A trip through the Hebrew Bible, session 3, April 2 nd, 2015 at 9:30 am Today marks the halfway mark through this course of study, session three of six. As the Tanakh has been divided into three sections, it made sense to try and cover each section in two lectures. Thus we are not going into any depth into the actual writings; this is really a survey course, covering the overall understanding of the Hebrew Bible. We finished the first section, called the Torah, last month. This is the most important section for the Jewish people. It covers all of the laws of Israel, and as these people are a people of the law, this section is their most important. I think there are some 615 different laws outlined in the Torah. The word Torah, means the teachings or the laws. Remember the Torah ended in the book of Deuteronomy with the death of Moses and the people still on the eastern bank of the Jordan River. They have not entered into the Promised Land. We start the Nevi im, the prophets with the Book of Joshua. Joshua was the second in charge to Moses and took over the leadership of the Jews as they entered the Promised Land. The writers of this book and the other books of the historical prophets were probably the Deuteronomists, the same writer of the Book of Deuteronomy. Scholars have suggested this was a school of scholars who wrote or edited the final edition of these historic books. These books include, Joshua, Judges, 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings. They form the historical account of Israel from the death of Moses (about 1250 BCE) through to the Babylonian exile in 586 BCE. These books have a uniformed belief in Worshipping only one God, the catastrophic consequences of idolatry, a concern for the centrality of Jerusalem and a belief in the supremacy of the eternal Davidic dynasty. You will find these themes throughout those six books 1
and also through the Book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy forms an excellent transition between the Torah and the Prophets. There is a verse in Joshua where he says, he must return home and destroy his house-hold Gods. (Read Joshua 24:14-28).. This is Joshua talking, and he is telling the Hebrew people to put away the gods of their forefathers from Mesopotamia and from Egypt. This section suggest that the people still worshiped other gods. Joshua now calls them to put away these other gods, as will he and that the only god they may worship from henceforth, will be the God, Yahweh. I believe that Monotheism was introduced by Moses and became the norm in Israel after the time of Moses. Thus the early patriarchs probably worshipped many gods as was the norm in that part of the world in 1500-1300 BCE. As the priests rewrote their history, they wrote them as a monotheistic people, but I think they were covering up the early patriarchs! That is the way they saw them and that was the story they told. They were not trying to tell lies, but to show the patriarchs in the monotheistic light, because that was the way the Jewish faith had evolved. Well, let s look at the story of the historical prophets. The people of Israel waited thirty days following the death of Moses, then they made their way across the Jordan River and into the land of Milk and Honey, the Promised Land. I think the authors of this account meant us to compare Moses with Joshua. There are a number of clues. The waters of the Jordan River were piled up as were the waters of the sea of Reeds for Moses. When they crossed the Jordan River, the first thing that Joshua had them do, was celebrate the Passover. With Moses, the last thing they did before leaving Egypt was to celebrate the Passover. In Joshua 23 we see his farewell speech as Moses gave three such speeches in Deuteronomy. In Joshua 24 we see the renewal of the covenant with God at Shechem. Moses received the covenant from God on Mount Sinai. The authors wanted us to see Joshua as the new Moses! 2
According to the Book of Joshua, the land of Canaan was quickly conquered. Other parts of the Bible do not support this fact. Jerusalem wasn t conquered and settled until the time of David, two hundred years later! Judges suggests that the cities in the south were not settled until some years after the death of Joshua. Judges 1 gives a long list of places from which the Canaanites were not expelled. Archeological evidence contradicts the pictures painted by the writers of Joshua as well. When cities were conquered in the ancient world, they were usually levelled and new cities built on top of the ruble. These slowly rising mounds were called Tells and each successive layer represented a destroyed city. Little evidence of this destruction has been discovered in 13 th Century BCE, Canaan. Some of the sites recorded destroyed by Joshua were not even occupied during this period in history. For example, Jericho and Ai were destroyed some two hundred years before Joshua and were not occupied during the thirteen century. During this period of history, there was much upheaval throughout the Mediterranean world. We have the Trojan wars. The Hittites were invading Asia Minor. Populations were moving and groups were revolting against their overlords. And many ancient gods were being replaced. The Philistines, a boat people from Greece, arrived in Canaan about this time. They settled the area of the Gaza strip. These would be encountered by the Israelites about two centuries later. It is from the Philistines that the name Palestine came. There is some evidence suggesting this unrest was also felt among the Canaanite people as well. It is into this unrest that the Hebrew people arrived about 1250 BCE. I think the Hebrews settled into the mountainous central highlands which were sparsely populated and may have joined up with some of the Canaanite tribes. Again, archaeological evidence have discovered a number of new small villages established during the 12 and 13 th centuries in these areas and amazingly there were 3
