An Informal Overview of the Whole Bible

A few years ago I put together an informal summary of the whole Bible: "Bible Connections: A Summary of the Bible, and How the Material Fits Together."

If this sounds helpful to you, you can access that material at my site "Bible Connections": https://bibleconnections.wordpress.com/connections-2/

The same material can be accessed at my "Love of Bible Study" site, where I call it "A Book of Biblical Proportions": https://theloveofbiblestudy.com/chapter-7-a-book-of-biblical-proportions-1-gospels-and-acts/

Torah and Haftarah

I wrote about the Torah, or Pentateuch, a couple years ago, and in a couple other posts about the biblical law. For a long time I've enjoyed the book Torah: A Modern Commentary, edited by Gunther Plaut (New York: Union of American Hebrew Congregations, 1981), which wonderfully takes one on a year-long journey through this most sacred part of the Tanakh. Only more recently did I purchase Plaut's helpful book, The Haftarah Commentary (also UAHC Press, 1996). The following is interesting to me because, as a Christian, I'm familiar with the cycles of lectionary readings, but in Judaism, the reading is focused upon the yearly Torah portions (parshahs) with corresponding haftarah readings.

The author of the "Judaism 101" site writes, "Each week in synagogue, we read (or, more accurately, chant, because it is sung) a passage from the Torah. This passage is referred to as a parshah. The first parshah, for example, is Parshat Bereishit, which covers from the beginning of Genesis to the story of Noah. There are 54 parshahs, one for each week of a leap year, so that in the course of a year, we read the entire Torah (Genesis to Deuteronomy) in our services. ... We read the last portion of the Torah right before a holiday called Simchat Torah (Rejoicing in the Law), which occurs in October, a few weeks after Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year). On Simchat Torah, we read the last portion of the Torah, and proceed immediately to the first paragraph of Genesis, showing that the Torah is a circle, and never ends.

"In the synagogue service, the weekly parshah is followed by a passage from the prophets, which is referred to as a haftarah. Contrary to common misconception, 'haftarah' does not mean 'half-Torah.' The word comes from the Hebrew root Fei-Teit-Reish and means 'Concluding Portion'. Usually, haftarah portion is no longer than one chapter, and has some relation to the Torah portion of the week."

This is from http://www.jewfaq.org/readings.htm , which also has the list of weekly Torah and Haftarah readings. This site, https://www.hebcal.com/sedrot/ , also provides the daily and weekly readings for recent and upcoming years according to how Simchat Torah falls.

Remember that in Judaism, "the prophets" is not only Isaiah through Malachi, but also Joshua through II Kings, or the later and former prophets, respectively. The Ketuvim, or writings, have no formal cycle of readings, although the Five Megillot (Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, and Esther) are read on particular festivals, and Psalms are found throughout the Siddur (prayer book).

As reflected on my Journeys Home blog, I enjoy having year-long "projects" in my spiritual life, keeping me focused week to week on some activity that will help me grow. As a Gentile respectful of Jewish traditions, I may undertake a year-long reading and study that will help me understand sections of the Torah which, though part of the Bible, I don't often read.

The 613 Mitzvot

A couple years ago, I posted some aspects about the Torah, here. Lately I've been studying a wonderful book book by Harvey J. Fields, A Torah Commentary for Our Times, Volume Two: Exodus and Leviticus (New York: URI Press, 1991). In the chapter on the Parashat Mishpatim (the Torah portion Exodus 21:1-24:18: parashat means section and mishpatim means laws or rules), the author notes that this is not the only Torah section dealing with laws and mitzvot, which are found throughout the Torah, but it does begin a listing of laws following the giving of the Ten Commandments. The author notes that the 4th century Rabbi Simlai was perhaps the first to ask how many mitzvot are given in the Torah, and he gave the classic answer, agreed upon by Rambam (Maimonides): 248 positive commands (“you shall...”) and 365 negative ones (“you shall not...”). The number corresponds to the parts of the human body and the days of the solar year, respectively (p. 53). Other rabbis distinguished mitzvot bein adam le-Makom, or mitzvot “between human being and God”) and mitzvot bein adam le-chavero, mitzvot between a person and other persons. But this distinction between ritual and ethical commandments doesn’t imply that one is more important than the other, and rituals often lead to proper ethical actions (p. 54).

An aside: I know that this is a common Christian idea about the Torah: that ethical commandments are more important than the rituals. That may be true for Christians, but there is no basis in the text or in Jewish tradition.

