Talk:Mosaic authorship

Article started

Started this article, because the phrase "Mosaic authorship" is mentioned ni quite a few articles dealing with biblical scholarship but the article describing it does not exist.

This has been written off the top of the head and is intended simply to scetch the broad outline of what the article needs to cover. Please feel free to amend, improve, add references, etc etc.

PiCo 01:24, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm uncertain whther it is worth mentioning the errors that Hoffmann and Jacob Benno pointed out in the DH. I suspect most of their points were taken care of by the newer formulations that date P to be earlier. Wolf2191 22:48, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

I think we should stick to explaining the MA rather than the DH. There might be room for this in the DH page of course. But what did Hoffman and Jacobs say? (As for redating P, I'm impressed by what Friedman says on that subject, arguing that the Tabernacle was real, not fictional, as Wellhausen had said). PiCo 23:53, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

From NEJ (Encyclopedia Judaica)on Hoffmann: "His biblical investigations, too, were directed against biblical criticism. These writings, which occupied him for many years, were viewed by Hoffmann as "a holy undertaking… an obligatory battle to answer decisively these new critics who come as oppressors to violate the holy Torah." In his work opposing Wellhausen, Hoffmann rejected the theories of "sources," but he did not formulate an original method of biblical investigation, relying on the basic assumption of "Torah from heaven." In his commentaries to Leviticus and Deuteronomy he relied on rabbinic homiletical and exegetical interpretations for an understanding of these books, as well as offering his own innovative ideas, often based on comparisons between biblical Hebrew and other Semitic languages. While his approach to biblical investigation was essentially the result of the conditions of his time and place, they have stood the test of time and are still studied."

On Jacob Benno: "His principal field of activity in biblical research was the Pentateuch. Although he was not a fundamentalist, his conclusions, as a result of his study of the text rather than on religious grounds, were a complete denial of modern Bible criticism – both textual criticism and Higher Criticism with its documentary hypothesis. He regarded the traditional text more reliable than the ancient translations. He considered the arbitrary textual emendations of Higher Criticism to be unscientific because their only purpose was to validate the latter's own assumptions. Moreover, he accused the school of Higher Criticism of antisemitic trends and of prejudices against Judaism. His opinions were propounded in Der Pentateuch, exegetischkritische Forschungen (1905) and Quellenscheidung und Exegese im Pentateuch (1916). He clarified biblical ideas and expressions which had not been properly understood in Im Namen Gottes (1903) and Auge um Auge, eine Untersuchung zum Alten und Neuen Testament (1929). He also developed a theory concerning the internal rhythm of the Bible, which is expressed by the repetition of key words in set numbers in the narratives of the Torah and its laws, in Die Abzaehlungen in den Gesetzen der Buecher Leviticus und Numeri (1909). His major exegetical work is Das erste Buch der Torah: Genesis, uebersetzt und erklaert (1934). While Jacob did not accept the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch nor the dogma of literal inspiration, he found in its composition so much literary unity and spiritual harmony that all search for its "sources" appeared to him an exercise in futile hypothesis. His comprehensive commentaries on Exodus and a section of Leviticus are extant in manuscript. (An excerpt from the commentary on Exodus was published in Judaism, 13 (1964), 3–18.)" Note, as a Reform Rabbi Jacob dis not believe in MA, but his work is used by Nechama Liebowitz and others to bolster MA.

See also this guy [1].

And don't forget about the Hertz Chumash Wolf2191 01:05, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

He considered the arbitrary textual emendations of Higher Criticism to be unscientific because their only purpose was to validate the latter's own assumptions. An example of this is the pair saq-amtahat, the first characterizing E and the second J according to nearly all critics. the appearance of saq in Gen 42:27 contradicts the source-critical division into documents. The "solution" to this is either to emend saq to amtahat or to attribute its appearance to the Redactor. (In progress) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wolf2191 (talk • contribs) 02:30, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

That's an interesting blog ([2]) and I'll read more of it. He raises some interesting points. But let me say first that I wish more people would read the Prolegomena before they venture opinions on it. It's not about the documentary hypothesis at alol, contrary to what a lot of people seem to think - it's about the development of Israelite and Jewish religion, using Wellhausen's analysis of the sources of the biblical texts as its basis. It takes the DH for granted. W's views on the DH were set out in an earlier book, called, I believe, "Sources of the Pentateuch" or something like that - it's mentioned in the documentary hypothesis article.

