Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible

CONTENTS

Part 1 Comparative Studies
1 History and Methods
2 Comparative Studies, Scholarship, and Theology

Part 2 Literature of the Ancient Near East
3 Summary of the Literature of the Ancient Near East

Part 3 Religion
4 The Gods
5 Temples and Rituals
6 State and Family Religion

Part 4 Cosmos
7 Cosmic Geography
8 Cosmology and Cosmogony

Part 5 People
9 Understanding the Past: Human Origins and Role
10 Understanding the Past: Historiography
11 Encountering the Present: Guidance for Life—Divination and Omens
12 Encountering the Present: Context of Life—Cities and Kingship
13 Encountering the Present: Guidelines for Life—Law and Wisdom
14 Pondering the Future on Earth and after Death

Postscript

History
The rediscovery of Egypt began in earnest in the eighteenth century AD and of Mesopotamia in the mid-nineteenth century AD. With the decipherment of the ancient languages, the tens of thousands of texts that were being unearthed began to be translated and analyzed. In many cases the motives of the adventurers and scholars represented a strange combination of politics, interest in antiquities (or treasures), and biblical apologetics. Initial studies were inclined to be defensive of the Bible, even if such a stance required the dismissal or distortion of the cuneiform texts. The flurry of activity in connection with the relationship of these texts to the Bible had reached a critical mass of sorts by the turn of the century; and, consequently, widespread attention was attracted by the series of lectures presented in 1902 under the auspices of the German Oriental Society and attended by Kaiser Wilhelm II. What the Scopes trial was to the discussion of evolution, these lectures were to comparative studies. The lecturer was the noted Assyriologist, Friedrich Delitzsch, son of the famous conservative biblical commentator, Franz Delitzsch.

Delitzsch’s lectures, entitled “Babel und Bibel,” brought a more focused attention to the impact of Assyriology on the understanding of the Bible. More controversial, however, was his claim that the literature of the Bible was dependent on, and even borrowed from, the literature of the dominant culture represented in the region of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. His contention was: “The Mesopotamian evidence shows us not just parallels to Old Testament customs and ideas, but genuine evidence regarding their origin.” The inevitable conclusion would therefore be that the origin of the Old Testament was human, not divine, and that the Christian faith therefore had its roots in pagan mythology. Two more lectures elaborating on this thesis came over the next two years. In the second, more objectionable than the first, he questioned the appropriateness of the traditional theological terminology used to describe the Bible (e.g., revelation, inspiration) in light of its now evident dependency. As H. Huffmon observes, “Delitzsch had moved from Babylonia as interpreter and illustrator of the Old Testament to a general attack on the religious value of the Old Testament for the modern German.” At this time, many Assyriologists were people of faith, with the result that Delitzsch was criticized vehemently in their written responses to his lectures. Over the following decades, however, as Assyriology became increasingly secular and its scholars, if concerned with the Bible at all, had embraced the tenets of critical scholarship, Delitzsch’s lectures became recognized as a watershed in comparative studies.

The result was a growing ideological divide between those who viewed comparative studies from a confessional standpoint seeking to use Assyriology in their apologetics, and those who viewed it from a scientific or secular standpoint viewing the Bible as a latecomer in world literature filled with what were little more than adaptations from the mythology of the ancient Near East. Critical scholars considered their opponents to be naïve traditionalists. Confessional scholars considered their opponents to be godless heretics. As evidence emerged that did not fit easily with a desire to vindicate the Bible, the critics became more strident, and many came to agree with Delitzsch’s contention that “the Old Testament was no book of Christian religion and should be excluded from Christian theology.” In response confessional scholars became more entrenched and defensive. The cycle of division drove its wedges deeper and deeper.

The space of a century allows current scholars to recognize that Delitzsch’s lectures were not motivated solely by a sense of scientific objectivity. He was a child of his culture as we all are, and his obvious nationalism can now be seen to have been encumbered with not only anti-Christian but also anti-Semitic sentiment. Huffmon summarizes the regression well: “In dealing with Assyriological matters, as Delitzsch did in his first two lectures, he combined scholarship with special pleading; in dealing with Old Testament materials, Delitzsch mixed learning with considerable naiveté; in dealing with the New Testament, or, more specifically Jesus, Delitzsch displayed naiveté and perfidy.”

