“A Voice Cries Out”: Reassessing John the Baptist’s Wilderness Relationship to Qumran
Jeffrey P. García Alliance University (New York City) | jeffreypgarcia@gmail.com
JJMJS No. 9 (2022): 5–29
Abstract
The aim of this study is to challenge the nearly 70 years of attempts to identify some degree of relationship/influence between John the Baptist and the Qumran community vis-à-vis geographical proximity and the use of Isaiah 40:3. First, the confluence of traditions that the Baptist’s immersion event(s) occurred on the southern stretches of the Jordan river near Jericho his presumed association with the Essenes, and Khirbet Qumran’s location in the Judean wilderness, have resulted in geographical proximity’s continual enumeration among arguments for a relationship/influence between the two. Second, the use of Isaiah 40:3 in the Dead Sea Community Rule (1QS) naturally draws attention to its occurrence in the gospels to describe the Baptist’s role. Most examinations, however, of 1QS and the gospels are matter-of-factly comparisons with the Gospel of Mark. Consequently, this has hindered fruitful analysis of Luke’s employment of a longer Isaianic passage and its place in the third gospel’s mostly independent Baptist narrative. As such, this study will show: 1) there is little to no evidence from the early Roman period that warrants locating John’s event(s) near Qumran or in the Judean wilderness, and 2) the Lukan portrait of John diverges from its counterparts depicting an eschatological “herald” whose calls for interpersonal justice appear to be a catalyst for God’s not a messiah’s direct redemptive engagement. It distances John somewhat from the yaḥad and, importantly, relocates at least one portrayal of the Baptist in the wider landscape of early Jewish thought.
Keywords
John the Baptist, Qumran, Wilderness, Isaiah 40, Herald
1. Introduction
In 1952, G. Lankester Harding noted, when responding to a telegram from benefactors who questioned the importance of the Dead Sea Scrolls’ discovery,
“And it must be borne in mind that these fragments are the remains of a library of the settlement of the Essenes described by the historian Josephus and by Pliny the Elder, a sect or school that John the Baptist was a member.”1 Yet, even before their discovery, scholars associated John the Baptist with the Essenes of the desert.2 With the growing conversation of identifying the Qumran yaḥad with the Essenes,3 this conversation naturally evolved into the Baptist’s relationship to the Qumran community.4 Continual research into the scrolls in particular,
* For R. Steven Notley, who continues to show me first-hand the importance of physical setting to reading and understanding the Gospels.
** A concise version of this study was presented at The Sixteenth International Orion Symposium at Hebrew University, Jerusalem: “The Dead Sea Scrolls at Seventy, Clear a Path in the Wilderness, in conjunction with the University of Vienna, New York University, the Israel Antiquities Authority, and the Israel Museum, May 2, 2018.
1 Weston W. Fields, The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History Volume 1 (Leiden: Brill, 2009), 163–164. Harding’s response was to Mr. and Mrs. Bechtel, who showed interest in contributing to a fund to purchase of some of the first scrolls. Fields states that the Bechtels were “the first private contributors to the purchase, restoration, and publication of the scrolls.”
2 In the late 19th century, Heinrich Graetz stated that the cry regarding the coming messiah and the kingdom of heaven in early Judaism came from the Essenes, namely, out of the mouth of the Baptist, “John dwelt with other Essenes in the desert, in the vicinity of the Dead Sea...,” in History of the Jewish People, 6 vols. (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1893), 2:145–147; rev. and trans. of Geschichte der Juden von den altesten Zeiten bis auf die Gegenwart: aus den Quellen neu bearbeitet, 11 vols. (Leipzig: Leiner, 1853–1875). Graetz did not believe John’s Essenism to be in contradistinction to Pharisaism. John’s call would have been socially and religiously acceptable to both. Shortly thereafter, in the early 19th century, Israel Abrahams described John as having “Essenic leanings,” noting that Josephus’ attempt to identify John with the Essenes is clear, Studies in Pharisaism and the Gospels (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1917), 31–34. For Brownlee, identifying the scrolls with the Essenes was a settled matter; he naturally presumed that the contents of the scrolls were one and the same with them. He was, however, more cautious in an article describing the affinities between the Essenes, the Therapeutae of Egypt, Covenanters of Damascus, and John the Baptist, “A Comparison of the Covenanters of the Dead Sea Scrolls with Pre-Christian Jewish Sects,” BA 13 3 (1950): 50–72 See also A. T. Robertson, “The Baptism of John and the Qumran Community: Testing a Hypothesis,” HTR 50.3 (1957): 175; Joseph Schmitt, “Le milieu baptiste de Jean le Précurseur,” Revue des Sciences Religieuses 47.2–4 (1973): 391–407.
3 For a sample of the bibliography on this issue, see Emil Schürer, The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ I (175 B.C.–A.D. 135), rev. and ed. Geza Vermes, Matthew Black, Fergus Millar, 4 vols. (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1979), 2:583, n. 31; more recently, Todd S. Beal, “Essenes” and Devorah Dimant, “Qumran: Written Material,” EDSS 1:262–269; 2:739–746, respectively.
4 See the survey by Paul Anderson, “John and Qumran: Discovery and Interpretation over Sixty Years,” in John, Qumran, and the Dead Sea Scrolls: Sixty Years of Discovery and Debate, ed. Mary L. Coloe and Tom Thatcher (Atlanta: SBL, 2011), 15–52.
6 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
García, “A Voice Cries Out” 7
after their release to the public in 1991 has proven to keep questions regarding the identity of John’s socio-religious circle(s) alive. In fact, all studies that deal with John the Baptist must cross the Qumran/Essene bridge.5 In 2006, Charlesworth stating, “There seems no reason to doubt that the Baptizer adopted at least some of the teachings of the Qumranites,”6 ventured the bold conjecture, “John would…have progressed through the early stages of initiation, which took at least two years…He would thus, almost surely, have taken the vows of celibacy and absolute separation from others.”7
For over 70 years, two matters have stayed the course. First, while there remains no consensus on whether the Baptist or his movement were affiliated with the Qumran/Essenes, geographical proximity, namely, the yaḥad’s location at Khirbet Qumran8 in the so-called Judean wilderness,9 and John baptizing on
5 See for example, Hermann Lichtenberger, “The Dead Sea Scrolls and John the Baptist: Reflection on Josephus’ Account of John the Baptist,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Forty Years of Research, ed. Devorah Dimant and Uriel Rappaport, STDJ 10 (Leiden: Brill; Jerusalem: Magnes Press, Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 1992), 340–346; Hartmut Stegemann, The Library of Qumran: On the Essenes, Qumran, John the Baptist, and Jesus (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), 221–255, trans. from Die Essener, Qumran, Johannes der Taüfer und Jesus (Freiburg im Breisgau: Verlag Heder, 1993); Joan E. Taylor, “John the Baptist and the Essenes,” JJS 47.2 (1996): 256–284; eadem, The Immerser, John the Baptist within Second Temple Judaism (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 15–48; James VanderKam, The Dead Sea Scrolls Today, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), 206–208; Josef Ernst, “Johannes der Täufer: Interpretation, ” Geschichte, Wirkungsgeschichte, BZNW 53 (2013), 268–284.
6 James Charlesworth, “John the Baptizer and the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls: The Princeton Symposium on the Dead Sea Scrolls, ed. James Charlesworth, 3 vols. (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2006), 3:19
7 Charlesworth, “John the Baptizer,” 7–9. There is no evidence that the Baptist went through any stages required of the yaḥad’s novitiates. Charlesworth’s conjecture closely parallels the video used to introduce tourists to the site of Khirbet Qumran. While viewing a dramatization of life at the site and in the community, the narrator tells a brief story about hearing of the tragic end of a person named John the Baptist. This is followed by his recollection that the yaḥad once had a member named John, who volunteered to join, and broke his vow after two years. While this portion of the video is exceedingly brief, the implications are as obvious as they are fictional. Charlesworth is not the only one to offer specifics as to why John would have left the desert community. Marcus offers three reasons for the Baptist’s departure, John the Baptist, 35–36.
8 See Daniel R. Schwartz, “Introduction: On the Jewish Background of Christianity,” in Studies in the Jewish Background of Christianity, WUNT 60 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992), 3.
9 Taylor, one of the few dissenters, argues that John’s movements around the Jordan Valley occurred primarily in Perea (as well as Samaria and within Perea proper), The Immerser, 47. Her dissent, of course, gives John a wider berth along the Jordan Valley, but it does not necessarily remove him from the region near Qumran. The traditional Jordanian baptismal site where John was located, al-Maghtas, dates to the Byzantine period and is on the eastern bank of the Jordan river, would have been in first-century
the southern end of the Jordan river near Jericho a distance of no more than 16 km (10 mi) remains a part of the debate.10 Second, the use of Isaiah by the Gospel writers and by the Community Rule continues to draw John into conversation with the yaḥad. While there is little agreement regarding this parallel, most have not fully appreciated Luke’s unique portrayal of the Baptist and how it informs this issue. Therefore, the aim is to reassess these two matters as part of a larger and continual examination of John’s relationship, or lack thereof, with the Qumran community.
2. Historical Geography and the Baptist’s Wilderness
Accounts of John the Baptist appear in the Gospels and Josephus, but John’s presence in the wilderness is only referenced in the former (Matt 3:1, Mark 1:4, Luke 3:2, John 1:23). As mentioned, there has been little deviation among scholars in identifying the wilderness of John as the modern Judean desert that now defines the stretch of the Jordan Valley that begins near the area of Jericho and occupies the western shore of the Dead Sea; the same desert where Khirbet Qumran is located.11 The depiction in the Gospels of John’s location, however, is not so clear. Mark and Luke’s Gospels describe that the Baptist is simply in the “wilderness.” In contrast, Matthew appears to attest a more secure12 perhaps unnecessary13 toponym, “the wilderness of Judah”14 (τῇ ἐρήµῳ τῆς Ἰουδαίας) or as it is commonly understood, the Judean desert.
