Ancient Israel and the Writing of the Bible

How did the Bible become a book? Who wrote the books of the Bible and how is it the Bible was written at all? How did the Bible become a book? The social infrastructure necessary for the widespread use of writing in Israel would not begin to emerge until the late monarchy. Before this time, the beginnings of the Bible are to be found in oral literature and songs passed on from one generation to the next. 

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SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to Supernatural Insight. My name is Lauren. Today I'm dealing with a couple of important questions about the Bible. How did the Bible become a book? Who wrote the books of the Bible? And how is it the Bible was written at all? My insight is adopted from three excellent sources, three books which I recommend for a more in depth study. First How the Bible became a book by William M. Snidwin. Secondly, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Bible by Carl Vandorn. Thirdly, the Bible on Earth Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the origin of its ancient texts by Israel Finkenstein and Neil Asher Syberman. The stories of the Bible or stories in the Bible place the early Israelites in Canaan as early as the intermediate Bronze Age between twenty two hundred two thousand BCE. The ancient Israelites are depicted as shepherds living an agricultural lifestyle. This is not a setting in which we should expect writing to flourish. Did these shepherds and farmers write books? Who would have read such books anyway? Few, if any, could read or write. It is something of self contradiction that the ancient Israelites who were illiterate should present a book as their contribution to the world. An oral society is a society without a writing system. However, it's possible for a society to transmit oral history, oral literature, oral law, and other knowledge across generations without a writing system or in parallel to a writing system. It's an extraordinary accomplishment when their own world was without books. The ancient religion known as Judaism has been acknowledged throughout the world as a religion of the book, a book produced by a culture of oral tradition, the spoken word, preserved by cultural memory, the songs and stories, proverbs and folk tales of traditional society. So who in this ancient culture of oral tradition had the writing skill, the professional writing skill produced such a book? And when was the Bible written? The social infrastructure necessary for the widespread use of writing in Israel would not begin to emerge until the late monarchy. Before this time the beginnings of the Bible are to be found in oral literature and songs passed on from one generation to the next. The Bible as we know it began to take shape in Jerusalem in the late eighth centuries seven hundred twenty seven BCE to six ninety eight BCE in the days of Isaiah the prophet and Ezekiah the king of Judah. The Assyrian invasion of the Northern Kingdom resulting in the exile of massive numbers of people from the Northern Kingdom seven hundred forty five BCE to seven hundred twenty seven BCE, many of whom migrated to Jerusalem. These powerful social and political forces coming together at that time, resulting in the collection of earlier mostly oral traditions and the writing of new texts. The exile of northern Israel also gave rise to the prophetic works of Amos, Hosea, Micah, and Isaiah of Jerusalem, to priestly liturgies and to ritual texts, as well as to a pre Deuteronomic historical work. The idealization of a golden age of David and Solomon also inspired the collection of wisdom, traditions, and poetry ascribed to these great kings. This was a time when Jerusalem expanded into a large metropolis. The ferocity of the Assyrian Empire pressured rural populations to settle in the cities where they could find relative security. Writing became a part of the urban bureaucracy as a political extension of growing royal power. These changes would be the catalyst for the collecting and composing of biblical literature. It was the dawn of the literature of the Bible. In reaction to the pace and scope of the changes brought to Judah from the outside, the seventh century leaders in Jerusalem, headed by King Josiah six hundred nine BCE to six hundred thirty nine BCE, a sixteenth generation descendant of King David, declared all traces of foreign worship to be cursed, and indeed the cause of Judah's current misfortunes. They embarked on a rigorous campaign of religious purification of the countryside, ordering the destruction of rural shrines, declaring them to be sources of evil. Jerusalem was recognized as the only legitimate place of worship. In the seventh century it was bursting at the seams with a swollen population of royal officials, priests, prophets, refugees, and displaced peasants. When the sun set on the Assyrian Empire at the end of the seventh century BCE, the empire, rather than disappearing, passed to the Babylonians, and later to the Persians and then to Alexandra the Great. With the first campaign in five hundred ninety seven BCE, and then again in five hundred eighty