Another aside: a rabbi friend tells me that about 300 laws can still be observed today. Those that pertain to the Temple, priesthood and sacrifices are not observed because those institutions no longer exist in Judaism, although even those laws can be studied and meditated upon today. Other laws are certainly followed by Jews today, although Jews do differ on issues of contemporary interpretation (just as Christians differ among themselves about biblical topics).

The author Harvey Fields discusses the views of Maimonides and other teachers, that the commandments are given to Jews by God in order to uplift one’s life to God’s will and to submit oneself to discipline (pp. 54-55). This includes the commandments that seem to have no particular connection to ethical improvement, or those for which the meaning is no longer understood. By practicing and/or meditating on the meaning of mitzvot, “we become more just and loving and add to the good n our lives and in the world” (p. 55).

Fields concludes, “the 613 commandments form the essential core of Jewish practice and tradition. Their blend of both the ethical and ritual is unique” (p. 56), for other religions tend to separate the two kinds of teaching.

How about the laws themselves? The Judaism 101 site has a helpful listening of the laws, arranged topically: http://www.jewfaq.org/613.htm She indicates which laws can still be followed and provides the scripture links.

The book I cited in that earlier post is by a Presbyterian author, William J. Doorly, The Laws of Yahweh: A Handbook of Biblical Laws (New York: Paulist Press, 2002). Chapter 6 gives all the laws in order.

Rabbi Joseph Telushkin has a wonderful book, from which I've taken notes elsewhere in this blog: Biblical Literacy: The Most Important People, Evens, and Ideas of the Hebrew Bible (New York: William Morrow, 1997). Part Two pertains to "laws and ideas" (pp. 397-510). Then Part Three gives a short summary and/or discussion of all the laws in order of appearance (pp. 511-592).

Tribute to Brevard S. Childs

When I attended the Society of Biblical Literature convention this past November, I purchased a book that I'd not yet seen, The Bible as Christian Scripture: The Work of Brevard S. Childs, edited by Christopher R. Seitz and Kent Harold Richards.

Childs (1923-2007), was professor of Old Testament at Yale in 1958 till 1999 (and Sterling Professor in 1992-1999) He was known for his "canonical criticism," which focused upon the biblical text as canon, in contrast to the historical-critical method. He wrote several books, a notable one of which was Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture (1979). I was very privileged to have him as my Old Testament professor at Yale Divinity School during the Fall 1979 semester, when that book was just beginning to be discussed. I am diligently searching for a letter he wrote to me in the early 00s in response to a grateful letter that I had sent to him.

During these past several years of renewing my personal Bible study, I've enjoyed studying again not only his Introduction book but some of his others. The past few weeks I've been enjoying reading through Seitz's and Richards' book, a tribute and assessment of Childs' work. (I didn't know Seitz but I vaguely remember that he was an Old Testament doctoral student at the time I did my masters degree there.)

The contents of the book:

Preface by Christopher R. Seitz

The Works of Brevard Springs Childs

Tribute to Brevard S. Childs, at the International SBL Meeting in Vienna, Austria, by Christopher R. Seitz.

Brevard Childs and Form Criticism, by David L. Petersen

The Wrath of God at Mount Sinai (Exod 32; Deut 9–10), by Jörg Jeremias

The Contrastive Unity of Scripture: On the Hermeneutics of the Biblical Canon, by Bernd Kanowski

Brevard Childs as a Historical Critic: Divine Concession and the Unity of the Canon, by Stephen B. Chapman

Theological Interpretation, the Historical Formation of Scripture, and God’s Action in Time, by Neil B. MacDonald

Faith Seeking Canonical Understanding: Childs’s Guide to the Pauline Letters, by Leander E. Keck

Childs and the History of Interpretation, by Mark W. Elliott

Biblical Theology and the Communicative Presence of God, by Murray A. Rae

The Doctrine of God is a Hermeneutic: The Biblical Theology of Brevard S. Childs, by C. Kavin Rowe

A Shared Reality: Ontology in Brevard Childs’s Isaiah Commentary, by Mark Gignilliat

A Tale of Two Testaments: Childs, Old Testament Torah, and Heilsgeschichte, by Don Collett

Reflections on the Rule of Faith, by Leonard G. Finn

Childs and the Canon or Rule of Faith, by Daniel R. Driver

Psalm 34: Redaction, Inner-Biblical Exegesis and the Longer Psalm Superscriptions—“Mistake” Making and Theological Significance, by Christopher R. Seitz