no pig bones found in these sites. Many of these villages are mentioned in the Hebrew Bible. We also have the Merneptah Stele, planted about 1204 BCE. I mentioned this stele last month. A stele is a large, flat rock with an inscription carved into it. On this stele, Merneptah boasted that he had destroyed a number of people, including the Hebrew people. This was obviously an idle boast, for the people were not destroyed, but it does indicate that there were a tribe of people known as the Hebrews living in Palestine in 1204 BCE. Remember these stories were recorded some centuries after the events took place. The writers using a number of different sources, some oral, and the many folk-tales about their past heroes. Stories have a habit of being embellished as they are retold over the years. I am sure this was true for these ancient people as they would be for us today. I think Jericho and Ai were destroyed by other local tribal wars, and somehow their stories were intermingled with the Hebrew folk-lore and these stories were put into the Hebrew historical accounts. The story of Rahab, the Jericho prostitute who helped the Jewish spies and later became a member of the Hebrew people was told to record how some of the Canaanite people became part of the Jewish race. (The Book of Ruth which we will look at in the final section, does the same. It suggested that even king David had foreign blood.) The Book of Ruth is placed between Judges and 1 Samuel in the English translation of the Old Testament, following the Septuagint (Greek) translation. It comes here in timing, but the Tanakh has moved it to the writings section of scriptures. After the death of Joshua, the Hebrew people entered into the period of the Judges. This era lasted about two hundred years. The land of Canaan at this time was composed of a few city states, and a number of tribes or clans scattered throughout most of the land. Israel had twelve such clans named after the twelve sons of Israel. 4
The tribal leaders were referred to as Judges or in Hebrew Shofetim. (Another word for your Hebrew vocabulary) Which could be translated chieftain. Although they did exercise some judicial authority, their main function was as military leaders. Interestingly, the Book of Judges, mentions some twelve such leaders. The recurring theme throughout Judges is sin, punishment, repentance, and redemption. A tribe would turn away from God, usually as some Hebrew men married outside the Jewish race, and would take up the gods of their foreign wives. As they fell away, God would allow them to be conquered by their enemies, the people would call out for relief and God would rise up a military leader to free them from bondage and peace would reign in the land. This is of course the theme of most scriptures! These shofetims would often be very charismatic people who would bring the people back to worshipping the one true God. These scrimmages were usually confined to one or two tribes at a time. By listing the number twelve, the authors were indeed trying to emphases the twelve tribes of Israel. Although not all twelve tribes are represented on this list. One person does not list his tribal connection and there is one woman listed here. The Book of judges was probably composed by linking together the various folk-tales collected together during the eighth century BCE. They were later redacted by the Deuteronomist Historians during the exile in the sixth century and it became part of the scriptures. Let s look at the two most familiar stories here. First the only woman Judge listed is Deborah. She was from the tribe of Ephraim. Her fight was against the Canaanites. In Judges 4:5 she is seen as doing some of her judicial duties. Her General was Barak who was quite successful against the Canaanites. He had the help of soldiers from Naphtali and Zebulun, two local tribes of the Jewish people. The 5
Canaanite general had managed to escape the battle and sought refuge in the tent of a Kenite woman, who managed to kill him in his sleep. She was from an non Hebrew tribe! Thus two women were responsible for the success of this war and the song of Deborah was written to record this victorious deed. This is found in Judges 5 and may be the oldest written text in the Hebrew Bible! Probably the most popular Judge is Samson. He was not a soldier or military commander. He was the typical strong man. He was born under unique circumstances. His mother was barren until she conceived Samson. This was unique for several matriarchs in the Hebrew Bible and also for the mother of John the Baptist in the Christian Bible. He was dedicated to God at his birth as a Nazirite, no alcohol and no hair cutting. (As was John