C BCE, the Babylonian army stormed into Judah, burned the city of Jerusalem and countryside, devastating the economy of the region. You can read about this description in Second Kings twenty four and second Kings twenty five. According to the Jewish tradition, prophecy ended with the destruction of the temple and the end of the Hebrew kingdom. With the royal family and its royal archives in exile, the exile itself is a turning point for the collecting and editing of ancient Israelite literature which eventually become a book. It's also a critical period for the Hebrew language. Biblical texts written before the exiles are described as classical Hebrew or standard biblical Hebrew, whereas later biblical texts, such as Ezra, Nehemiah, Daniel, and Esther is categorized as late Biblical Hebrew. Over the past century, scholars have tended to see the exile as the formative period for the writing, collecting, and adding of the biblical text. However, this seems very unlikely. The conditions of the exile would most likely cause a major setback or reentrenchment, not serving as fuel for increased writing activity. With that said, prior to this period, ancient Israel was a society making leaps and bounds in the production of literature at the end of the Judean monarchy. The report coming from recent archaeological findings have proven the fury of the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem, Judea or Judah, and the entire Levant. The impact on the demographic the demographic changes is beyond comprehension, showing a massive depopulation. The land was not completely empty, but it was severely depopulated. There were no more Davidic kings. There was no more temple. The entire cultural life of the people remaining in the land was forever altered. Daniel one verses three to four reflect this. The scribal infrastructure was exiled as well. Even the language that the people spoke changed from Hebrew to Aramaic. The invasion was ruthless. eighty percent of the cities, towns and villages were either abandoned or destroyed in the sixth century. The evidence from archaeological research indicates that the infrastructure for writing was destroyed. In antiquity, writing depended on a prosperous urban economy in order to thrive. The plight of Judah was bleak, but was the exile much better? Could Babylonian exile have been the setting for the thriving of literature? I think not. But there certainly seems to have been some writing activity during the exile period. According to Psalm 137, one to four, the situation was gloomy. The exiles are described as prisoners and slaves tormented by their overlords. The exiles are described as completely demoralized. Lamentations one and three, lamentations two and eleven, and lamentations five and twenty reflect this. In addition to this, there is the story the story of the prophets Jeremiah and Ezekiel, which is tied to the fate of King Jehoachin in Babylon. Jehoachin is a prisoner in Babylon for some thirty seven years before his release in five fifty BCE. Now, why is the fate of this king important to the narrative of the extras of the exile? The answer is that this king, Jehoachin, was behind the writing of the Bible during the exile. The Book of Kings ends by telling the reader about the eventual release of Jehoachin. But without getting into the details of the history leading up to this moment, there were apparently three living kings. Jehoachin was Exile in Babylon, Jehoahaz was Axil in Egypt, and Zedekiah, a puppet king, was on the throne in Jerusalem. This situation would overshadow the preservation and writing of biblical literature during the sixth century BCE. The royal family of Jehoachin and the pala scribes would shape the collection, editing, writing, and preservation of biblical literature. Many texts were discovered in the vaults below the famous Estargate leading into the city of Babylon. They date from the years five hundred ninety five BCE to five sixty seven BCE. The texts list rations to prominent political prisoners from Nebuchadnezzar's military campaigns. Most important for us is the record of payment to Jehoachin, King of Judah. He was treated as royalty, even though he was under house arrest by Babylonians. These individuals were given monthly rations in oil, which was an exchange commodity that could be traded. It served the same function as money. It was out of this royal family and the support afforded them in the Babylonian court that the preservation and writing of biblical literature continued, though on a limited basis in the exile period. Ancient Israel, hemmed in on two sides by desert and on one side by the Mediterranean, that has over the millennia been plagued by recurrent drought and almost continued warfare. Its cities and population were minuscule in the comparison to those of the neighboring empires of Egypt and Mesopotamia. Likewise, its material culture was poor in comparison to the splendor and extravagance of theirs, and yet this land was the birthplace of a literary masterpiece that has exerted an unparalleled impact on world civilization as both sacred scripture and history. That's a pretty amazing accomplishment indeed. We tend to read the Bible