Delitzsch’s work spawned a movement, never widely popular but remarkable for its excesses, called “Pan-Babylonianism,” which argued that all world myths and all Christian Scriptures (Old and New Testament alike) were simply versions of Babylonian mythology. For instance, the stories of Jesus in the Gospels were based on the Gilgamesh Epic, and the passion of Christ was based on Marduk mythology.

Even as Assyriology and Egyptology (and also Hittitology) emerged as serious, autonomous, academic disciplines, the attention of many remained focused on the Bible. As discoveries of major archives followed one after another from the 1920s to the 1970s, each was greeted with initial excitement as scholars made great claims for the impact of the archive on the Bible. In most cases, time and more careful attention resulted in many, if not all, of the initial claims being rejected. Methodological maturity began to be displayed in the careful work of W. W. Hallo, who promoted a balanced approach called the “contextual approach,” which seeks to identify and discuss both similarities and differences that can be observed between the Bible and the texts from the ancient Near East. “Hallo’s goal, ‘is not to find the key to every biblical phenomenon in some ancient Near Eastern precedent, but rather to silhouette the biblical text against its wider literary and cultural environment.’ Thus we must not succumb either to ‘parallelomania’ or to ‘parallelophobia.’ ” It is Hallo’s work that has provided the foundation for the following discussion of methodology.

Methodology
What Is Comparative Study?

Just as it would be foolish to think that all Europeans share the same culture, it would be a mistake to suppose that Babylonians, Hittites, Egyptians, Israelites, and Sumerians all shared the same culture. There would even be noticeable differences between the second-millennium Babylonians of Hammurabi’s time and the first-millennium Babylonians at the time of Nebuchadnezzar. Nevertheless, there were some elements that many of the cultures of the ancient Near East held in common, and certainly many areas in which they shared more commonality with one another than they do with our modern culture.

Ultimately the goal of background studies is to examine the literature and archaeology of the ancient Near East in order to reconstruct the behavior, beliefs, culture, values, and worldview of the people. These could alternatively be called cultural studies. Comparative studies constitutes a branch of cultural studies in that it attempts to draw data from different segments of the broader culture (in time and/or space) into juxtaposition with one another in order to assess what might be learned from one to enhance the understanding of another.

The range of this understanding can include behavior and belief within the culture, or the ways in which a culture is represented in art or literature. Within the literary category, areas for research include the larger issues of literary genre, the analysis of specific traditions and texts, and the use of individual metaphors, idioms, and words.

Development of Sound Methodology for Comparative Study

As one can infer from the history related at the beginning of the chapter, early practitioners were distracted from this larger task by curiosity or by axes to grind. Whether defending or critiquing the Bible or defending the ancient Near East, some scholars became enmeshed in using cultural and comparative studies as a means to a polemical end. As is often the case in polemics of any stripe, techniques such as selectivity and special pleading can create distortion. This polemical application resulted in the abuse of comparative studies from scholars at either end of the spectrum. Consequently some confessional scholars concluded that comparative studies posed a danger to the biblical text when they saw it wielded as a weapon of skepticism and unbelief. At the same time some critical scholars openly ridiculed what they saw as feeble attempts by apologists to use comparative studies to prove that the Bible was true.

It took some generations for correctives to be put in place that served to establish an appropriate methodology for background and comparative study, which will be introduced below. Even as these have been put into place over the last several decades, abuse and misunderstanding persist in pockets. These methodological correctives have exposed the dangers inherent in research that ignores either similarities or differences between the Bible and the ancient Near East.

One of the earliest and most significant correctives was the insistence that neither biblical studies nor ancient Near Eastern studies should be subordinated to the other. Both represent autonomous disciplines, though they can mutually benefit from cross-fertilization. Even as comparative studies are important for those seeking to understand the Bible, study of the ancient Near East is not merely a subservient field to biblical studies. Assyriology, Egyptology, and the like are disciplines in themselves and valid academic, cultural, and linguistic pursuits. Comparative study by Bible students is just one application of the findings from those fields. ...