the Baptist!) Samson had unusual strength. His one major weakness was Philistine women. His fights were with the Philistines, these were the Boat-people from Greece, who settled in the area of the Gaza strip.) He had several encounters with the Philistines, but he never led an army. He was a oneman show. He was betrayed by a Philistine woman, Delilah, who cut his hair, allowing him to be captured by the Philistines. During one of their religious festivals, Samson was paraded out to their temple and chained between two massive pillars. As his hair had regrown, so had his strength, and he managed to collapse the temple onto his enemies, killing many, including himself. The only time the Hebrew tribes were united in Judges was in a civil war; the eleven tribes against the tribe of Benjamin. This was one of the smaller tribes and they were almost obliterated in this war. One member of this tribe had killed a wife of a Levite, and had caused this backlash against this tribe. The Levites were the tribe charged with attending the religious sites throughout Canaan. The first Jewish King, 6
Saul came from this tribe of Benjamin, as did Saul of Tarsus in the New Testament. The Book of Judges moves in a slow progression towards the need for a king. The only way they could survive as a nation was to be united under a king. The final authors of this part of the Bible, the Deuteronomist Historians have a kind of love-hate feeling about the monarchy. We should move on now to the creation of the monarchy. This brings us to the first book of Samuel. Samuel was an interesting combination of Judge and Prophet. Samuel is the last of the Judges and we will talk about the role of the prophets in Israel at our next session. The authors seem to swing between pro-monarchy and anti- monarchy position. As we read through the various sources of the monarchy, we see this dichotomy; the weight of evidence would come down on the anti-monarchy side. They really didn t want a king. Yahweh was their king! Why did they need another? Even Samuel was reluctant to anoint a king. But he felt compelled to do so by God. And Saul was anointed the first king of Israel about 1025 BCE. This happened in three different ways in scripture. (Suggesting three different sources). In 1 Samuel 9, Saul is anointed privately by Samuel. 1 Samuel 10: recorded Saul s election by lottery. 1 Samuel 11 records how Saul was victorious over the Ammonites in battle and was elected by popular demand. These may be complementary ways of securing office, or they could be from three competing sources. Take your pick! Saul was a striking figure. He was tall and handsome; he was a winner of battles; charismatic; and associated with ecstatic prophecy. He was from the tribe of Benjamin who were almost obliterated in the Book of Judges. We date the era of the Judges from about 1225 to 1025 BCE. Saul was anointed king in 1025 BCE. 7
Saul was a popular choice until David appeared on the scene. Then his popularity decreased. His prophetic utterances appeared as the ravings of a lunatic. He became depressed and defensive and insanely jealous of David. He even tried to destroy David at one point. There are also three different passages of David making his appearance in scriptures. 1 Samuel 16:13, he is secretly anointed King of Judah by Samuel. This was rather tricky as Saul was still alive! David is from Bethlehem, of the tribe of Judah. He is the youngest of eight brothers. (Sound familiar). The second account, David is summoned by Saul to play music to help Saul get out of his depression (1 Samuel 16:23). And finally the famous story of the young David slaying Goliath (1 Samuel 17) Again, take your pick. I can accept all three as having some reference to history. David became a great friend with Jonathan, Saul s son and actually marries Michel, Saul s daughter. David was the most important king in Israel and his monarchy is still looked upon as the golden days of the land. Saul is almost forgotten. David and Moses are the two most important characters in the Tanakh. There is more written about these two, than anyone else in scripture. Eventually Saul and his son Jonathan were killed in battle with the Philistines. And we see David slowly taken hold of the kingdom and bringing the twelve tribes together. One of his first acts was to conquer Jerusalem from the Jebusites. This would become his capital. A rather smart move, as Jerusalem was not part of any tribe before this time. Jerusalem was to play a very important role in Israel s history for the rest of time. (And still does so!) David moved the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. The Holy City would become God s home and the centre of Hebrew worship. God also told David that his kingdom would be eternal (2 Samuel 7:8-17). This 8