2.1 The Wilderness
Before dealing with this toponym, it is worth noting that the semantic range of “wilderness,” ἔρηµος, and its Hebrew equivalent,מִדְבַּר , offer more nuance than an arid, dry region.מִדְבַּר can refer to a desert but also an uncultivated pasture (e.g., Joel 1:19) or a “pastureland between two villages.”15 Similarly, ἔρηµος can be used to describe a desert, pastureland, or, more importantly, a grassland.16 Outside of the Baptist narratives when geographical clues can be ascertained
Perea. The site facing al-Maghtas on the western bank of the river, Qasr al-Yahud, is situated in the Judean Wilderness a relatively modern name for this area (see below).
10 Charlesworth, “The Baptizer,” 18–19; idem, “John the Baptizer and Qumran,” https://www.bibleodyssey.org/en/passages/related-articles/john-the-baptizer-andqumran; Joel Marcus, John the Baptist in History and Theology (Columbia: University of South Carolina, 2018), 30–33.
11 Joan E. Taylor, “John the Baptist in the Jordan River,” ARAM 1 & 2 (2017): 1–19. She does not specify a particular site where John would have immersed followers but names both Makhadat Hajla a site near the ancient road that led from the Transjordan to Jerusalem and al-Maghtas (see, n. 9) as possibilities, 13–15.
12 Ernst, Johannes der Täufer, 280.
13 Taylor, “John the Baptist,” 4; also, eadem, The Immerser, 42–48.
14 Unless otherwise noted, all translations are the author’s.
15 HALOT 2:548.
16 BDAG 392.
8 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
the Synoptic Gospels use “wilderness” (ἔρηµος) primarily to refer to desolate areas that are in the Galilee and Gaulanitis, which were surely not arid and dry.17 For example, after the Baptist is killed, Jesus is described as going into “the wildernesses” (ταῖς ἐρήµοις) to pray (Luke 5:16). Within the larger context of the chapter, the passage likely refers to uninhabited pasturelands that were around the northern stretches of the Sea of Galilee. Furthermore, some manuscripts of Luke refer to the area surrounding Bethsaida located technically in Gaulanitis as the “wilderness (or uncultivated pastureland area) of a city called Bethsaida” (τόπον ἔρηµον πόλεως καλουµένης Βηθσαϊδά, Luke 9:1018). Therefore, the occurrence of “wilderness” alone does not require a desert location.
2.2 Jerusalem and Judea
Other geographical markers preserved in the accounts of Matthew and Mark are worth considering. Mark states that “John was baptizing in the wilderness” (ἐγένετο Ἰωάννης βαπτίζων ἐν τῇ ἐρήµω) with only two possible geographic identifiers, “And there went out to him all the district of Judea, and all the people of Jerusalem” (πᾶσα ἡ Ἰουδαία χώρα καὶ οἱ Ἱεροσολυµῖται πάντες). Matthew, who may be following Mark, omits “all” before Jerusalem and Judea but adds “all the region near (or around) the Jordan” (πᾶσα ἡ περίχωρος τοῦ Ἰορδάνου, 3:5). Neither are intended to pinpoint the Baptist’s location, however. Vincent Taylor notes that Mark’s statement of “all” reads somewhat hyperbolically and indicates that level of interest that John aroused.19 Matthew is also not concerned with providing the geography of John’s movement, but rather, both gospel writers are heavily invested in John’s role as Elijah.20 First, Mark and Matthew portray John with a similar sense of style to that of Elijah, wearing a garment of hair and leather girdle (Matt 3:4; Mark 1:6; cf. 2 Kings 1:8).21 Second, Mark associates the
17 Matt 11:17, 14:13, 15; Mark 1:45, 6:30–35; Luke 4:42, 5:16 (in light of parallels), 8:29, 15:4. See Joshua Schwartz, “Sinai-Mountain and Desert: The Desert Geography and Theology of the Rabbis and Desert Fathers,” in “Follow the Wise:” Studies in Jewish History and Culture in Honor of Lee I. Levine,” ed. Zeev Weiss, Oded Irshai, Jodi Magness, and Seth Schwartz (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2010), 354.
18 Mss. A, C, K, N, W, Γ, Δ, Ξmg, ƒ1.13, 565, 700, 892, 1424, � sy(p).h. 19 Vincent Taylor, The Gospel of According to St. Mark: The Greek Text with Introduction, Notes, and Indexes, 2nd ed., Thornapple Commentaries (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1981), 155; Adela Yarbro Collins, Mark: A Commentary, Hermeneia (Grand Rapids: Fortress Press, 2007), 142. 20 Craig Evans argues that Matthew should not be read hyperbolically here, reasoning “for Josephus says much the same,” Matthew, New Cambridge Bible Commentary (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 68. Yet, when referencing the crowds (τῶν ἄλλων συστρεφοµένων, Ant. 18.118) that came to John, the first-century historian makes no mention from where they came. The bulk of the story sans mention of the Herodian fortress Machaerus (more on this below) is primarily an account that takes place in the Galilee (Ant. 18.116–119), esp. when compared to the Gospel accounts.
21 See, for example, Collins, Mark, 141; William L. Lane, The Gospel According to Mark:
Out” 9
García, “A Voice Cries
messenger of Mal 3:1, perhaps Elijah, with John the Baptist (1:2). Third, Matthew preserves testimony of John’s warning of coming judgment (Matt 3:10; also, Luke 3:7–9), a role envisioned for Elijah and Moses in Mal 3–4 and Elijah in other postbiblical texts (more on this later). It is conceivable, then, that both Jerusalem and Judah are part of Matthew’s and Mark’s allusion to Malachi 3. There the messenger who portends judgment will purify the sons of Levi, allowing Jerusalem and Judah to offer pleasing offerings “as the days of old and former years” ( כִּימֵי עוֹלָם וּכְשָׁנִים קַדְמֹנִיּוֹת , 3:4). Therefore, in the same manner that being dressed in camel hair and a leather waistband is not a statement of the Baptist’s fashion sense, the reference to Jerusalem and Judah is not by itself a compelling argument for a specific location.22
Luke also refers to the “wilderness” without reference to Judah or Jerusalem, simply stating that “the word of God came to John the son of Zechariah in the wilderness and he went into all the region about the Jordan” (Luke 3:3). Unfortunately, the “region about the Jordan” (πᾶσα ἡ περίχωρος τοῦ Ἰορδάνου, also Matt 3:5) is equally unspecific, designating several places along the river. For example, similar language is used one time in the Hebrew Bible, “And when they came to the regions about the Jordan…” ( יָּבֹאוּ הַיַּרְדֵּןאֶל־גְּלִילוֹת , Josh 10:22). The account records the building of an altar on the eastern bank of the Jordan by Reuben, Gad, and half of Manasseh. However, the tribal territories mentioned span most of the length of the Jordan river from the Sea of Galilee to the Dead Sea.
2.3 The Wilderness of Judea
The only seemingly secure geographical marker is Matthew’s “the wilderness of Judah” (τῇ ἐρήµῳ τῆς Ἰουδαίας). The Hebrew equivalent מִדְבַּר יְהוּדָה is found only twice in the Hebrew Bible. In Judges 1:16, the “wilderness of Judah” is geographically defined for the reader, “and the descendants of the Kenite, Moses’ father-in-law, went up with the people of Judah from the city of palms into the wilderness of Judah, which lies in the negev of Arad” ( מִדְבַּר יְהוּדָה אֲשֶׁר בְּנֶגֶב ﬠֲרָד ). Thus, the wilderness of Judah here lies in the Negev, near the city of Arad, which is not far from the western shore of the Dead Sea but is approximately 107 km (66.5 mi) south of Khirbet Qumran and even further from the Jericho region. Interestingly, manuscripts of the Septuagint [LXX] do not preserve this phraseology; rather, they refer to the “wilderness” (τὴν ἔρηµον) or the “wilderness
The English Text with Introduction, Exposition and Notes, NICNT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1974), 51; Ulrich Luz, Matthew 1–7: A Commentary, Hermeneia, trans. James E. Crouch, ed. Helmut Koester (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2007), 135–136; Herbert W. Basser with Marsha Cohen, The Gospel of Matthew and Judaic Traditions: A RelevanceBased Commentary, BRLJ 46 (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 84–85.
22 R. Steven Notley, "The Geographical Setting for the Ministry of John and the Baptism of Jesus" in The Sacred Bridge: Carta's Atlas of the Biblical World, ed. Anson F. Rainey and R. Steven Notley (Jerusalem: Carta, 2005), 350-351.
10 JJMJS No.
9 (2022)
García, “A Voice Cries Out” 11 that is south of Judah.” Butler notes that “south of Judah” (νότω Ιουδα) is a standard geographic term, which is not unlike what is found in 1 Sam 27:10 (νότον τῆς Ιουδαίας) and 2 Sam 24:7 (νότον Ιουδα).23 Perhaps, the LXX, around the period of its translation, did not know or understand the toponym, “wilderness of Judah,” and the translator amended the terminology to simplify the geography, correctly describing the Negev as “south of Judah.” The second occurrence of “wilderness of Judah” is in the superscription of Psalm 63:0 [MT: v. 1], “A Psalm of David, when he was in the wilderness of Judah” ( מִזְמוֹר לְדָוִד בִּהְיוֹתוֹ בְּמִדְבַּר יְהוּדָה ). It is difficult to ascertain which part of David’s life is referred to in the psalm, but it has been suggested to be an allusion to David’s flight from Absalom (2 Sam 15–17). If indeed David’s route into the wilderness in 2 Sam 15:23 is alluded to in the psalm, David is said to cross the Kidron ( נַחַל קִדְרוֹן ) and travel into the wilderness ( הַמִּדְבָּר ).24 The Kidron valley winds its way south and east from Jerusalem; the valley’s exit is approximately 8 km (5 mi) south of Qumran. David, however, is also depicted as fleeing into the wilderness from Saul, specifically to “the strongholds in the wilderness, in the hill country of the Wilderness of Ziph” ( וַיֵּשֶׁב דָּוִד בַּמִּדְבָּר בַּמְּצָדוֹת וַיֵּשֶׁב בָּהָר בְּמִדְבַּר־זִיף , 1 Sam 23:14). Whether the toponym “wilderness of Judah” is intended to direct the reader back to either account is unclear. When geographical coordinates can be ascertained, it appears that biblical literature locates the “wilderness of Judah” as an area that encompassed part of the Negev, which is significantly south of Qumran, somewhere near the cities of Arad and Beersheva. In postexilic and Second Temple sources, the “wilderness of Judah” ( מִדְבַּר יְהוּדָה or ἔρηµος τῆς Ἰουδαίας) is altogether unattested.25 In particular, it does not appear that people in the Second Temple period referred to the area of Qumran with the specific toponym, “wilderness of Judah.” A “wilderness,” yes (cf. 1QS 8:13), but not the “wilderness of Judah.” Indeed, in the early Roman period (1st century CE), the toponym may have been obvious the “wilderness of Judah” is the wilderness that belongs to the Roman province of Judaea.26 This might be compared to standing in Jerusalem and referring to the Mount of Olives, as the “Mount of Olives of Jerusalem;” it is wholly unnecessary. Still, for a region that is so active in the Hellenistic and Roman period, it is a striking lacuna. “Wilderness of Judah” also does not appear in the earliest strands of Rabbinic (apart from quotations of Judges 8; e.g., Mek. R. Ish. 14:26) or Christian literature and is missing in Latin and Greek sources between the 4th
