(4 votes, average: 4.25 out of 5)
Loading...QUESTION:
Do you have a suggestion for a book concerning the OT’s construction? I believe in the History of God (by K. Armstrong) she mentioned that there were about five distinct writers for the OT. Is this the scholarly view and do you have a book suggestion to delve deeper into it?
RESPONSE:
Right! The Old Testament (for Christians; otherwise: the Jewish Scriptures, the Hebrew Bible; the Tanakh – these are all more or less synonyms.)
It’s been on my mind a lot lately. Right now, my current writing project is a college-level textbook on the entire Bible, Genesis to Revelation. This seems to me to be way too much to cram into a semester, but as it turns out, something like half the colleges in the country teach biblical courses this way, rather than having Hebrew Bible in one semester and New Testament another. And, in my judgment, the textbooks currently available for the course are not as good as they should be. So my publisher, some years ago, urged me to write one myself. I decided to make the attempt, and I’m in the midst of it right now.
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I agree with Dr. Ehrman on Richard Elliott Friedman’s book, “Who Wrote the Bible?” It is an amazing book to read! Sort of like a detective story figuring out who wrote which parts of the Torah and when. If you like the “Synoptic Problem,” you will love J, E, P, D (and R).
Dr. Ehrman, whom do the Hebrew scholars think redacted (the Radactor, “R”) the Torah? I know who Mr. Freidman thinks it is. But is this a majority view?
I’m afraid we don’t know. Even those of us who claim we do. 🙂
Prof. Ehrman
I find it interesting that you regard Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman’s “The Bible Unearthed” as one of the two recent best books out there… Maybe I should ask that you qualify the statement. Why do you think it is one of the best two recent books on the Hebrew Bible? (I personally think that Finkelstein and Silberman are a bit too minimalistic in their approach, to the point of being a bit too skeptic. I think a more balanced view is that of William G. Dever, two of his books that I could recommend is “Did God have a Wife? Archaeology and Folk Religion in Ancient Israel” and “What did the Biblical Writers know & when did they know it?” I suppose one of the classic works on OT background is Roland de Vaux’s “Hoe het oude Israel leefde”/ “Israel its life and institutions.” , the original was in French>. I think that Mark S. Smith’s can also help someone grasp the sitz im leben (sorry I can’t remember what the English equivalent is right now) of the authors of the Hebrew Bible.
I realise that you have an almost impossible task, as the field of Old Testament studies is immensely vast and there are a lot of heavy weight scholars. How do you approach the writing of an introduction?
INteresting. Dever is usually ranked among the minimalists, isn’t he??
I think Finkelstein and Silberman’s book is insightful, perspicuous, and persuasive. And it’s gotten a lot of air time among scholars.
On how to write an Intro: I may devote a blog post to the question. It ain’t easy!
Yet, Finkelstein and Silberman seems to be more minimalistic. Hope you do devote a post to the question.
Friedman’s book is far and away the best! His translation and commentary of the Torah is also spectacular, if one can get used to reading backwards. dcs
Am I correct in thinking there is no archeological evidence or Egyptian records that would indicate a significant number of Jews were ever enslaved in Egypt? Thus no plagues, no exodus. Could Moses have been a composite of the generals who led the battles against the neighboring tribes or city-states in the Levant?
You’re correct. My hunch is that Moses is a completely legendary figure.
On a related yet separate note, what is your opinion of Karen Armstrong as a scholar? I loved her book “History og God” but looking back I am not sure if all her claims are supported by evidence… What are your thoughts?
I’m afraid I’m not an expert on the topics she writes on! So I don’t have much of a basis for saying….
Deuteronomy 34
5 And Moses the servant of the Lord died there in Moab, as the Lord had said. 6 He buried him[a] in Moab, in the valley opposite Beth Peor, but to this day no one knows where his grave is. 7 Moses was a hundred and twenty years old when he died, yet his eyes were not weak nor his strength gone. 8 The Israelites grieved for Moses in the plains of Moab thirty days, until the time of weeping and mourning was over
i don’t know how Christians believes that Moses wrote (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy)
and the above quote shows that he was dead and buried using the past tense and that he was 120 years old when he died and no one knows where his grave is
its obvious that he was not the writer its does not even need any research i think
Does anyone know what the current academic evaluation is of Umberto Cassuto’s published eight lectures challenging the Documentary Hypothesis?
Not I!
Dr. Ehrman you are brilliant. Thank you for your ministry of liberation. Do you believe the Odes of Solomon are an OT apocrypha as opposed to NT apocrypha? Thank you sir.
They are Jewish and not Christian, if that’s what you mean, and so are meant to carry on the tradition of the OT rather than the traditions about Jesus and his followrs.