumran community runs as follows: the Maskil appears as a key community functionary in the sectarian scrolls and the community itself which he leads has adopted the designation ha-rabbimrepresenting an institutionalization of the terminology we find in Daniel. The paper argued that the evidence is more complex than often portrayed, and offered a fresh assessment of the Maskiltraditions in the Community Rule that takes into account the complex literary history of this text. This individual appears in a number of different contexts, some universalistic, others with rudimentary communal requirements, and a third group of texts that are quite developed and employ Yahadterminology. In addition the Maskil is found in headings throughout the Community Rule manuscripts and must have been an authority figure both in a number of early traditions and at the point of the Endredaktion of the manuscripts. The closest points of contact between these traditions and the Danielic Maskilim are found somewhere along this line of development, probably near but not at the beginning.

Dr Diana Lipton (Cambridge): Bezalel in Babylon? Anti-Priestly Polemics in Isaiah 40-55

Religious practitioners are notoriously preoccupied with the details of their own religion, yet uninterested in the internal dynamics of others. An apparent Hebrew Bible exception is the author of Deutero-Isaiah’s anti-idol polemics (40:18-20; 41:6-7; 44:9-20; 46:1-7), who seems to engage in detail with Babylonian religion. This paper suggested that Deutero-Isaiah’s primary target was not Babylonian idol-makers, but Israel’s priestly cult. Moshe Weinfeld (Tarbiz, 1968) noticed polemical allusions in Deutero-Isaiah to Priestly texts in Genesis. The present paper identified a second set, concentrated in and around Deutero-Isaiah’s idol texts and alluding to the tabernacle narratives (Exodus 25-31 and 35-40). Given the difficulty of determining that allusions are real and intentional, eight guidelines were offered – six semantic and two theoretical – and the examples were organised accordingly. It was suggested that Deutero-Isaiah’s criticisms of idolatry function as veiled polemics against the Priestly worldview, whose material focus was incompatible with his notion of transcendence. A particular concern was the prediction of future events. For Deutero-Isaiah, divine intentions are revealed not through signs in the external world or human representations of it, but through the historical experiences of a personified Israel. The paper tried to show that he emphasises this contrast by reshaping Exodus patterns in the light of mis pî, the Babylonian mouth-washing/opening ritual for ‘enlivening’ idols (see, e.g., Isaiah 41:17-20). Deutero-Isaiah’s God, then, is not quite beyond compare. Counter-intuitive as it may seem, God is like a Babylonian idol-maker with a difference: Israel is his living idol.

Ms Kristin Joachimson (Tromsø): Steck’s Five Stories of the Servant in Isaiah 53, and Beyond

Since the arrival of Bernhard Duhm’s Servant Song thesis in 1892, that thesis has had a paradigmatic status for more than a century. Gottesknecht has become a technical term, Ebed-Jahwe-Lieder a genre, Stellvertretung an established theological concept, and ‘Servant Song Research’ a particular discipline within Old Testament scholarship. The present paper made use of Odil Hannes Steck’s reading. Steck outlines an inner-Isaianic reception of the ‘songs’ in five levels dated from the time of Second Isaiah to the Ptolemaic period (that is, from 539 to 270 BCE). In the original version, he identifies the servant mentioned outside the ‘Servant Songs’ collectively as Israel, whereas the servant within the ‘Servant Songs’ is identified individually as the prophet. On the remaining four redactional levels, the servant of Isaiah 53 is collectively identified as Zion, as those who have returned from exile, as those who remained at home in Judah, and as the true Israel (which includes other peoples). After a presentation of Steck’s reading of Isaiah, the paper discussed features of reading related to historicisation, theologisation, and textualisation, as well as the increased attention brought to different forces at work in the text and in the reading of it, where a variety of possible focuses has come to the fore. Finally, a narrative reading of Isaiah 53 was offered, with a focus on the literary trope of personification.

Professor Terje Stordalen (Oslo): Dialogue and Dialogism in the Book of Job

Recent scholarship has applied elements of Mikhail Bakhtin’s criticism and philosophy to reading the book of Job. This paper attempted to identify specific elements of Dostoevsky’s poetics (as described by Bakhtin) to Job. First, it was briefly argued that there are several prima facie similarities between Dostoevsky and Job. Secondly, three elements in Bakhtin’s poetics are more fully described in the book of Job: (1) a non-hierarchical representation of characters (ideas) and their voices; (2) the nature of voices in Job, and the way of interrelating them; (3) a non-narrative dimension of the book. In the course of this argument it was claimed that the voice of tradition is perhaps the most conspicuous ‘other’ to which characters in Job make their ‘sideward glance’ (Bakhtin). The paper also claimed that certain characters (in particular Job) represent several mutually incommensurable voices (ideas). It also argued that the author devised certain overarching dialogical topics, on which every character in the book speaks (including the narrator, Hassatan and Mrs Job).