Goals of Background and Comparative Study

I would contend .. that students should undertake background study with four goals in mind:

1. Students may study the history of the ancient Near East as a means of recovering knowledge of the events that shaped the lives of people in the ancient world.
2. Students may study archaeology as a means of recovering the lifestyle reflected in the material culture of the ancient world.
3. Students may study the literature of the ancient Near East as a means of penetrating the heart and soul of the people who inhabited the ancient world that Israel shared.
4. Students may study the language of the ancient Near East as a means of gaining additional insight into the semantics, lexicography, idioms, and metaphors used in Hebrew. ...

These goals then each contribute to comparative studies and will help us understand the Old Testament better.

Extract from ... Postscript

Generalizations are always misleading (including that one). As hazardous as generalizations can be, they also can provide a helpful educational tool if used in a careful, nuanced way. Many of the specialists in the field of ancient Near Eastern studies have steadfastly eschewed the sort of synthesis that has been presented in this book, preferring instead the safe and reliable harbors of description. Their caution is to be commended and the integrity they bring to their discipline has made their work a tremendous resource.

The synthesis that I have offered is undoubtedly characterized by assessments that some scholars will judge to be misleading, premature, or even wrongheaded. But my intention was not to provide a failsafe guide to crawl inside the mind of someone from the ancient Near East. This is not possible and will never be possible. Instead, I desired to sift through the information provided by the specialists who have diligently made the literatures and cultures of the ancient Near East available to us, to perceive some of the important basics of that ancient cognitive environment. I attempted this specifically with the intention of demonstrating that Israel was indeed a partaker of this cognitive environment and shared many of the basics in some degree with its neighbors.

As we have studied the cognitive environments of the ancient Near East, the similarities across a broad spectrum of issues have emerged. The foundations, at least, show significant homogeneity. Where there are differences, they emerge due to a number of factors. Some could be the result of the physical environment (e.g., climate, topography): Egypt with its Nile, the Levant with its forbidding mountains, or southern Mesopotamia with its alluvial basin. Others are the result of sociopolitical realities or developments (e.g., the cities of Mesopotamia). Perhaps more significant are the driving forces that come to inhabit individual cultures and serve as catalysts that shape the unique characteristics of each. Egypt had its sense of afterlife that was fueled by the idea of a divinized king. In life he spoke as a god, and the only acceptable change of status after death was promotion. Mesopotamia had its divination, an institution fueled by a king whose divine sponsorship legitimated his rule. As son of the god, he was the one to whom the gods spoke. Israel had its covenant with its one God, Yahweh, who spoke through his covenant and the prophets, who were its guardians and champions.

The common cognitive environment was not borrowed from one culture to another. A cognitive environment is a cultural heritage shaped by infinite forces and influences generation by generation, through complexities that cannot be traced or identified. Even today when one culture decides to imbibe deeply of the cognitive environment of another (e.g., the Japanese adoption of Western culture), the result is a complex mix of that which is adopted wholesale, that which is adapted, that which is taken at one level without really being understood, that which is utterly rejected, and on and on in innumerable variations.

The literature of a culture reflects its own cognitive environment with all of the subtleties and nuances that have been forged both in continuity and discontinuity with the general culture. The extent to which the cultural environment expressed in any piece of literature derives from the commonalities is the extent to which one may detect familiarity, allusion, intertextuality, polemics, interaction, or even mimicry or adaptation. But it is never straightforward or simple. Our analysis of any literature will be more significant when we move beyond the forces and processes that shaped it to an understanding of how it functions and what it reflects in its new environment. This is true whether we are considering the intracultural use of the Atrahasis Epic in the Gilgamesh Epic, or of the motifs of the Tale of Anzu inEnuma Elish; or the intercultural use of El mythology by the Hittites or the treaty formula by the Israelites. It is the understanding of the cognitive environment that contributes most to the interpretation. Literary sources and history of composition have their place, but their significance pales in comparison. Interior literary analysis, whether structuralist or rhetorical, is important, but must be informed by knowledge of the cognitive environment lest the issues of modernity or postmodernity fuel the effort. ...