Deception in Genesis: An Investigation into the Morality of a Unique Biblical Phenomenon (review)

Abstract

Studies in Biblical Literature 32. New York: Peter Lang, 2001. 252 pp. $57.95.Both the contents and the concerns addressed by this study go well beyond those mentioned in the title. Its focus on fifteen incidents of that the author has identified in the book of Genesis. These provide the structure for the entire work: He first lists their common features, then examines how each was treated in post-biblical Jewish tradition, after which he contrasts them with other biblical accounts of before looking at various parallels from the ancient Near East and then folk traditions. From this, he able to conclude that the book of Genesis views positively when it is perpetrated by someone who has been wronged by another, so that the previous status quo, or shalom, reachieved (without, therefore, causing harm to the deceived) (p. 56). By way of contrast, other parts of the Bible are found to view positively only when it results in the removal of a threat to the perpetrator's well-being (p. 74). Not surprisingly, post-biblical interpreters have an even more negative view of deception, which leads them to minimize such behavior (p. 137). Elsewhere in the ancient Near East, treated positively only when it takes place among the gods.Besides extending well beyond what the book's title would suggest, these conclusions are far more insightful and important than the heavily apologetic and theological tone of its introduction and more far-reaching than one would expect in a work that so methodically presented, a characteristic that no doubt the result of its origin as a dissertation (from the University of Pennsylvania). In this, it serves as an outstanding argument for following the lead of those disciplines which require dissertations to be thoroughly reworked before they are published. Indeed, the only area where the book delivers less than it promises in the survey of post-biblical exegesis, where midrashic interpretations are largely restricted to those found in Genesis Rabbah, albeit with some citations from Louis Ginzberg's Legends of the Jews, and the Dead Sea Scrolls are not mentioned at all.To be sure, one might raise a variety of questions about the execution of this project. For example, its collection of deception events not always convincing. It includes some incidents that do not really involve deception. For example, Eve's claim to have been deceived (hi??'ani, Gen 3:13) not supported by what the snake actually said, which turns out to be entirely true, whatever its intended purpose. …