23 Trent C. Butler, Judges, Volume 8, WBC (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2017), 1–33.
24 Roff Rendorf, “The Psalms of David: David in the Psalms,” in The Book of Psalms: Composition and Reception, ed. Peter W. Flint and Patrick D. Miller, VTSup 99, FIOTL 5 (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 59.
25 This was brought to my attention in a private conversation with Marc Turnage.
26 See Michael Avi-Yonah, Gazeteer of Roman Palestine, Qedem 5 (Jerusalem: Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1976). Avi-Yonah refers to the toponyms of other wildernesses, specifically, the Wilderness of Ruba (91) and Wilderness of Suca (98).
century BCE and 7th century CE.27 Furthermore, Christian pilgrims from the 3rd to the 18th centuries CE, who traveled to the traditional site of John’s baptism on the southern end of the Jordan river, never refer to it as being located in the “wilderness of Judah.”28
Why, then, is Matthew utilizing the “wilderness of Judah”? Taylor suggests that it creates unnecessary repetition but “is perhaps meant to clarify where we are at the start.”29 Schwartz is not convinced that John ever baptized in an area known as the wilderness of Judah. He argues that a setting in the wilderness of Samaria, or the “Desert of Samaria” somewhat bolstered by an identification for Aenon near Salim (John 3:23) in Samaria30 works as much for John’s baptisms as does the Judaean wilderness. He suggests that perhaps Matthew has chosen the “wilderness of Judah” because he was unfamiliar with other desert regions.31 This argumentation only holds, however, if the area now designated as the Judaean wilderness was known as such when Matthew’s Gospel was written. As we contend, regardless of the gospel’s dating, this is unlikely.
There is, in fact, a more germane reason for Matthew’s specification. Notley has already shown that the term “Sea of Galilee” is the Matthean creation of a previously unknown toponym for the Galilean lake due to early Christianity’s understanding that Jesus’ ministry was a fulfillment of the prophecy mentioned in Isa 9:1.32 The phrase “wilderness of Judah” may be another example of this Matthean creativity. First, if the gospel writer intended a geographical location with “wilderness of Judah,” it would have been lost on the audience. Second, Matthew makes no equivocation of John’s identity as Elijah. It is the only gospel to preserve the unique statement by Jesus concerning John’s role, “and if you are willing to accept it, he [i.e., the Baptist] is Elijah” (αὐτός ἐστιν Ἠλίας, Matt 11:14). This prophetic motif drives the appearance of the
27 See Leah Di Segni and Yoram Tsafrir, The Onomasticon of Iudaea, Palaestina and Arabia in the Greek and Latin Sources Volume I: Introduction, Sources, Major Texts (Jerusalem: The Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 2015). 28 See Fr. Donatus Baldi, Enchiridion Locorum Sanctorum, 2nd ed. (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1955), 177–201. 29 Taylor, “John the Baptist,” 4.
30 Joshua Schwartz, “John the Baptist, the Wilderness and the Samaritan Mission,” in Studies in Historical Geography and Biblical Historiography: Presented to Zecharia Kallai, ed. Gershon Galil and Moshe Weinfeld, VTSup 81 (Leiden: Brill, 2000), 106–117. See Avi-Yonah, Roman Gazeteer, 26–27; Yoram Tsafrir, Leah Di Segni, and Judith Green, Tabula Imperii Romani: Iudaea and Palaestina – Eretz Israel in the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine Periods, Maps and Gazeteer (Jerusalem: The Israel Academy of Science and Humanities, 1994), 58; also “M[adaba] M[ap],” in Di Segni and Tsafrir, The Onomasticon, 315.
31 Schwartz, “John the Baptist,” n. 3.
32 R. Steven Notley, “The Sea of Galilee: Development of an Early Christian Toponym,” JBL 128.1 (2009): 183–185; idem, The Sacred Bridge, 352–354.
12 JJMJS No. 9
(2022)
“wilderness of Judah.” In the 1 King’s Elijah narrative, one gets very close to the Matthean toponym, “[Elijah] came to Beer-sheva, which is in Judah ( בְּאֵר שֶׁבַע אֲשֶׁר לִיהוּדָה ) and left his servant there. But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness.” ( בַּמִּדְבָּר ,1 Kgs 19:3–4).33 The prophet flees to Beersheva due to Jezebel’s threat against his life. It is possible to read that the prophet begins his day’s journey in the “wilderness” that belongs to “Judah,” i.e., the “wilderness of Judah.” Moreover, Elijah’s role in early Judaism is partly seen as bringing about the nation’s repentance prior to judgment (Mal 4:6 [MT: 3:24]). Aspects of this are associated with the revelations of judgment that Elijah receives at Mount Horeb (Mal 4:5 [MT 3:23]; Sir 48:7–10), where the Prophet concludes his aforementioned journey (1 Kgs 19:8). Matthew’s creativity has little to do with geography. The evangelist is creating a theological toponym à la “Sea of Galilee” that views John’s ministry as a fulfillment of the expected coming of the prophet whose wilderness (of Judah) journey is interpreted later in the light of the aforementioned Elijianic themes.
2.4
Locating the Baptist’s Ministry
Notley’s and Schwartz’s argument for alternate locations of John’s immersion events has received only a modicum of scholarly attention, and it is worth examining their suggestions here. As mentioned earlier, Schwartz suggests that the desert area of Samaria is as good a choice as anywhere else (see above).34 According to him, John’s experience in Samaria resolves why the Gospel of John depicts the Baptist at “Aenon near Salim” (3:23). Scholars have, by and large, identified Salim just 13–17 km (8–11 mi) south of Scythopolis/Beth Shean35 although identifying the spring (i.e., Aenon) has proven difficult.36 While Schwartz’s tendency is correct, namely, “that some John the Baptist wilderness traditions need not be identified with the Judean Desert…,” there is no evidence for John’s presence in Samaria outside of a possible Samaritan identification for “Aenon near Salim.” This identification, however, appears for the first time on the 6th century CE Madaba Map.37 Moreover, the earliest Roman archaeological remains found at a site identified with Salim, namely, Tell Shalem, is a Roman
33 1 Kings follows Judges’ general geography by indicating that the “wilderness” area that belongs to Judah is near Arad and Beersheva, which is in the biblical Negev.
34 Schwartz, “John the Baptist,” 117.
35 Tsafrir, Di Segni, and Green identify “Tel er Radgha,” Salem III, Salumias; Tabula, 219, which is located 13 km (8 mi) south of Scythopolis/Beth Shean. Avi Yonah identified Tel Abu Sus, Roman Gazeteer, 92, which is approximately 17 km (11 mi) south of Scythopolis/Beth Shean.
36 Avi-Yonah identifies two sites for “Aenon,” springs near ‘Umm el-Umdan and Bassett el Kharrar, Roman Gazeteer, 26–27, which are located on the western Jordan valley near Scythopolis and the eastern Jordan valley near the river’s entry into the Dead Sea, respectively.
37 Di Segni and Tsafrir, The Onomasticon, 315.
Out” 13
García, “A Voice Cries
fort once occupied by the VI Ferrata Legion dated to the 2nd century CE.38 Of all the sites that are thought to be either Salim or Aenon, none are very far from the Galilee. Unfortunately, determining a first-century CE “Aenon” or “Salim” based solely on archaeology cannot be done up to this point, and textual evidence is scant. Schwartz’s work does highlight the apparent itinerancy of the Baptist depicted in the fourth Gospel. Still, very little of the Baptist’s apparent movements argue for locating him at the southern end of the Jordan river. Before reviewing Notley’s argument, it is necessary to examine the Gospel of John’s reference to “Bethany beyond the Jordan” (Βηθανίᾳ…πέραν τοῦ Ἰορδάνου, 1:28).39 This Bethany is not the village of Martha and Mary referenced in 11:18 as being 3 km (1.8 mi) from Jerusalem (11:18). “Beyond the Jordan” without mention of Bethany refers to a place on the eastern bank of the river, without specification.40 In fact, a Byzantine period site just off the eastern bank of Jordan and just north of the Dead Sea essentially across from the traditional baptism site on the western bank, Qasr al-Yahud has been identified as “Bethany Beyond the Jordan.” Excavations of Tell al-Kharrar situated in Wadi al-Kharrar between 1996 and 1997, led archaeologist Mohammed Waheeb to state that, “the recent discovery of Roman and Byzantine architectural remains….without exaggeration represent the discovery of Bethany Beyond the Jordan River….”41 While the excavations are essential to understanding the development of Christian traditions in the holy land, most of the remains date
38 See Mark A. Chancey, Greco-Roman Culture and the Galilee of Jesus, SNTMS 134 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 67. 39 Origen and Chrysostom support reading “Bethabara” (Βηθαβαρά) rather than “Bethany,” which is attested in several manuscripts of John. Likely a Greek form of “Bethavar” ( בית עבר ), “place of crossing” i.e., a ford in the Jordan river the church father championed it due to his inability to locate Bethany, see Metzger, Textual Commentary, 171. Eusebius, following Origen, also follows the Bethabara reading. It is, however, the Bordeaux pilgrim in 333 CE who provides a general geographical location for Origen’s and Eusebius’ geographical understanding by referencing that John’s baptisms occurred near Jericho, a ford (monticulous) in the river, and at the place from where Elijah was taken into heaven (…ubi raptus est Helias in caelo), Paul Geyer, Itinera Hierosolymitana Saeculi III–VII, CSEL 39 (Vindobone; Pragae: F. Tempsky; Lipsiae: G. Freytag, 1898), 24. As a result of this identification at that point of the Jordan, “Bethabara” is identified on the Madaba Map on the western bank of the Jordan. See comments by Michael AviYonah, The Madaba Mosaic Map with Introduction and Commentary (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1954), 37.
