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Class
Prep
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- Israel:
Covenant in Monarchy & Exile
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- The texts you will read for today span a long period of
time in Israel and Judah's history, from the time of the
United Monarchy (1000 BCE) to the Babylonian Exile and its
aftermath (539 BCE). As you might imagine, this
means that each text has its own "take" on justice
and order, depending upon the situation in which the various
authors found themselves. We will be reviewing
the chronology in class, but in the meantime, please print,
review and bring to class the Timeline
of Tanak and Deuterocanonical Books (pdf
24KB).
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- The diverse nature of the books also requires that we
pose different questions to each text:
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- How would you characterize God's relationship with
the humans in Genesis 2:4b-3:24?
- As you read the Exodus passages, study them closely.
Do you see any evidence of repetition or contradiction
in the stories of Moses and the Israelites at Mount
Sinai? In which texts is Moses portrayed in a positive
light? In a negative light? After trying to discern
the differences yourself, try your hand at an exercise
to Distinguish
the Authors of Torah.
- Try to identify the central themes of the portions
of Deuteronomy that you read. To identify
a theme, consider what teaching the work emphasizes
by repetition, placement, or amount of treatment. If
you're having trouble, drop in to any of the other books
written by the Deuteronomists: Joshua, Judges, 1-2 Samuel,
and 1-2 Kings; together these are called The
Deuteronomistic History (click to see a chart
of its contents [pdf 51KB]).
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The Deuteronomists wrote before and during one of the greatest
disasters of Israelite history, the Babylonian Exile (587-539
BCE). Israel's leadership had been carted off
into exile in Babylon, while the remaining 90% of the population
had remained behind in a destroyed country under Babylonian
domination. Members of the ruling Davidic family
had been executed, prophets and priests had been enslaved,
and everyone dreamt of returning to Zion (a poetic name
for Jerusalem) and restoring the monarchy and the Temple.
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- Within about 50 years, Babylon was itself destroyed, first
partially by the Medes and then completely by the Persians
under King Cyrus (see Isaiah 44:28-45:6). These
are the same Persians Aeschylus battled at Marathon. While
the Greeks viewed the Persians as tyrants and advocated
their native democratic institutions against them, the Jewish
experience of Persian policy was that it was better than
the Babylonians. The Persians allowed the exiles from all
countries to return to their homelands, and even helped
subject nations rebuild their infrastructures.
But Persia still governed these near-eastern nations, and
the people of Israel would still have to deal with the fact
that they were not autonomous and their God appeared weaker
than the empires that subjected them.
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The first Genesis creation story was written at this time,
when some of the Jewish leadership had returned to Israel
and, with Persian financing, had rebuilt a modest Temple
and reinstituted the sacrificial system. The
priests, who in the absence of a native monarchy represented
the country's only native "government," took responsibility
for reorganizing society in the wake of the disaster. In
addition to regulating the calendar, maintaining the relationship
with God through the daily sacrifices and yearly festivals,
and working with the Persian governors, they compiled prior
sources of the Torah and added some new material to establish
and recall the history of the people (for a summary of the
four authors of Torah, see Documentary
Hypothesis [pdf 25KB]). As
you read the first creation story, assume that it was written
by these priests, and consider these questions:
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- What priestly concerns are apparent in the story?
- How does the image of God differ from the earlier
Yahwist account in Genesis 2?
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- We have now read enough biblical literature to practice
drawing links between the themes of story and the
historical circumstances of the discourse (the author's
time). We will work on this in class, but there
is also an online
exercise on which you can practice before and after
class.
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- Assigned Readings
- Primary: Genesis 2:4b-3:24; Exodus 19-20; Deuteronomy
5-6; 2 Kings 22 ; then Genesis 1:1—2:4a
- Secondary: Online class prep
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- Further Reading
Albright, William Foxwell. Yahweh and the
Gods of Canaan: A Historical Analysis of Two Contrasting
Faiths. Garden City, New York: Doubleday,
1968.
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Blenkinsopp, Joseph. The Pentateuch: An Introduction
to the First Five Books of the Bible. New
York: Doubleday, 1992.
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Cross, Frank Moore. Canaanite Myth and Hebrew
Epic: Essays in the History of the Religion of Israel. Cambridge,
Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1973.
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Driver, Godfrey R. Canaanite Myths and Legends. Edinburgh:
T & T Clark, 1977; original, 1956.
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Friedman, Richard Elliott. The Exile and Biblical
Narrative: The Formation of the Deuteronomistic and Priestly
Works, Harvard Semitic Monographs 22. Chico,
California: Scholars Press, 1981.
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--------. Who Wrote the Bible? San
Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1997.
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Noth, Martin. The Deuteronomistic History,
2d ed. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1991.
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Person, Raymond F. The Deuteronomic School:
History, Social Setting, and Literature, Studies in
Biblical Literature 2. Atlanta: Society of Biblical
Literature, 2002.
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- Scott, James M., ed. Exile: Old Testament,
Jewish, and Christian Conceptions, JSJSup 56. Leiden:
Brill, 1997.
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- Smith-Christopher, Daniel. A Biblical Theology
of Exile, Overtures to Biblical Theology. Minneapolis:
Fortress, 2002.
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- Links
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- Sources
- Photographs:
- Moses: Plate LIII in A. R. Bellinger, F. E.
Brown, A. Perkins and C. B. Welles, eds., The Excavations
at Dura-Europos Conducted by Yale University and the
French Academy of Inscriptions and Letters, Final Report
VIII, Part 1 (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1956).
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- Ishtar Gate of Babylon: "Ishtar Gate Reconstruction,
Germany," Gallery X - Modern Images, online,
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Cavern/5178/imag_x.html.
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- Chagall's "La Création de l'homme":
Marc Chagall, "La création de l'homme,"
1956-1958, Chagall Museum, Nice, France; photographed
by A. Malaval, MBMC 3, IC-00-5023; c1990 Agence photographique
de la Réunion des musées nationaux.
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