The blogger is quite right to say that earlier writers had anticipated W's arguments - W's aim was to defend and promote the views of earlier scholars whose thinking tended in the direction he wanted to go himself - a late P. He wanted this because it supported his views on the late development of Judaism. He saw Israelite religion as originally polytheistic, with a royal cult developing in the Kingdom period and finally a putsch by the Temple priests.

This brings us to the interesting questoin of W's anti-Semitism. I haven't read anything by him that I could construe as anti-Semitic - nothing hateful about Jews at all. BUT, he obviously wanted the Jews as a people to be absorbed into mainstream European society...BUT again, I get the distinct impression that he saw European society as essentially secular, not religious. If the Temple priests saw Temple priests as being the highest estate to which man could aspire, Wellhausen saw the German university professor as the pinnacle of human evolution. I don't think he had a religious bone in his body.

I started writing an article about the Prolegomena but didn't quite finish it - but if you go the article on Julius Wellhausen you should find a link to it.

If you think Benno and Hoffman are important, by all means put them in here. But it's probably best to mention only the essential names - the world is full of scholars and exegetes, and there simply isn't room for all of them. (I'd encourage you to write articles about them, too. PiCo 11:55, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

David Zvi Hoffman has a decent article already. I will work on a Jacob article. In terms of MA Hoffman is basically THE main player on the Orthodox side which is why his work need be mentioned. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wolf2191 (talk • contribs) 03:27, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Good source

[3] good source. Wolf2191 05:50, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

(I made your latest into a new section, as the page was getting a bit long and unweildy). Yes it is a good source - by Gil Student I gather?. I have a little trouble distinguishing his own ideas from those of others that he summarises. But it would make a good basis for organising the article - on the basis of various ideas on just how Moses wrote the Torah, whether by direct dictation and all at one time, by dictation but not all at one time, whether Genesis was based on written sources available to Moses, etc. PiCo 06:55, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

To use Students own words "It's all a (poorly written) summary of an essay by R. Menachem Mendel Kasher in the addenda to one of the volumes of Torah Shelemah." Will try to work on it some other timeWolf2191 14:32, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

This article

I like very much this article but would like the mention of some of the oldest manuscripts of the torah so as to show that the latest possible date for the writing of the torah i know there are manuscripts predating that of the dead sea scrolls but I am not sure what they are named--75.43.79.238 11:56, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

I found one notable manuscript at Ketef Hinnom was found a manuscript dating to 600 BCE i will finish writing this later--75.43.79.238 11:59, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

In 1979, two silver scrolls that were used as amulets, inscribed with portions of the well-known Priestly Blessing of the Book of Numbers were discovered in a burial cave near Jerusalem. These scrolls have been dated to close to 600 BCE based on late Iron Age artifacts found in the undisturbed area of the tomb where they were located. Also based on paleographic evidence Erik Waaler, in his book "A revised date for Pentateuchal texts?" published in 2002, dates the amulets somewhat earlier than the other artifacts in the cave (725-650 BCE). Should these datings be correct than the dating of Torah to the time of Ezra would be incorrect and the date of the Torah would be much older than what most Biblical critics think it is, it would also mean it would be more likely for the Torah to have been written because of this earlier date.--129.115.38.13 12:33, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