40 This is the consistent use of the “beyond the Jordan” in both the Hebrew Bible ( מֵﬠֵבֶר לְיַרְדֵּן ; LXX: πέραν τοῦ Ιορδάνου, e.g., Num 32:32) and Josephus (πέραν τοῦ Ἰορδάνου; e.g., Ant. 12 222).
41 Waheeb, “The Discovery of Bethany,” 123; also idem, Abdelaziz Mahmod, and Eyad al-Masri, “A Unique Byzantine Complex Near the Jordan River in the Southern Levant and a Tentative Interpretation,” Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry 13 2 (2013): 128–134; Rami G. Khouri, “Where John Baptized,” BAR 31.1 (Jan.–Feb. 2005): 39.
14 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
well into the Byzantine period (5th–6th century CE). The only early Roman remains come from a well that was dug into the “water table of a nearby spring.”42 It is unclear which remains are early Roman as Waheeb lists fallen ashlars, sand, pottery sherds, and coins but does not provide dating for the material. He notes further that the excavated material indicates a Byzantine date for the digging of the well. Waheeb is perhaps suggesting, without explicitly stating, that the digging of the Byzantine well inadvertently disturbed earlier, perhaps Roman, remains. Yet, even early Roman remains do not establish the Baptist’s presence. The ford in the Jordan river that is near the outlet of Wadi al-Kharrar would have been used by Jewish pilgrims traveling through the Transjordan.43 Therefore, the presence of early Roman remains may be evidence that this area of Wadi al-Kharrar functioned as a way-stop for pilgrims going to and from Jerusalem. The river’s nearby springs and ford allowed access from the region of Perea (in the Transjordan) to Judea/Jerusalem. Unfortunately, detailed accounts of travel to Jerusalem in the first century CE through the Transjordan are meager (cf. J.W. 2.43). However, Luke’s description of Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem as going through Jericho (19:1) indicates that he traveled through that area on occasion.44 Consequently, that the Evangelist’s “Bethany Beyond the Jordan” has been properly identified at Tell al-Kharrar is uncertain. Particularly germane to this discussion is Notley’s assessment that it is possible for “Bethany beyond the Jordan” to be identified north of the Sea of Galilee. As noted, “beyond the Jordan” can refer to any place along the eastern bank of the river including the portion located north of the lake. This section of the river enters the lake through the Bethsaida (modern day Buteiḥa) valley an area which is referred to in some Lukan manuscripts as a “wilderness” (9:10, see above).45 Moreover, following the proposals of Brownlee and Reisner, Notley contends that “Bethany” (Βηθανία, 1:23) might be identified with the Bashan/Batanea region on the eastern side of the river in the modern-day Golan. As he notes, “John's ministry in the north seems a more fitting setting for his critique of actions involving the Herodian families, who resided in the Galilee and the north. John's popularity and outspoken critique resulted in his imprisonment by Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee.”46 As such, he adds that a
42 Waheeb, “The Discovery of Bethany,” 122.
43 Later Christian pilgrims, e.g., Theodosius, traveled along a similar route, see Yoram Tsafrir, “The Maps Used by Theodosius: On the Pilgrim Maps of the Holy Land and Jerusalem an in the Sixth Century C.E.,” Dumbarton Oaks Papers 40 (1986): 129–145
44 Notley, “The Last Days of Jesus,” in The Sacred Bridge, 363; see also Jeffrey P. García, “Epistle: Jesus and His Pilgrimage Practices,” BAR 47.2 (2021): 60–62.
45 Notley, “The Geographical Setting,” 350–351. See also Rainer Reisner, “Bethany Beyond the Jordan (John 1:28): Topography, Theology and History in the Fourth Gospel,” TynBul 38 (1987): 29–64; Craig Keener, The Gospel of John: A Commentary, 2 vols. (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003), 1:450. This is likely how John 10:40 should be understood.
46 Notley, “The Geographical Setting,” 351. See also Reisner, “Bethany Beyond the
Out” 15
García, “A Voice Cries
northern setting, specifically northwestern, seemingly makes sense of John’s narrative after Jesus’ baptism Some additional details in John help to fill out this aforementioned location.
The evangelist reports that two of the Baptist’s disciples begin to follow Jesus the day after his baptism. One disciple, Andrew, also brings his brother Peter to Jesus (1:29–42). While the narratives are distinctly different in the Synoptic Gospels, the meeting and calling of the disciples are always set by the northern shores of the Sea of Galilee (Matt 4:18; Mark 1:16). If, as in the other gospels, John the Evangelist is describing the meeting of Andrew and Simon somewhere around the Galilee the day after Jesus is baptized, it is unfeasible that Jesus would have taken the 60-plus mile journey between the southern stretches of the Jordan and the Galilee in a single day. On the day following this encounter, Jesus finds Philip who is described as being from “Bethsaida, the city of Peter and Andrew” (Βηθσαϊδά, ἐκ τῆς πόλεως Ἀνδρέου καὶ Πέτρου, 1:44b). John couples this with Jesus’ decision to return to the Galilee (43). If Jesus and John are on the eastern bank of the river near and around Bethsaida then heading to the region of the Galilee would have been a matter of crossing the Jordan. The river formed a political boundary between Batanea, part of the tetrarchy of Philip and the Galilee which was administered by Antipas (Ant. 17.189). Therefore, a setting north of the lake comports with the Gospel of John’s evidence.47
2.5 Machaerus and the Baptist's Death
One matter must still be considered regarding the Baptist’s place near the Dead Sea. Josephus’ reports that Herod Antipas has John killed in his desert stronghold Machaerus, which lies 25 km (16 mi) southeast of the mouth of the Jordan River: But to some of the Jews the destruction of Herod’s [i.e., Antipas] army seemed to be divine vengeance, for his treatment of John, surnamed the Baptist. For Herod had put
Jordan,” 53–56. 47 Notley suggests additionally that the mishnaic statement, “water of the Jordan and water of the Yarmuk are unfit, because they are mixed waters” ( הַיַּרְדֵּן וּמֵי יַרְמוּך פְּסוּלִים
תַﬠֲרוֹבוֹת , m. Par. 8:10), may prohibit any form of ritual immersion south of the lake where these waters meet, “Geographical Setting,” 351. The context of the mishnah deals with the waters of immersion for “males with seminal discharge” ( זָבִין ), “sufferers of a skin disease” ( מְצוֹרָﬠִין ), and waters for mixing with the ashes of red heifer ( חַטָּאת , 8:8–9; see the ruling of Akiva and Hanina in the toseftan par.). Lawrence Schiffman has suggested to me in a private conversation that this mishnah is not intended to disqualify these waters from all forms of ritual immersion, rather, it designates that the waters where the Yarmuk and the Jordan meet as being unfit for the three aforementioned categories. Thus, other forms of ritual immersion likely, including the Baptist’s immersion events would have been permitted in these waters.
16 JJMJS No.
9 (2022)
מִפְּנֵי שֶׁהֵם
him to death, though he was good man … Though John, because of Herod’s suspicions, was brought in chains to Machaerus, the stronghold that we have previously mentioned, and was there put to death… (Ant. 18:116–117, 119).48
Josephus begins by remarking that Herod Antipas unwittingly embroils himself in a conflict with king Aretas of Nabatea after Antipas sends his wife Aretas’ daughter back to her father in order for him to marry his brother Philip’s wife. According to Josephus, Antipas’ wife gets wind of his desires and requests departure to Machaerus. The reason being, as the historian adds, the stronghold was subject to her father.49 The hilltop fortification was situated on the border of Antipas’ tetrarchy and the Nabatean kingdom. The ensuing battle between Antipas and Aretas does little to change the former’s fortunes, his army is destroyed (Ant. 18.112–116). As with Josephus, in Matthew and Mark, the Baptist who amasses a significant popularity among Herod’s subjects (Ant. 18.118), stokes fear in the tetrarch. John openly rebukes his relationship with Philip’s former wife, Herodias (Mark 6:14–29, also Matt 14:1–12). Flusser points out details in the Gospels’ accounts that effectively argue for moving the Baptist’s death from Machaerus to Galilee, namely, Antipas holds a birthday banquet (Mark 6:21; Matt 14:6) that was given “for his courtiers and officers and the leading men of Galilee” (Mark 6:21).50 It makes little sense that a celebration of Antipas’ birthday with Galilean leading mean51 in attendance would be held at the fortress that bordered with the, potentially contentious, Nabatean kingdom. Reasonably, this indicates that John’s murder is portrayed in Matthew, Mark, and Luke as transpiring somewhere in the Galilee, the central region of John’s ministry and the locale of Antipas’s capital city, Tiberias. Thus, the consistency of the Synoptic Gospel's depiction of John's death in the Galilee, the location of Herod Antipas' seat of power in Tiberias, and the general location of the Baptist's Galilean ministry comprise a compelling challenge to Josephus' identification of the desert fortress as the place of John's death.
In conclusion, Taylor may be correct that “physical proximity means
48 Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, Books 18–20, trans. and ed. Louis H. Feldman (London: Harvard University Press, 1969), 81–85.