through the lens of mononity. To say it in another way we read the Bible as if it came from a world of texts, books, and authors. Yet the Bible was written before there were books. The Bible is really a collection of scrolls and not of an individual author. Rather, the books are a result of a scribal workshop or scribal workshops plural within the context of communal authorship. We need to think of a group rather than the individual. Authorship is a concept that comes from a predominantly written culture, whereas ancient Israelite society was largely an oral culture. So who then in this culture, ancient culture of oral tradition, had the professional writing skill to produce such a book? In our modern times we have academics who are scholars in universities who do research papers and write books. In a similar way scribes wrote for scribes. Their body of knowledge was accessible only through the oral instruction given by religious professors known as scribes. The text of the scribes was not of the general society. The Bible was born and studied in workshops of the temple. To put another way, the scrolls of scripture were scrolls of the clergy. Those who wrote the texts were not authors, but were artisans. Intellectual property was not an issue. What was important to them was skill and technical mastery. Students who continued in advanced learning became scholars of antiquity. The scribes crafted their texts, preserved documents, and taught classical texts of their time. The Bible is an extraordinary book, not because of bright minds that wrote it, but because of the unique way it came into being. The writing of the Bible is the result of generations of scribes, each new one carrying on the work of the previous ones. The making of books and the appeal to the authority of writing was largely derived from the institution of state and temple. Writing was the domain of the royal court, and then the priestly aristocracy. Writing was used as a tool of government and then taken over as a tool of religious authority and orthodoxy. The first Jewish book in Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek were written in the Hellenistic Greek era. All literature written before that time was not books in the modern sense of the term. A book market did not exist, nor were there public libraries. In fact, there were no reading public of any sort. Text was read out loud by a professional by a professional person. Scribes did not concern themselves with originality, and what they wrote was not understood as a special gift, but as an expression of craftsmanship. They were scribes not authors. It's important to note that scribes were often copyist or government officials. The scribes to whom we owe the Hebrew Bible were scribes whose training made them the intellectuals of their time. They were scribes in the sense of scholars. Let us look at some of the data from the Bible itself. If we are going to piece together a picture of the Hebrew scribes, his identity must be approached in terms of their place in society and their institutional background. When the Bible passage makes mention about their writers, the reference is usually to a god to God or a prophet. The two places in the Bible which speaks of scribes as writers of the text are from the book of Jeremiah. The scribes are referred to as sages who are motivated by prestige from the literature they have written. This is how it goes. How can you say we are sages? And we possess the Torah of Yahweh. Assuredly, the deceitful pen of the scribes has turned it into a deception. The sages shall be put to shame. They shall be dismayed and caught, for they have rejected the word of Yahweh. So what kind of wisdom is theirs? Jeremiah chapter eight verses eight to nine. In this passage the self styled sages brag of their possession of the Torah of Yahweh. Clearly the Torah is a written document. The author of the oracle, whether the historical Jeremiah or the editor of his collected prophecies, regard this Torah as a deception or lie, and denies its divine inspiration. The scribes proclaim the book to be a revelation, because they refer to it as the Torah of Yahweh. As a source of authority, it has obviously surplanted the oral tradition. Since those who proclaim themselves sages derive their wisdom from the possession of the written law, instead of boasting of their mastery of the oral lore of their profession, they exult in their access to a written text. The one book that speaks of being the Torah of Yahweh is the book of Deuteronomy. The innovation of Deuteronomy lies not in the fact of it being written Torah, but in its claim to be a source of authority overruling the oral tradition. This was the bone of contention. Deuteronomy stands for a reversal of roles. It turns oral instruction into a servant of the written text. It was a continuous issue with Jeremiah. The reason is not explained. In any case, the scribe who were responsible for this Torah were not just copyists, but composers of the text. The second reference to a scribe writing the Bible is the account of Boch recording the oracles of Jeremiah, Jeremiah 36. Jeremiah speaks of his oracles. Craftsman, a writing known by implements