Scribal culture and the making of the Hebrew Bible

Abstract

Scribal Culture and Making of Hebrew Bible, by Karel van der Toorn. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 2007. 401 pp. $35.00. Scribal Culture and Making of Hebrew Bible, Karel van der Toorn seeks origins of Bible in scribal of ancient Israel. As he acknowledges, what sets his study apart from other contributions on subject is its extensive use of comparative method (p. 3). The author describes his work as a in four stages (p. 4). First, he conducts a reconnaissance of roles of writing and authorship and place of written texts in ancient Near East (Chapters 1 and 2). He concludes that a book culture did not exist; rather author in Israel and Mesopotamia a craftsman, whose talent was not an instrument to express private and personal but a way to attain pinnacle of collective art (pp. 46-47). second phase, van der Toorn explores scribal milleu and its modes of production (Chapters 3, 4, and 5). He argues that cosmopolitan spirit of scribal made it open to influences from outside world (p. 53); thus a study of Israelite scribal naturally lends itself to use of comparative data. Inasmuch as author takes his methodological cues from nature of evidence itself, his work provides a superb model for use of comparative method. However, it bears considering that oral may have had a stronger foothold in Israel than it did in Mesopotamia and Egypt (as witness vast difference in numbers of texts that have come down to us from Israel and its vicinity as compared with Egypt and Mesopotamia - a fact that perhaps should not be explained on basis of preservation alone). If indeed Israel differed from its distant neighbors in this regard, this may have affected a distinct set of Israelite attitudes towards scribalism itself, a possibility that van der Toorn does not address. third phase of his work he applies his conclusions to two biblical case studies: of Deuteronomy (Chapter 6) and of Jeremiah (Chapter 7). While both books contain illuminating references to production and transmission of texts, scholars widely recognize that these books share a common outlook and vocabulary that suggests close temporal and institutional connections. Van der Toorn admits this, speculating that scribes behind Jeremiah had same background as, or were even identical with, scribes behind Deuteronomy (p. 199). These books then, probably should not be regarded as representative of the making of Bible as a whole (p. 7), as van der Toorn suggests. His analysis may provide a more limited picture of Israelite scribal than he acknowledges. The author's choice of Deuteronomy as a sample of scribal is dependent on 1889 work of Karl Marti, who identified iorwf yhwh attributed to deceitful pen of scribes, in Jeremiah 8:8, as of Deuteronomy. Van der Toorn explains, In view of obvious connection berween Deuteronomy and the'book of Teaching,' underlying religious reform carried out by King Josiah in 622, it makes sense to think that it indeed an early edition of Deuteronomy that provoked Jeremiah's criticism. On assumption that Deuteronomy is a product of 'pen of scribes' then, it can be read as a mirror in which scribal is reflected (p. 143). Van der Toorn's logic here reflects an array of unsubstantiated assumptions. …