49 There is an alternate manuscript reading to 18:112 that is noted by Feldman which suggests that the messengers, and not the fortress, are under subject to Aretas Feldman, ed., Jewish Antiquities, 79.
50 See David Flusser’s discussion on this issue, especially Josephus’ double reference to the fortress of Machaerus in Ant. 18, in Jesus, with the collaboration of R. Steven Notley, 3rd ed. (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 2001), 278–279; and Notley, “Geographical Setting,” 351.
51 I am reading the three categories, courtiers, officers, and Galilean leading men as a hendiadys, that is they are intended to express a single idea the chief nobles of Antipas’ Galilean court.
García,
Voice Cries Out” 17
“A
nothing in terms of tracing influence or connection.”52 However, it has endured as a factor in the Baptist’s potential relationship to the yaḥad.53 Surely, geographical proximity should not be wholly abandoned. While reasons vary, the political, social, and cultural realities of a particular region at any point in history can prove the catalyst for the emergence of new religious ideas. For example, Shmuel Safrai suggests that the particularities of Galilean culture in the first century were an important component to the development of a group of early Jewish pietists known as the Hasidim.54 In our particular case, the evidence that is often understood as connecting John the Baptist with the southern stretches of the Jordan river does not hold under closer scrutiny. Even more to the point, demonstrating that John’s ministry was located in the modern-day Judean wilderness seems an insurmountable task and should not be enumerated among the reasons for a relationship between John and Qumran
3. The Wilderness of Isaiah 40:3 and Luke’s Baptist
The use of Isaiah 40:3 by both the Community Rule (1QS) and the four Gospels is significant. From Brownlee to Charlesworth, there endures an opinion that this parallel equals some form of relationship.55 In the scrolls, Isa 40:3 appears in 1QS 8:1456 and, partly in 9:19–20,57 while Isa 40:1–5 is attested in 4Q176 1 2 i 4–9. In the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and John utilize Isa 40:3, while Luke quotes Isa 40:3–4, 5b in relation to the Baptist.
3.1 Isaiah 40:3
Regarding the 1QS quotation, it is, in part, a biblical justification for the community’s separation into a wilderness whether literal, metaphorical, or both58 from the dwelling of “perverse people” ( הנשי העול , 8:13; אנשי העול , 9:17). Column 8 of 1QS clarifies how Isa 40:3 should be understood, “This is (the)
52 Taylor, The Immerser, 48. 53 Charlesworth, “John the Baptizer.”
54 Shmuel Safrai, “The Pious (‘Hassidim’) and the Men of Deeds/Hasidim ve-anshei maaseh,” Zion 50 (1985): 134–138 [Heb.]. See also idem, “Teaching of Pietists in Mishnaic Literature” JJS 16.1–2 (1965): 15–33; “Jesus as a Hasid,” Proceedings of the Tenth World Congress of Jewish Studies: Jerusalem, August 16–24, 1989, Div. B, ed. David Asaf (Jerusalem: World Congress of Jewish Studies, 1990), 1–7 [Heb.]; Geza Vermes, Jesus the Jew: A Historian’s Reading of the Gospels, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1981), 58–82.
55 Brownlee, “John the Baptist,” 72–74; Charlesworth, “John the Baptizer,” 14; but also, Taylor, The Immerser, 24.
56 Par. 4Q259 (Serekhe) 3:5.
57 Par. 4Q259 (Serekhe) 3:19.
58 George J. Brooke, “Isaiah 40:3 and the Wilderness of the Community,” in New Qumran Texts and Studies: Proceedings of the First Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Paris 1992, ed. George Brooke and Florentino García Martínez, STJD 15 (Leiden: Brill, 1994), 117–132.
18 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
interpreting of the torah ( היאה מדרש התורה ), which he commanded through Moses…” (8:15). Column 9 elaborates further, stating that “preparing the way” involves each member of the yaḥad walking blamelessly in what is revealed of God’s truly wonderous mysteries (18–20). While both Baumgarten and Dimant argue that the interpretations of Isa 40 in the Gospels and 1QS differ significantly and “therefore should remain distinct.”59 The gospels do share some similarity to the interpretive style reflected in the scroll. The author of the Community Rule associates the prophetic passage with its own group. In good pesher style, the single Isaianic passage is fulfilled in the yaḥad’s present circumstance. While the gospels are reflecting on a past event, rather than a current predicament, Matthew and Mark appear to view the Baptist’s place in the wilderness as a fulfillment of Isa 40:3 (as well as, Mal 3:1 in Mark). John’s Gospel differs, in that the prophetic passage is placed on the Baptist’s lips (1:23). It is self-reflective, not unlike 1QS. That is, the interpretive style is not dissimilar, John sees himself as the fulfillment of the prophetic passage. In that sense, the gospel writers have something in common with the author of 1QS, even if the applications diverge.
Luke charts a different course both methodologically and interpretatively.60 The evangelist’s departure from his counterparts is exhibited in attributing a longer quotation of Isa 40 to the content of the Baptist’s teaching, rather than his person. The nuance is subtle, but critical. Unfortunately, the Lukan Baptist is mired in the Synoptic problem.61 The generally accepted solution, Markan Priority with or without the theoretical sayings source, Q(uelle) calls into question the reliability of texts that deviate from the presumed Markan source. Yet, as Sanders and Davies correctly conclude, “no one solution to the synoptic problem is without objection.”62 Indeed, Luke’s deviation is so significant that Bovon, who ascribes to the two-source hypothesis (Markan Priority + Q), states that the Lukan Baptist is “organizing still older materials,” has “roots in the most ancient Christian kerygma,” and that individual sayings “could be attributed to the historical John.”63 Joseph Fitzmyer asserts that apart from John’s presence in the wilderness and the occurrence of Isa 40:3, the Lukan composition is “independent” 64 even though he does not
59 Devorah Dimant, “Not Exile in the Desert but Exile in Spirit: The Pesher of Isa 40:3 in the Rule of the Community and the History of the Scrolls Community – Collected Studies,” in History, Ideology, and Bible Interpretation in the Dead Sea Scrolls, FAT 90 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014), 460; Joseph M. Baumgarten, “The Unwritten Law in the Pre-Rabbinic Period,” in Studies in Qumran (Leiden: Brill, 1977), 32.
60 Pace Marshall, Luke, 137.
61 See E. P. Sanders and Margaret Davies, Studying the Synoptic Gospels (London: SCM Press; Harrisburg: Trinity Press International, 1989), 51–122.
62 Sanders and Davies, Studying, 112.
63 F. Bovon, Luke 1: A Commentary of Luke 1:1–9:50, trans. Christian M. Thomas, ed. Helmut Koester, Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2002), 119.
64 Joseph Fitzmyer, The Gospel According to Luke I–IX, AB 28 (New York: Doubleday,
García,
Voice Cries Out” 19
“A
assess the value of it with regard to the Baptist. The focus of this second part of the study, then, will treat, in contrast to Fitzmyer et al., the employment of Isa 40:3–4, 5b as a mostly independent tradition that perhaps reflects the historical John, his disciples, or memories of his movement, and provides additional information about the Baptist that allows a fresh assessment of his relationship, if any, to the Qumran community.
3.2 Luke’s Baptism
Before examining Luke’s use of Isaiah, there are contextual matters that betray the partly independent nature of the Baptist narrative (3:1–20). First, Luke does not, in this account,65 utilize the moniker “Baptist” (βαπτιστὴς) or “Baptizer” (βαπτίζων), which is a later development of those who remember John’s mission, including to some extent Josephus (βαπτιστοῦ, Ant. 18.116). Rather, Luke, on this occasion, speaks of John as one might expect in an ancient Jewish environment, “John son of Zechariah” (Ιωάννην τὸν Ζαχαρίου υἱὸν, 3:2;־זְכַרְיָה רבַּיוֹחָנָן ).66 Second, John is not as present in Jesus’ baptism as he is in Matthew, Mark, and John. Literarily, Matthew and Mark present a single, continuous narrative that locates the Baptist somehow participating in Jesus’ immersion (Matt 3:13–17; Mark 1:9–11). Luke uniquely reports Jesus’ baptism only after John is imprisoned and all the people have been baptized. In the third Gospel, John is not explicitly present at Jesus’ baptism (Luke 3:21–22). Third, the Baptist’s role in Luke as the messianic forerunner is muted. There is a single statement in Luke regarding who will come after him (see Acts 18:24–26), but it is prefaced with, “all men questioned in their hearts concerning John, whether perhaps he was the Christ” (3:15). The Baptist’s acknowledgement that the “one” coming “is mightier” than him is disconnected (3:16–17) from the appearance of the apparent “one” (21–22). In both Matthew and Mark, mention of the one who is coming is directly followed by Jesus’ entrance into the narrative (Matt 14:3–4; Mark 6:17–18). Additionally, the other three gospels present Jesus’ baptism in grand fashion: Jesus comes from the Galilee “to be baptized” (βαπτισθῆναι) by John (Matt 3:13; Mark 1:9; John 1:31 = the Baptist’s own retelling), John’s role primarily is to introduce Jesus, and upon Jesus’ immersion the heavens open and a divine voice speaks (Matt 3:16–17; Mark 1:10–11; John 1:33–34). Comparatively, Jesus’ immersion in Luke is far less monumental. Fitzmyer suggests that Luke is 1981), 479. Luke I–IX, 452. Fitzmyer points out that there are five Lukan stand outs, among them being the longer Isaianic passage.
65 Luke does employ “Baptist” later (cf. 7:20, 33, 9:19).
66 Marshall notes that the use of “son” (υἱὸς) is unnecessary in Greek idiom and may reflect a Semitic source, I. Howard Marshall, Commentary on Luke: A Commentary on the Greek Text, NIGTC (Exeter: Paternoster Press; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978), 135. But the Gospel writer is still utilizing a common way of expressing parentage in ancient Judaism, see, e.g., 4Q477 2 ii 3, 9; m. Šeqal. 8:5.