as a pin Psalm forty five and two. It says My heart overflows with a pleasing theme. I address my verse to the king. My tongue is like the pen of a ready scribe. Ezekiel nine refers to a man with a writing case at his side. Verse two. A scribe normally writes in ink on a scroll, where he writes his text in columns. Zariah was the scribe of David, second Kings eight and seventeen. His sons Elohorfin and Hajab Heajah were the scribes of Solomon, Kings three and three. Sibna was scribe was the scribe under Hezekiah, second Kings eighteen, verse eighteen. Shafan was the scribe of Josiah, Second Kings twenty two. Elias Hama was the scribe of Joachim, Jeremiah thirty six, and Jonathan scribe of Zedekiah, Jeremiah thirty seven. These men were not your average scribes, but high ranking officials, the equivalent of a chancellor or secretary of state. They ranked higher than a penman or scholars. Their position resembled that of an Egyptian royal letter writer of Pharaoh, who, as head of the royal secretariat, was responsible for the foreign and domestic or domesticated correspondence of the king, or domestic correspondence of the king. The activities of royal scribes are reported in the Bible have to do with diplomatic encounters. The consultation with political advisors in 2 Kings nineteen, verse eleven. And the management of temple funds. The physical act of writing seems to have been a minor aspect of their duties. Ezra, apparently a scribe who is secretary for Jewish Affairs, in the title or role of the Persian government, a scribe is a high ranking member of the Persian royal bureaucracy. In Ezra's case, with a special responsibility for Jewish affairs, Ezra is authorized to draw money from the royal treasury to pay for construction activities on the Jerusalem Temple, Ezra 7 21 to 22. But there is more to add. Being an expert scribe in the Torah of Moses, Ezra seven and six, Ezra is a scholar rather than an official. The area of Ezra scholarship is specified as being the written Torah. He is described as a wise and expert scribe. The Torah is his wisdom. Ezra's status as a scribe is a Torah scholar. Ezra is a scholar of scripture. The scribes who were scholars of scripture belong to the group of the Levites. The fact that the Levitical scribes operated as a group is significant. They offered instruction throughout Judah, and they had with them the scroll of the Torah of Yahweh. They made the rounds of the cities of Judah and taught, interpreting and clarifying the meaning of the Torah among the people. As scholars of Scripture, the Levites acted as successors of Moses who had been the first to explain or interpret the Torah. Deuteronomy one and five compare that with Deuteronomy thirty, one to thirteen. Scribes were considered wise. The Hebrew concept of wisdom is somewhat broader than the concept of our modern times. To us, wisdom stands for prudence, common sense, and balanced judgment, all which comes about by intuition and experience. In Hebrew, as in most other ancient Near Eastern language, wisdom can also refer to specialized knowledge and learning acquired through education. Where an Israelite would say, acquired wisdom, Proverbs four, five and seven, we would say get an education. The scribes are not only wise human beings, but experts, sages, and thus scholars. So then in the sense of learning and scholarship presupposes I literacy, and literacy is acquired by scribal training. The rhetorical question, who is wise? Let him consider these words. It's really an admonition to scribal students who is reading the book Hosea, Hosea 4 and 10, or Psalm 107 and verse, or Psalm 107 and 43. And when Proverbs says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, Proverbs 1 and 7 and elsewhere, it understands wisdom as learning a scribal education. The scribe or the accomplished scribe, in other words, is an expert. In conclusion, our concept of books always entails a concept of authors, on the premise that there are no books without authors. We therefore assume there must have been an author or when the Bible is viewed as a collection of books, there is several authors. We must be careful not to approach the Bible as such notions based on our modern concepts of authorships that spring from a culture of books. Most of the ancient texts are for most part anonymous. Text was often assigned to great figures from the past is a way to impress their authority on the audience. The real author remains anonymous. The book of the Bible literature does not carry the name of its author. None of the so called historical books Joshua judges contain superscriptions or any other reference to the author in the text. The same is true for four of the five books traditionally assigned to Moses, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers. None contains superscriptions or any mention of author. The practice of anonymous authorship is related to ancient concepts of literature. Trust that this presentation has been helpful, and if you wish to make a comment, you can do so at my email address LK Andrews underscore nineteen fifty eight at hotmail.com. That is LK Andrews underscore nineteen fifty-eight at hotmail dot com. Thank you.