Allegory and Typology within Biblical Interpretation, by Brevard S. Childs

The Pentateuch

This past winter, before the hectic semester began, I took notes from the enjoyable article on the Pentateuch in the New Interpreter’s Bible Dictionary. The author, R. W. L. Moberly, discusses issues of interpretation and content. For instance, narrative tensions can be found throughout the various books. Isaac’s blessing of his two sons (Genesis 27) implies that Isaac was near death; but Isaac died years later, after Jacob returns from his fourteen years with Laban (Genesis 29:15-30, 35:27-29) (p. 432). The number of Israelites who left Egypt seem to be a comparatively smaller group---that can be accommodated by twelve springs and by water produced from a rock (Ex. 15:27, 17:6). But elsewhere the narrative describes the group as 600,000 men on food, not including women and children, or nearly two millions people (p. 433).

Another contrast is the status of women: Exodus 20:17 places “wife” after “house,” while the corresponding commandment in Deuteronomy (5:21) places wife before house. Similarly, Deuteronomy 22:22 makes a woman accountable for her actions, although in Genesis, when Sarah is taken into Pharaoh’s harem (and later Abimelech’s), it is Abraham who is accountable (Genesis 12:18-19, 20:10) (p. 433).

Still another contrast is the difference between the Ten Commandments, usually in small details, but notably in the difference between the Exodus and Deuteronomy versions of the Sabbath commandment, where two different reasons for the commandment are given (Ex. 20:11, Deut. 5;15) (p. 433).

The article lists several similar examples, reflecting the different traditions that have been brought together in the writing and editing of what became the canonical text. But I was particularly interested in points made in the section "Genesis as ‘the Old Testament of the Old Testament’" (p. 434-435). The focus is on the fact that, in Exodus 3:13-15, God reveals the divine name to Moses as a new name, and in Exodus 6:2-3, it is stated that the patriarchs knew God, not as YHWH but as El Shaddai. But in Genesis, God uses the divine name (Gen. 15:7, 28:13), and the name is frequently used throughout the book (p. 434).

A possible explanation is that, for the hypothesized writers named as the Elohist and the Priestly sources, the divine name was made known to Moses but not before, while the source called the Jahwist used the divine name all along, in Genesis 2, in Gen. 4:26, and so on. Still, these different traditions were preserved together when Genesis was written. (Another explanation is that the divine name was familiar to the authors and used in the test, even if it is anachronistic: p. 435.)

Moberly writes that the divine name becomes attached to the covenant of Moses and therefore to holiness and exclusivity (as in Exodus 12, where the Egyptians did not known the true God.) And yet, the Lord named by the divine name YHWH is traditionally called the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob---Moses' forebearers. As Moberly puts it, “The one God can apparently be known in markedly different ways. This poses the ancient problem: how should one recognize as religiously authoritative material that is full of religious practices different from or even forbidden by Mosaic torah (compare, e.g., Jacob’s setting up a pillar in Gene. 28:18 with the strong prohbition of such in Deut. 16:22)?” (p. 435).

Moberly suggests that the patriarchs “become types and/or figures of Israel” for instance, Abraham’s journey to Egypt. The Abraham stories aren’t rewritten to reflect later religious realities but they remain authoritative heritage for Israel. Christians, of course, do the same thing in their interepretation of Abraham, Moses, and other aspects of the Old Testament (p 435).

Another interesting point made in the article concerns the Shema, not only Deut. 6:4-5 but also Deut. 6:6-9. Christians tend to ignore 6-9 as Jewish practices. Yet Christians feel scriptural obligations to follow other teachings of scripture (as in the "do this" of 1 Cor. 11:23-26, et al.). It’s just that Christians have appropriated other practices for their own heritage. "Of course, some Christians traditionally have practiced equivalent to those of Deut. 6:6-9, most obviously int he regular recital of the Lord's Prayer and in the display of the prime Christian symbol of the cross---often on a necklace but also over the gates of critics in the historic Christian empire of Byzantium, where they symbolically depicted the identity and allegiance of the place one was entering, just as Deut. 6:9 envisages the working of the Shema doing for Israel's homes (private space) and cities (public space). Deuteronomy does not envisage the recital and display of an equivalent to the Shema, but of the Shema itself. Yet Christians only receive Deuteronomy as part of the larger canon of Scripture… and that makes the difference" (p. 437).