20 JJMJS No.
9 (2022)
“inspired” here by Mark.67 This is a difficult proposition as Luke’s obscure portrayal ignores the primary thrust of its Markan source, namely, Jesus’ baptism as part of the commencement of Jesus’ public ministry. Frankly, the presentation of the Lukan Baptist in 3:1–20 is barely that of a forerunner.68 If as Bovon suggests, that Luke is reordering older material, perhaps the elements that do not deal specifically with the forerunner’s role (c.f. vv. 13–15) represent the pieces of that more ancient tradition. Not functioning as the forerunner fits well within early Judaism; both Trebolle Barrera and Jassen have noted the scarcity of an eschatological prophet Elijah or otherwise functioning as a forerunner to the messiah in Second Temple sources.69
It is also not certain that the Luke, specifically 3:1–20, understands John’s role as a type of Elijah an eschatological prophet,70 yes, an Elijah type, however, is uncertain. Indeed, an eschatological prophet does not necessitate an identification with Elijah (e.g., 1QS 9:11), although it is easy to see how Elijah’s work, as envisioned in the Second Temple period (Mal 4:5–6 [MT: 3:23–24], Sir 48:10, m. ‘Ed. 8:7; perhaps, 4Q521 2 iii 2), can be thought to lie behind the Lukan account. Of course, in Matthew and Mark, the attribution with Elijah is unmistakable (Matt 3:4; Mark 1:671). In John, the Baptist denies any association with Elijah or any other prophet but acknowledges that he is the voice in the wilderness of Isa 40 (1:19–23). Notably outside of Luke’s Baptist narrative, the third gospel does trade in Elijianic tradition (Luke 1:17, 9:7).72 Yet, read as an independent narrative, Luke 3 is not necessarily Elijianic. As argued here, John’s role in Luke is that of the “herald” ( מבשר ) of redemption and judgment as found in Isaiah and the reinterpretation of the prophet in Second Temple texts.
67
Fitzmyer, Luke I–IX, 479.
68 See Fitzmyer’s notes on Luke, Luke I–IX, 3:7–10, 464–465.
69 Barrera states, “the concept of Elijah as forerunner of the Messiah is not widely attested in the Pseudepigrapha,” Julio Trebolle Barrera, “Elijah,” EDSS 1:146. Regarding the scrolls, Alex Jassen states, “In none of these texts, however, does Elijah (or the eschatological prophet) appear as the harbinger of the messiah, whereby Elijah emerges prior to the arrival of the messiah in order to announce his arrival. Such a tradition will not appear unequivocally until the New Testament,” Mediating the Divine: Prophecy and Revelation in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Second Temple Judaism, STDJ 68 (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 155. See Morris M. Faierstein, “Why do the Scribes say that Elijah Must Come First?” JBL 100.1 (1981): 75–86; John J. Collins, “The Works of the Messiah,” DSD 1.1 (1994): 103; Rivka Nir, “The Appearance of Elijah and Enoch ‘Before the Judgment was Held’ 1 Enoch 90:31: A Christian Tradition,” Hen 33 1 (2011): 108–112. But see, more recently, Anthony Ferguson, “The Elijah Forerunner Concept as an Authentic Jewish Expectation,” JBL 137.1 (2018): 127–145; Bovon, Luke 1, 128.
70 Ernst, Johannes der Täufer, 81–84.
71 John’s presence as the Elijah-type eschatological prophet is embedded in Mark’s fusion of Mal 3:1 and Isa 40:3. See Notley and García, “Hebrew-Only Exegesis,” in The Language Environment of First Century Judaea: Jerusalem Studies in the Synoptic Gospels Volume 2, ed. R. Steven Notley and Randall Buth, JCP 26 (Leiden: Brill, 2014), 357–362.
72 See Marcus’ discussion on John/Jesus as Elijah/Elisha in John the Baptist, 87–91.
Cries Out” 21
García, “A Voice
3.3 Luke’s Longer Isaiah Text
Returning now to Luke’s use of Isa 40:3–4, 5b, the quotation diverges from the interpretation and employment of Isa 40:3 in the other gospels. The longer passage, as in other places in Luke, is likely intended to point the reader/hearer to the larger context of Isa 40.73 One of the markers that the Gospel is pointing to the context of the prophetic passage as well as, perhaps, other interconnected texts is the association of the verb εὐαγγελίζω74 with John’s teaching, “Therefore, with many exhortations he [i.e., John] brought good news (εὐηγγελίζετο) to the people” (3:18). The most common Hebrew equivalent for εὐαγγελίζω isבשׂר , “bring news.”75 The formמְבַשֶּׂרֶת (“news bringer/herald,” fem.) appears in Isa 40:9, “Get you up to a high mountain, O Zion, herald of good tidings…” ( צִיּוֹן שֶׂרֶת בַ מְ ﬠֲלִי־לָך הַר־גָּבֹהַ ).76 John’s portrayal as bringing good news and the occurrence of one of Isaiah’s “herald” passages feminine form not withstanding77 is not coincidental. For all intents and purposes, the Baptist in Luke is the herald of good news. It is worth considering here whether Luke’s Gospel is intending to allude to other passages that naturally connect with Isa 40’s “herald.” To that end, the Gospel’s incomplete quotation of Isa 40:5 is strange in light of nearly preserving a complete quotation of vv. 3–4. The omission of 40:5a, “And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed,” and 5c, “for the Lord has spoken,” appears to intentionally stress 40:5b, “and all flesh shall see it together, the salvation of God…” It is possible that the emphasis is an allusion to Isa 52:10. In their Septuagintal form, 40:5b and 52:10 are linguistically similar:
73 See R. Steven Notley, “Jesus’ Jewish Hermeneutical Technique in the Nazareth Synagogue,” in Early Christian Literature and Intertextuality. Vol. 2: Exegetical Studies, ed. Craig A. Evans and Daniel H. Zacharias (London and New York: T&T Clark, 2009) 46–59; R. Steven Notley and Jeffrey P. García, “The Hebrew Scriptures in the Third Gospel,” in Searching the Scriptures: Studies in Context and Intertextuality, ed. Craig A. Evans and Jeremiah Johnston, LNTS 543 (London and New York: Bloomsbury, T&T Clark, 2015), 128–147; also, Fitzmyer, Luke I–XI, 533. See also Charles David Isbell, How Jews and Christians Interpret Their Sacred Texts: A Study in Transvaluation (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2014), 104–112.
74 Occurring 11 times in the Gospels, εὐαγγελίζω is predominantly a Lukan word (10 of the 11 occasions). This is not due to Mark since the word is altogether missing there. It is also equally unlikely related to Matthew, in that Matthew is Luke’s source, since it employs the word once (cf. Matt 11:5).
75 E.g., 1 Sam 31:9; 2 Sam 1:20, 4:10, 18:19–20, 26, 31; 1 Kgs 1:42; Isa 60:6; Jer 20:15; Nah 2:1; Ps 39:10.
76 RSV translation. But see also the commentary in John Goldingay and David Payne, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Isaiah 40–55, Volume I, ICC (London: T&T Clark, 2006), 86.
77 The LXX translates as a masculine participle, ὁ εὐαγγελιζόµενος.
22 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
40:5b: and all flesh shall see it together, the salvation of God…
52:10: and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.78
καὶ ὄψεται πᾶσα σὰρξ τὸ σωτήριον τοῦ θεοῦ·
καὶ ὄψονται πάντα τὰ ἄκρα τῆς γῆς τὴν σωτηρίαν τὴν παρὰ τοῦ θεοῦ
Goldingay and Payne note that 40:9–11 and 52:7–10 are “twin” texts (cf. also Nah 1:15 [MT 2:1]).79 Both refer to the “herald” ( מְבַשֶּׂרֶת , 40:9;מְבַשֵּׂר , 52:7) and its good news.80 For Blenkinsopp, the good news is “tripartite: the end of indentured service; the liquidation of debts incurred, understood metaphorically; and the bestowing of benefits that will outweigh the punishment inflicted for sins committed.”81 The picture painted here, namely, the removal of debt and indentured servitude is of God’s redemption82 (esp. 52:3).
The “herald” in Isaiah chapters 40 and 52 continued to inspire later/contemporary Second Temple authors in the portrayals of national83/communal redemption. One example is the rewrite of Isa 40 in Psalms of Solomon 11 where the elements of redemption are spoken of as already having occurred, “Blow in Zion on the trumpet to summon (the) holy ones. Proclaim in Jerusalem the voice of him who brings good news, for God has had pity (ἠλέησεν) on Israel in visiting them.” (cf. also 1 Bar. 5:1–9). In 4Q176, redemption and the redeemer ( ייייגואלׄךׄ , 8 11 10) are vividly represented with numerous Isaianic passages including Isa 40:1–5 (1 2 i 4–8) and 52:1–3 (8 11 1–4).84 Sometimes known as 4QTanḥumim, Høgenhaven states, “The overall concern of the composition seems to consist in the construction of a salvation history with the steadfastness of God, that brings about the change in his
78 The Masoretic text of both verses read differently. However, it is not beyond the pale to suggest that perhaps the difference between the LXX and the MT are due alternate Hebrew mss.
79 Joseph Blenkinsopp notes the interconnectedness of Isa 40:9–11 and 52:7 with chaps. 40–55’s salvific narrative, Isaiah 4–55, ABR 19 (New York: Doubleday, 2002), 185–186.
80 See Goldingay and Payne, Isaiah 40–55, 1:86.
81 Blenkinsopp, Isaiah, 179.
82 For this study, the term "salvation" seems to be interconnected with redemptive imagery Both are intended to describe God’s active engagement on behalf of his people, returning them to land of Israel and its former glory, and dealing with their debts/sins. While these matters are not always eschatological in nature, in the Second Temple period there is considerable evidence of their eschatologicalization
83 “National” refers to however early Jewish authors uniquely define God’s people, i.e., God’s nation. According to Blenkinsopp, in Isaiah, the “reprobate” has no share in it, which he attributes to “sectarian thinking,” Isaiah, 84–87; 296.
84 John M. Allegro, with collaboration of Arnold A. Anderson, Qumran Cave 4: I (4Q158–4Q186), DJD V (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), 60–66.