will become very important in the New Testament. Jesus was a direct descendent of King David as the writers of the New Testament took great pains to prove! The Biblical writers did not portray David as the perfect king. He was at times, all too human. The Hebrew kings were never considered divine as in many ancient cultures, and of course, the Roman Emperor of the first century. David s worst moral slip was with Bathsheba. She was married to one of David s soldiers, and yet David still pursued her. She became pregnant with David s child and David brought her husband back from the front to sleep with his wife, which he refused to do. A soldier must remain pure while he was at war! Thus David had no choice but to have him killed and then he married Bathsheba. Their child eventually died, but the second child born to Bathsheba, was Solomon, who became David s successor. It was Solomon who built the beautiful temple in Jerusalem. (Interestingly, if you read through the book of Chronicles which is another account of history of the Israelites, they ignore this story about Bathsheba altogether!) David is looked upon as the most important king in the history of Israel. It was to David s line that God promised an eternal kingdom (2 Samuel 7:8-17). This was God s fourth covenant with the Hebrew people. There was a constant tension between the covenant given to Moses on Sinai and this covenant with David and his successors for ever. Hand-out the Chronological History of Israel (Thanks to Linda Aldridge for this sheet. David s monarchy flourished in Canaan primarily because of a power vacuum that existed in the eleventh century. Egypt was weakened and had lost control over the Canaan, as had Mesopotamia. There was no major power to challenge David kingdom. He managed an uneasy 9
truce with the neighbouring states and controlled the eastward expansion of the Philistines. David was also considered a poet and musician. He is credited with writing the book of Psalms. Some may actually date back to the time of David, but many actually had a much later origin. The biblical writers describe David with all his foibles. He was a charismatic leader who brought together the twelve tribes of Israel. He was an excellent military strategist. But his morality was not always of the highest calibre. He obviously committed adultery with Bathsheba and then had her husband killed in battle. In later life, David became suspicious, vindictive and even fearful. Towards the end of David s life, palace intrigue was rampant. His eldest son Absalom was killed in a palace revolt against his father. Eventually, Solomon the second child of David and Bathsheba became king, but not without more intrigue led by Nathan the prophet and Bathsheba. Solomon did become a good king and managed to hold the twelve tribes together and to build the magnificent temple on Mount Zion in Jerusalem on palace property, thus signifying the close association of the monarchy and the religious beliefs of the people. Solomon like David, ruled over a golden age in Israel. Solomon transferred the Ark of the Covenant into this newly built temple, thus further cementing the Sinai Covenant with Moses, and the Covenant with David. Solomon exploited Israel s position on the north-south trade routes. He fortified a number of cities and through marriages he maintained a political alliance with his neighbours. He was noted for his wisdom and is credited with writing the books of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. This was not true, but probably the beginning of writing down these early stories happened during his reign. We see the early appearance of the J source about this time. 10
We date the reign of David from 1004 to 965 BCE Solomon s reign from 965 to 928 BCE Solomon had a great court with a very large harem. He was reported to have had seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines. (That is a lot of women to keep happy!) He also had a very efficient army. As this was rather expensive, Solomon levied large taxes on his people. He also introduced a concept called corvée a rather elaborate system for demanding free forced labour from the population. This was very unpopular, especially with the ten tribes in the north. There was always an unease with the northern part of the kingdom, which eventually led to the separation of the two parts of Israel. David and Solomon changed the course of Israel s history. No longer would it be a loose collection of tribes. They were now united under of king and this proved difficult at times. Their king had always been Yahweh, but now they had an earthly monarch. The people had an allegiance to both God and King. Sometimes this allegiance would be in conflict. They also had a covenant with both God and their King. If the king sinned, the people suffered. If the king worshipped other gods, the people would be conquered and forced into exile. This became the reason for the later history of Israel according to the writers of the Hebrew Bible! On the death of Solomon in 928 BCE his son Rehoboam was anointed king. The northern tribes used this time to rebel and another son, Jeroboam was appointed their king. And here we see the permanent separation of the two kingdoms in Israel. The northern kingdom of the ten tribes was called Israel and the southern two tribes of Judah and Benjamin were to be called Judah. (This is where the term Jews came from this tribal name!) The south included the capital of Jerusalem. The northern capital was eventually moved to Samaria. 11