That the amulets are dated to the 7th century only proves that Blessing inscribed on them was known in the 7th century, not that the entire Torah was known. But yes, there is room in the article for a paragraph on archaeological and other evidence of the antiquity of the Torah. But (again a "but") be sure to quote reputable academic/scholarly, sources, don't rely on your own deductions. PiCo 15:31, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Possible evidence of Mosaic authorship

In general, Wiki articles try to avoid lists and use normal prose instead - do you think you could re-write your new section as paragraphs, using lists only when you need to? (Or at the very least, introducing lists with short prose paragrpahs explaining what they mean) PiCo (talk) 17:41, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

My deletion from the Evidence section

Java, you really do have a repeated line - your 8th dot-point reads: "The Torah uses phrases which are of Egyptian origin in which the words are translated verbatim", and your 10th: "Furthermore, the Torah uses phrases which are of Egyptian origin in which the words are translated verbatim". The footnotes for both refer to the same book and same page-number.PiCo (talk) 02:59, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Revision of the Evidence section

Thanks Java, IMO it reads much better this way. I wonder if you could go even further - under the subheading "Other", some points deal with archaeological evidence, others with critical views, and some with linguistic evidence - perhaps the linguistic material could be joined with the Egyptian material and two new subheadings made for the other material? (Incidentally, this illustrates why prose is so often preferred to dot-points - it helps to structure the material, as well as in constructing an "argument", although of course we're not supposed to argue cases on Wiki).PiCo (talk) 03:15, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Later: Congratulations on your hard work on this. I'll just make a few comments that you might or might not like to take up:

• There are still a few dot-points left - perhaps you meant to delete the asterisks that create them, I don't know, but certainly the dots don't seem to me to be needed.
• The "Egyptian terminology" subsection begins: "Certain forms in standard Biblical Hebrew are borrowed from second-millennium Egyptian." This sentence isn't really needed, even as an introduction to what follows - I'd prefer just to launch straight into the substance. As you rely entirely on Hoffmeier for this section, it might be advisable to begin with something like: "According to James Hoffmeier, etc etc". You'd then need only one footnote for the entire subsection.
• The "Biblical manuscripts" subsection still has a dot-point, but it's not needed - if you delete it, you'll have a normal paragrpah for this subsection. The subsection also has no reference, although it mentions a book by Erik Waaler. If he's your source, you might like to put a footnote referencing his book at the end of the paragraph. I'm uncertain about the status of the last sentence: "Should these datings be correct than the dating of Torah to the time of Ezra would be incorrect and the date of the Torah would be much older than what most Biblical critics think it is, it would also mean it would be more likely for the Torah to have been written by Moses because of this earlier date."If this is from Waaler, then fine, but if it isn't, it needs to be referenced.
• "Correct portrayal of ancient history" is a terrible title. Better to call it "Archaeology". Again, the dot-point can be easily turned into a paragraph.
• "Antiquity of the Hebrew..." Personally I'd combine this with the Egyptian terminology subsection and call the whole thing "Linguistic evidence" or something like that - but if you want to have two subsections, they should at least be placed together, since they deal with similar subject matter.
• "Other". This subsection is largely about the antiquity of the Hebrew in the Torah, and should be included in that subsection. The very first point, about the trend to view the Pentateuch as a literary unit, relates to criticial reassessments, and perhaps could stay under the "Other" heading. Again, the dot-points could go.

I hope this is a help to you - I don't like to touch it myself as you'd probably revert anything I did! PiCo (talk) 07:43, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

The reason why the sentence starts with "Certain forms in standard Biblical Hebrew are borrowed from second-millennium Egyptian" is because different dialects of Egyptian have existed over time and the Egyptian found in the Torah was used during 2000-1000 BC if the Torah had Egyptian from say 500BC this would say the text was authored in 500BC. Furthermore it is very strange that if J document, E document, P document, D document were supposedly developed over a span of time starting at about 900BC after the dialect of Egyptian used in the Torah was already extinct! --Java7837 (talk) 08:00, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