García, “A Voice Cries Out” 23
people's fate, a change from affliction to reward and blessing, as the focal point.”85
In other texts, the conceiving of redemption with Isa 52 also appears to be paired with Isa 61 where similar themes of bringing news ( לְבַשֵּׂר , 1), redemption (to Zion) and judgment occur. Chapters 52 and 61 form part of the depiction of the eschatological redeemer in 11QMelchizedek (11Q13 2:9–10, 16–20, 23). As the original editors of 11Q13 state regarding the thematic pesher, the most legible “column focuses on the acts of redemption which will free the sons of the light from Belial and the spirits of his lot.”86 Melchizedek is also envisioned as administering “the vengeance of Go[d]’s judgements” ( נק֯ם֯ משפ֯ט֯י ל]א).87 As in 4Q176 and Psalms of Solomon, 11Q13 portrays redemption using two Isaianic “herald” texts. Unique, however, to 11QMelchizedek is the appearance of judgment against Belial. Judgment is not attested in the Pss. of Sol. 11 or, it seems, in 4QTanḥumim. What is clear is that the prophet Isaiah, especially chapters 40, 52, and 61 among others had a wide influence on the ancient Jewish literary imagination regarding redemption and judgment (cf. 11Q13 2:8–10).
The pairing of Luke’s Baptist as the preacher of “good news” (Luke 3:18) with the gospel’s tendency to utilize biblical texts in a decidedly Jewish interpretive fashion where the quotation is intended to echo the context and language of that text, as well as other complementary passages is likely intentional. Luke exclusively identifies John’s ministry with the “herald” ( מְבַשֵּׂר ) of redemption. In fact, the other unique details of the Lukan Baptist, namely, the additional teachings attributed to the Baptist in 3:11–14, may forward this argument, especially with regard to Isa 61 (and its use in the Second Temple period). In vv. 11–14, John outlines the fruits that befit repentance (καρποὺς ἀξίους τῆς µετανοίας, v. 8) to those who have repented and immersed, that is, the crowds, tax collectors, and soldiers. The three teachings are for the crowds to be charitable, the publicans to be fair when acquiring taxes, and the soldiers to be nonviolent and avoid slander. These instructions specify a sort of social justice charitable and merciful actions which calls forth redemption and protects from divine wrath. Similar themes to the Baptist’ instructions are unsurprisingly attested in the good (social) news of Isa 61. There the prophet brings news ( לְבַשֵּׂר /εὐαγγελίσασθαι) to the “afflicted”/ “poor” ( ﬠֲנָוִים /πτωχοῖς), proclaiming the year of the Lord’s favor (1–2). The redemptive portrait entails bringing justice to those in need binding the broken-hearted, liberating the captives, setting prisoners
85 Jesper Høgenhaven, “The Literary Character of 4QTanhumim,” DSS 14.1 (2007): 122. 86 Florentino García Martínez, Eibert J.C. Tigchelaar, and Adams Van Der Woude, eds “11QMelchizedek,” in Qumran Cave 11, II, 11Q2–18, 11Q20–31, DJD XXIII (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998), 222. See also R. Steven Notley, “11QMelchizedek,” in Early Jewish Literature: An Anthology, ed. Archie. T. Wright, Brad Embry, Ronald Herms, 2 vols. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2018), 490–498.
87 Text from García Martínez, Tigchelaar, and Van Der Woude, “11QMelchizedek,” 225.
24 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
free and rebuilding ancient remains (1–4). Later in 61, the Lord is described by the prophet as a lover of justice who hates robbery and iniquitous (interpersonal) action. Of course, the call for social justice is not unique to Isa 61 (cf. also e.g., 44:21–23; 58:5–7). Lying behind John’s instructions may also be the judgment portion of Ezekiel, specifically 18:5–9. There the “righteous person” ( אִישׁ...צַדִּיק ), in part, “does not oppress anyone, but restores to the debtor his pledge, commits no robbery, gives his bread to the hungry and covers the naked with a garment, does not lend at interest or take any increase, withholds his hand from iniquity, executes true justice between people…” (7–8). This “righteous person shall surely live” ( צַדִּיק הוּא חָיֹה יִחְיֶה , 9), whereas the wicked “shall surely die” ( מוֹת יוּמָת , 13). Block states that life here is not eternal life but escape from divine judgment. The wicked person has no escape; both life and death are a result of the person’s own action.88
The expectation to be charitable and interpersonally just what Flusser collectively refers to as “social love” 89 is very much present and heightened in texts dated to the Hellenistic-Roman period.90 In particular, the complex of passages utilized in 4Q521, the so-called Messianic Apocalypse, whose relationship to the Qumran community is unclear, are critical at this juncture. Most of the columns are exceptionally fragmentary. However, 2 ii + 4 preserve a good deal of legible content. The description of God’s “anointed,” perhaps describing an eschatological prophet (not necessarily a messiah),91 appears to be announcing the unfolding of redemption/salvation, “[…For the hea]vens and the earth shall give heed ( ישמעו ) to his anointed” (1).92 Particular to this study is
88 Daniel I. Block, The Book of Ezekiel: Chapters 1–24, NICOT (Grand Rapids; Cambridge, U.K.: Eerdmans, 2012), 574–579. See the longer discussion on this issue by Moshe Weinfeld, Social Justice in Ancient Israel and the Ancient Near East (Minneapolis: Fortress Press; Jerusalem: Magness Press, 1997), 140–141.
89 David Flusser, Judaism and the Origins of Christianity (Jerusalem: Magness Press, 1988), 474.
90
For biblical evidence regarding the individual’s responsibility, see Weinfeld, Social Justice, 222–225. These ideals are well attested in both Ben Sira (e.g., 7:32–35, 12:3, 16:14, 17:22, 40:17, 24) and Tobit (e.g., 4:5–11). In particular, both authors depict these social practices as analogous to observing the commandments (Tob 1:3), atoning for sins (Sir 3:30; “purging away,” Tob 12:9), protecting from times of affliction and death (Sir 11:27; Tob 4:10) perhaps even the day of judgment (ἡµέραν ἀνάγκης, Tob 4:9; cf. esp. ἡµέρᾳ ἀνάγκης, 1 En. 100:7) occurring in relation to repentance (specifically, God’s mercy to those who repent, Sir 17:29), and redeeming (Tob 14:2–7). They are also enumerated among the covenant-defining laws of the Qumran community, “[the] ne[w (covenant) in the lan[d of Damascus…] to lo[ve each man his brother as himself] [and] to [sup]port [the poor destitute and the proselyte, and to seek] each [m]an the pea[ce of his brother…” (4Q269 4 ii 1–4 = CD 6:19–7:1; cf. also 1QS 1:5, 5:4, 8:2). The impact of these moral actions is witnessed as well on the language of the day.
91 Jassen, Mediating, 86.
92 See comments by Émile Puech in, Qumrân Grotte 4 XVII: Textes Hébreux (4Q521–4Q528, 4Q576–4Q579), DJD XXV (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998), 12–17; also “The
Out” 25
García, “A Voice Cries
Isa 40 in line 5, “For the Lord will attend to the pious and the righteous he will call by name” ( בשם יקרא = Isa 40:2693), and Isa 61 in line 12, “he will bring good news to the afflicted” ( ענוים יבשר , cf. Isa 61:1). Again, it appears that in the mind of Second Temple authors, the “herald” passages of Isaiah fit together with others in describing eschatological redemption. God (or his agent94) redeem/save his servants from places of need (12–15). Moreover, redemption in 4Q521 hinges, it seems, on interpersonal justice.95 In other words, God’s eschatological engagement is partly found on socially just action. For example, the original editors construct line 4Q521 ii 4 10 to read, “and the frui[t, (i.e., benefit) of] good[dee]ds shall not be delayed for anyone” ( ופרׄ י] מעש [ ה֯ ט֯ו֯בׄ לאיש לוא יתאחר
). Later fragments of 4Q521 refer to “…those who do good before the Lor[d]” ( ... אתׄהׄעושים הטוב לפני אדנ֯ י][ , 7 + 5 ii 4). Puech notes that there are parallels regarding the salvation of the righteous and the judgment of the cursed (c.f. 5–6) that are found in other Second Temple Jewish texts (e.g., 1 En. 98:1–3; 27:1–4).96
What does this all mean about Luke's portrayal of the Baptist? First, the portrayal of the Lukan Baptist is not limited to the Isa 40:3–4, 5b. In fact, there is evidence that other “herald” passages are being hinted at in the Gospel. Second, the image of redemption (and judgment) in these passages, especially Isa 40, 52, 61 (and perhaps 41 and 60) are creatively reworked by early Jewish authors in their own portraits of redemption. Third, with respect to the Lukan Baptist, the growing emphasis on interpersonal justice and its dual role as a way of both escaping divine judgment and redeeming Israel make sense of John’s role as the “herald” and the additional teachings as they appear in Luke. As suggested here, the aforementioned elements are also integrated into the eschatology of 4Q521. Regrettably, its fragmentary state does not allow more to be said about the content of the scroll.
It is then the argument of this study that Luke’s longer quotation is intended to affirm the Baptist as the “herald,” who preaches “good news,” primarily, redemption of God’s people, that is, those who repent, immerse, and are socially just. Social engagement, functions as catalyst for God’s eschatological engagement with his people. Those who do not heed John’s call will not escape the “wrath to come.” As such, Luke’s longer quotation, Isa 40:3–5, 5b, is intended to draw the reader/hearer back to a number of “herald” texts and their contexts, especially Isa 52 and 61. The effect of this approach resolves
Wonder of the End-Time Metaphoric Language in 4Q521 and the Interpretation of Matt 11.5 par,” JSP 18 (1998): 87–110.
93 This phraseology only appears here and in Isa 40.
94 Benjamin Wold has brought important attention to this issue in, Agency and Raising the Dead in 4QPseudo-Ezekiel and 4Q521 2 ii,” ZNW 103.1 (2012): 1–19.
95 Although Florentino García-Martínez and Eibert Tigchelaar, eds., The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 1044.