Let s look at this word covenant for a bit. This was a very important part of the ancient world, and most kingdoms had covenants between the king and his people. A covenant was a treaty or contract between two parties. There are probably more covenants in archeological findings than any other documents from near eastern studies. These documents usually followed a similar order; the Suzerain or King with his vassals or subjects. Occasionally they would be between a conquered country and its conqueror. There are four major covenants mentioned in Hebrew Scriptures. Each of these covenants have Yahweh as the king with the Hebrew people. These covenants were an important part of the history of the Jewish people and their relationship with their God, Yahweh. The first covenant we find was between God and Noah (Genesis 9:8-11). After the flood God promised Noah and the people of the earth that never again would they be destroyed by water. The sign of this covenant was the rainbow, so each time we see a rainbow in the sky we are reminded of God s first covenant with all humankind. (There was no Hebrew nation at this time in pre-history). The second covenant was between God and Abraham (Genesis 15:18). Here God promised to make Abraham a father of a great nation. The sign of this covenant was circumcision. Each male child would be circumcised on the eighth day to mark him as a member of this tribe. They never circumcised women. Women were members of the Jewish race by virtue of their father and later their husbands. (The Christian covenant was baptism, replacing the rite of circumcision. Notice we baptism both genders equally!) Christians believe that in the eyes of God there is no male and female. All are equal. We have not always acted as though this were true. The third covenant was with Moses on Mount Sinai (Exodus 20:1-14). In this covenant Moses received the Ten Commandments as a code of behaviour. God promised them a land that flowed with milk and 12
honey. They were expected to keep the law, which included the Ten Commandments and the other four hundred or so laws contained in the Torah. They were now required to believe in one God, Yahweh. This was the mark of the Jewish people throughout the rest of their history. This is amazing when we realize that they existed in the midst of a very polytheistic society including most of the Hebrew people prior to Moses! The fourth covenant was with King David. (2 Samuel 7:13-16). This covenant was between God and the king. God promised David an everlasting kingdom but he must continue to worship and serve this one God. The people believed that as long as they obeyed this God, all would be well. The writers of scripture saw that this was usually the case. When the king fell away from God, they would be punished as a nation. Meanwhile their holy city and their holy temple would protect them and they would be kept safe in God s hands. It was only when they broke covenant that bad things happened to them. The northern kingdom of Israel did not follow the line of David after the death of Jeroboam, and many of their kings led the people into worshipping of false gods,. The Assyrian empire eventually rose up and conquered Israel in 722 BCE and most of the inhabitants were taken into exile. And the ten tribes of the north basically disappeared from history for ever. They were probably assimilated into the empire and lost all of their Jewish identity. That was the usual fate of a conquered people. The throne of the southern kingdom of Judah was inhabited continuously by descendants of David. They felt they were the true people of God. They had the holy city and temple. They had the descendants of David on the throne. They were very secure in their place. They felt they were invincible! The Assyrians came close to 13
attacking Jerusalem, but then the armies had to return home to put down a revolution. And Jerusalem was spared for a time. The Southern Kingdom of Judah survived for the next one hundred and fifty years when yet another major power arose in the east, when the Babylonians attacked and eventually conquered Jerusalem in 586 BCE and took most of the inhabitants into exile and destroyed the beautiful temple. Can you image how the people would have felt? This should have marked the end of the Jewish nation, but God s greatest miracle was about to happen. They survived the exile and returned to Jerusalem in 537 BCE to rebuild their temple and their city and their faith. A number of thing happened to make this possible. The priests who went into exile started to put together the various sources into what would ultimately become the Tanakh. This helped to maintain their faith and to understand their place in society as worshipping one God, not many. The people did not get assimilated into the Babylonian society. The Jews managed to keep pure within this society. The prophets were recording some of their faith beliefs and encouraging the people to maintain their religion. Next meeting we will deal with the role of the prophets in the development of the Jewish faith. Finally, the Babylonian empire was conquered by the Persians who had a different way of dealing with the conquered people. They preferred to set up the conquered as a state of their empire and give them a certain amount of freedom, as long as they paid their taxes to the empire. Thus in 537 BCE the Jewish people were allowed to return home and actually given funds to rebuild their city and temple. Next session we will look at the development and role of the prophet and some of the written works of the major and Minor Prophets. 14
See you again on April 17 th at 9:30 am Questions? Concerns? Comments? 15