Dr Elie Assis (Bar-Ilan): The Unity of Lamentations

The book of Lamentations includes five poems that lament the destruction of Jerusalem and its Temple in 587 BCE. Each of the five poems is clearly defined by the acrostic form that governs it. This paper discussed the unity of the book, making a necessary distinction between unity of authorship and literary unity. Differences in content, historical background, style and metre indicate multiple authorship to some scholars, while for others similarities between the poems in vocabulary, themes, structures and Jeremianic characteristics prove single authorship. This paper suggested that the differences between the laments cannot prove multiple authorship, because a single author may choose to adopt various styles. Similarly, uniform characteristics cannot prove single authorship because conventional styles may be adopted by various composers. While the question of unity of authorship is not crucial for an understanding of the book, the question of the literary unity of the book is a precondition for its comprehension. Is the book a collection of poems that deal with one topic, or are the poems a single literary unit? Is each of the poems a self-contained and complete composition or one component of a larger literary unit? The second option is established if it can be demonstrated that the poems are placed in a pre-planned order. Scholars have discovered that the poems are organized in a concentric structure: the first poem corresponds to the fifth, the second corresponds to the fourth, and the third is the pivot of a formation. Scholars who have adopted this pattern tend to believe that it is the work of the editor of the book. This paper sought to establish that every pair of poems is tied by means of exclusive themes, motifs, and vocabulary. These interconnections indicate that the book is not a collection of poems but an integral literary piece.

Dr Anne Gardner (Melbourne): Decoding Daniel: The Four Beasts of Daniel 7 with the Second Beast in Close Focus

A number of aspects of Daniel 7:5 have proved puzzling to scholars, and these cannot be resolved until the source of Daniel’s imagery of the four beasts is discovered. Further, conservative and critical scholars assign the second beast a different identity: Media and Persia in the former case and Media in the latter. While not sharing the presumptions of conservative scholars, this paper recognised that their claim that the second beast should be identified with Media and Persia is logical, for these two powers are identified as one composite beast in Daniel 8:20. Previous theories regarding the source of Daniel’s vision include the Enuma Elish or related texts; Canaanite mythology; Egyptian, Greek and Iranian mythology; astrology; treaty curses; Mesopotamian birth omens; the Assyrian ‘Vision of the Netherworld’ and ancient Near Eastern iconography. These were rejected as a primary source because none of them accounts for the descriptions of all four beasts. The Bible as a source has been suggested before but generally either in a perfunctory way (i.e. where an individual biblical verse is reminiscent of a particular detail in Daniel) or in terms of one individual text as the background to the vision of Daniel 7 (e.g. Psalm 89). Neither of these approaches explains the choice of beasts or the detailed descriptions of them. John Day’s suggestion that Hosea 13:7-8 lies behind the choice of beasts was accepted, although it does not account for their individual features. A close examination of the second beast illustrated that the Bible is indeed the source of the vision in Daniel 7. Isaiah 13:5, which predicts the downfall of Babylon, was the author’s starting point. Key phrases in that text led to other biblical texts which are alluded to in Daniel 7:5 and account for the detailed description of the bear, identified as both Media and Persia, and its activities. This, is turn, indicates the need to review the identities of the third and fourth beasts.

Dr Edgar Conrad (Brisbane): Looking into Vision: See-sawing in Prophetic Books

This paper took another look at vision in the Latter Prophets, arguing that the paucity of vocabulary of English words for ‘seeing’ tends to obscure the richer Hebrew vocabulary for ‘vision’ in the Old Testament. The different ways of seeing in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Amos and Zechariah, which have all been understood as ‘vision,’ tend to singularize a more plural set of realities of experiencing the alien world constructed by the community who produced the Hebrew prophetic scrolls. To dismiss the ‘vision of Isaiah’ as information of a late redactor is to ignore significant information for the reader of that scroll. To understand the ‘visions of God’ only as something Ezekiel sees is to overlook that Ezekiel is seeing what God is seeing. To interpret the visions of Jeremiah and Amos as typical of the prophets is to take no notice of the extraordinary claims they make about what they have seen. A central key for comprehending these different ways of seeing is the temple, which is an important feature for gaining perspective on what Zechariah sees at night.

[index of past meetings]