You misunderstand my point: I was saying that you could shorten the paragraph, and thus make it more readable, by dropping the introductory sentence and going straight into the main subject: something like this: "According to James Hoffmeier, the Torah uses words and phrases of 2nd millenium BC Egyptian origin - Hoffmeier cites the words used for basket, bulrushes, pitch, reeds, river, and river-bank in the narrative of Moses' nativity, and the word for magician, among others, in the Joseph narrative. Hoffmeier concludes... (and then give a quote from Hoffmeier saying what conclusions he draws from this). This would be much more succinct and would also source your material in Hoffmeier much more securely. (Incidentally, I think you'll find you've misused the word "verbatim" in your present text - it has no connection with translation). PiCo (talk) 09:43, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

(I should have congratulated you again on the work you've done on this section - it looks much more professional now. I really would find another word or phrase for "verbatim", though - it looks very odd to a native English speaker).PiCo (talk) 09:58, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Language

According to what I know, the Torah's language lead people to believe it was written during the era of the Second Temple... Siúnrá (talk) 17:24, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

---

"although in none of these is it unambiguously stated that the five books of the modern Torah are meant, as opposed to 'instruction' in its more general sense."

In truth in these sources the reference is to תורה הזאת - THIS Torah - Its certainly referring to a specific and well-known (must be a better term) document - not instruction in the general sense.Are you sure your statement isn't OR?Wolf2191 (talk) 03:06, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

The point being made in the quoted sentence (taken from our article) is that the language used is never unambiguous - it's never clear whether the "this" of "this torah" means the Five Books or a specific instruction. But I think Siúnrá might actually be talking about the wider question of whether the Hebrew of the Pentateuch can be identified as belonging to the 5th century and later. I'm not sure of the answer to that (if that is the question). Certainly there are good reasons, on quite other grounds, for believing that the Torah was given its current form in the 2nd Temple period, but this doesn't rule out a core tradition dating from a much earlier period. (Amos and Hosaea, for example, both writing in the 8th century, make reference to an Exodus, which suggests that the Exodus as a tradition dates from at least that period). PiCo (talk) 09:13, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Sorry! I should have started a new section, I was commenting on the statement, not on Siunra. My point was that in some of the verses the term Torah simply can't be referring to instruction "in the general sense". It refers to a SPECIFIC document - whether the Pentateuch , D or some other document.

Regarding the language question - this is the subject of disagreement among scholars. The acccepted view at the moment is that the language is consistent with Hezekiah's time but these things are "liable to change withou warning".Wolf2191 (talk) 17:21, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the statements about "this torah" are always referring to a document - as in the torah in Deuteronomy which Moses sets on a scroll beside the Ark. The question is always just where the "edges", so to speak, of each torah-scroll lie - the Deuteronomy scroll seems to refer to the law-code in Deuteronomy, for example, and the other references are also mostly to law-codes (the major exception probably being the injunction against the Amalakites in Exodus). But are you saying that our article is inadequate in expressing this? PiCo (talk) 07:09, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

"Instruction in a general sense" might imply oral instruction - I'd prefer "as opposed to an earlier document that was later incorporated into the Pentateuch" or something along those lines. What do you say?Wolf2191 (talk) 01:12, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

I see your point. This is the full passage: "Statements implying belief in Mosaic authorship of torah (instruction) are also found in Joshua,[3] Kings,[4] Chronicles,[5] Ezra[6] and Nehemiah,[7] although in none of these is it unambiguously stated that the five books of the modern Torah are meant, as opposed to "instruction" in its more general sense." Perhaps the answer is simply to shorten the passage, like this: "Statements implying belief in Mosaic authorship of torah (instruction) are also found in Joshua,[3] Kings,[4] Chronicles,[5] Ezra[6] and Nehemiah,[7] although in none of these is it unambiguously stated that the five books of the modern Torah are meant." I think this is a bit more elegant (as English). What do you think? PiCo (talk) 05:55, 13 October 2008 (UTC)