96 Notes on lines 5–6, Puech, Qumrân Grotte 4 XVII, 25–26.
26 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
two pertinent issues with the Lukan Baptist’s account: 1) Luke’s omission of Isa 40:5a and 5c and the emphasis placed on 5b the salvation of the Lord; 2) the occurrence John additional teachings on social justice. It also provides a picture of John with greater resolution.
3.4 11Q13 and 4Q521
A couple of points are key here. The two Dead Sea texts that bear similarities to John in their use of “herald” texts are 11Q13 and 4Q521. Regarding 11QMelchizedek, the appearance of Belial along with other Qumranic language may be sufficient to tie it closely to the yaḥad. 97 In terms of scriptural interpretation, as with other pesharim, the Melchizedek scroll is not necessarily concerned with the context of the passages as much as the quoted texts support the overall theme. Assuming that Luke’s longer Isaiah passage is intended to lead back to the context of those passages, then the interpretative style is unlike the yaḥad’s approach in 11Q13. Moreover, in 11Q13 Melchizedek is the eschatological redeemer, one who will atone for the sons of light and execute God’s judgment. In contrast, John is not a direct agent of redemption in the gospel and the lines between those judged and the groups of those redeemed are not so clearly specified as they are in the scroll. In Luke, the indefinite “crowds” are warned of judgment and instructed to be socially just after repenting and immersing. As scholars have long noted, this pattern betrays some form of relationship at least indirectly between John and Qumran via the repentance, immersion, and requisite action expected of community members in the Community Rule (1QS 3:8–11). Unlike 11Q13, unfortunately, it is not certain that the attribution of the Isaiah passage originates with John's community or memories of his movement. The scriptural texts associated with Melchizedek seem to originate with the Qumran community, as much as the scroll can be identified as a product of the yaḥad. Yet, for a moment, let us entertain that the Lukan Baptist specifically the attribution of Isaiah 40, the interconnected texts surveyed here, and the Luke's additional teachings remembers how John was remembered, namely, as the “herald” of God’s redemption. John seems to be waiting for God’s direct engagement, and not necessarily a human (messianic) agent (apart from 3:16–17, see above). This significantly pulls for him redemption and judgment are imminent. 98 In that sense, the Baptist seems to fit the role of some early Jewish eschatological prophets.
With regard to the use of Isaiah passages, 4Q521 seems to have the most in common with Luke. Unfortunately, its fragmentary nature prohibits a more
97
Devorah Dimant, “Sectarian and Non-Sectarian Texts from Qumran: The Pertinence and Usage of Taxonomy,” RevQ 93 (2009): 7–18 (17).
98 See the important discussion, David Flusser, “The Stages of Redemption History According to John the Baptist and Jesus,” in his, Jesus, (with R. Steven Notley; Jerusalem: Magnes, 2001), 258–275.
García,
Voice Cries Out” 27
“A
fruitful examination of 4Q521 and the Lukan Baptist. Yet, what is suggested here is that 4Q521 portrays an eschatological redemption and judgment. Additionally, there is evidence that socially just actions play a role in the coming eschatological event. If indeed John was viewed as the “herald,” believing that redemption and judgment were imminent, and that repentance, immersion, and social justice would trigger redemption, then the Baptist appears in a manner that is not unlike 4Q521.99 Any direct relationship then with the Qumran community vis-à-vis the use of Isaiah 40 is wanting and further examination of the relationship between John and Qumran should take full advantage of Luke's semi-independent, unique portrayal. There are some commonalities of course that cannot be ignored (e.g., immersions, repentance, etc.).
4. Conclusion
The aim of this study is to reassess two matters that have stayed the course in associating John the Baptist with the Qumran yaḥad. These are geographical proximity and the mutual use of Isa 40. On the one hand, proximity, it has been argued, is not a good enough reason for association; yet, it endures. Indeed, geography should not be so easily dismissed, as it along with societal developments in a particular region could provide some insight into the movements that developed there. Still, under close scrutiny, there is insufficient evidence to place John the Baptist’s ministry anywhere near Khirbet Qumran.100 Of course, this does not forgo a relationship, even if it negates one based on proximity. Moving forward, studies of John’s relationship to any particular early Jewish group should give full weight to the 1st century CE Galilean (Gaulanitis) ethos in as much as perhaps more than is given to the desert around Qumran.
On the other hand, the utilization of Isaiah proves somewhat problematic, especially, but not solely, because of the style of attribution utilized by the gospels. Our examination of the Lukan Baptist indicates that it is trading in ideas that are independent from the other Gospels. In other words, they may represent a different, if not earlier source(s) of the Baptist’s movement. While historical certitude is elusive, because Luke’s depiction has its own peculiar traditions, it is worth being read independently as representing a historical movement or memory thereof. What has been brought to bear here is that Luke’s longer quotation of Isa 40 connects the Baptist’s preaching with that of the Isaianic “herald” texts, not with the prophet that functions as a messianic forerunner. As the portent of goods news, Luke’s John comfortably can be
99 Repentance and good works are envisioned bringing redemption in b. Šabb 118b; b. Yoma 86b; b. Sanh. 97b.
100 The earliest reference that I discovered to the Judaean Wilderness was a German map from the mid 19th century, Map of Palestine or the Holy Land (Philadelphia: E.H. Butler & Co, 1859), Amir Cahanovitc Collection. Public domain work, Israel, ACC 1102–2. See also PEFQS 1–2 (1869–1870): 31.
28 JJMJS No. 9
(2022)
situated among early Jewish eschatological prophets. While there are a limited number of texts that employ similar Isaiah passages, 11Q13 and 4Q521 are the most pertinent. It appears that the Lukan Baptist and the Melchizedek scroll part ways in terms of scriptural interpretation, opinions regarding the agent of the expected eschatological event, and with defining specific groups of those who escape or receive divine judgment. 4Q521 offers surer footing. The colocation of Isaiah texts and the potential for interpersonal justice to be a catalyst for divine intervention appear to shed light on John’s role in Luke. Additionally, it has been noted that 4Q521 is likely not a text composed by the yaḥad. Being among the scrolls may indicate that it held some importance to the community, but to what extent is unclear. Even more to the point, the ideas in the so-called Messianic Apocalypse, which some argue may have originally depicted an eschatological prophet(s) rather than a messiah, may represent traditions that intersected with numerous communities. As such, while the scroll text provides a better context for the Lukan Baptist, and evidence that this unique portrayal fits comfortably in the religious landscape of early Judaism, ascertaining a relationship to the Qumran community is challenging. Speaking specifically of the use of Isa 40, there seems to be minimal connection between 4Q521 and the yaḥad. Where the scrolls provide comparable material defining definitive relationship can only be done imprecisely. Finally, this is not an argument of relational absence, as much as it is noting that geographical proximity and the use of Isaiah 40 are not suitable for supporting one. Relationships, however, are indeed nuanced and the two aspects reexamined here are only part of a more complex story
García,
Voice Cries Out” 29
“A
Reconsidering Psalm 89:25, Jewish Water Miracles and Markan Christology
Jonathan
Rivett Robinson
Carey Baptist College | jonathan.robinson@carey.ac.nz JJMJS No. 9 (2022): 30–42
Abstract
In this article I respond to Daniel Kirk and Stephen Young's argument (JBL: 2014) that the Markan sea miracles (Mark 4:35–41; 6:45–52) may depict Jesus within the same human paradigm as the idealized Davidic king of Psalm 89:25, whose “hand is set to the sea”, rather than imputing divine prerogatives to Jesus. They find support for this in other Jewish water miracle accounts, coherence between Psalm 89 and Mark’s depiction of Jesus, and the eschatological interpretation of Psalm 89 in early Jewish literature. The argument is also developed further in Kirk’s book, A Man Attested by God (2016). This study raises concerns as to whether Psalm 89:25, and the other texts adduced by Kirk and Young, provide significant parallels for Jesus’ performance of sea miracles. Further, when Jewish texts describing water miracles are considered, a strict paradigm emerges which casts doubt on Kirk and Young’s more inclusive construction. Consequently, I will argue that Mark’s portrayal of Jesus in the water miracles does not fit within any human paradigm that can be established for early Judaism.
Keywords
Christology, Miracles, Water, Early Judaism, Psalm 89, Sirach 50, Gospel of Mark
1. Introduction
In a 2014 Journal of Biblical Literature article, Daniel Kirk and Stephen Young make an important contribution to the early high Christology debate by questioning whether the Markan Jesus, in exercising authority over the sea (Mark 4:35–41; 6:45–52), is depicted as divine.1 Examining the idealized Davidic king of Psalm 89:25,2 whose “hand is set to the sea,” they argue that he is “a
1
J. R. Daniel Kirk and Stephen L. Young, “‘I Will Set His Hand to the Sea’: The Relevance of Ps 88:26 LXX to Debates about Christology in Mark,” JBL 133 (2014): 333–340.
2 MT 89:26; LXX 88:26; for simplicity I will refer throughout to NRSV numbering.
Robinson, Reconsidering Psalm 89:25 31
[human] figure other than God with authority over the sea.”3 They find ancillary support for this in other Jewish water miracle accounts; coherence between Psalm 89 and Mark’s depiction of Jesus, and the eschatological interpretation of Psalm 89 in early Jewish literature. Their proposal has been accepted by other scholars.4 The argument is also developed further in Kirk’s book, A Man Attested by God. Despite the admirable clarity and carefulness of their argument, concerns may be raised as to how far Psalm 89:25 really is an informative background text for Jesus’ performance of sea miracles. Further, when other Jewish texts describing water miracles are considered, a paradigm emerges which casts doubt on Kirk and Young’s construction. Consequently, I will argue that Mark’s portrayal of Jesus in the water miracles does not fit within any human paradigm that can be established in early Judaism.
2. A Challenge to Divine Christology in the Markan Sea Miracles
The sea miracles in Mark’s Gospel (Mark 4:35–41; 6:45–52) are of particular significance for those who argue for an early high Christology.5 While many of Jesus’ miracles resemble those performed by prophets in the Jewish scriptures, the sea miracles are unique and unprecedented for a biblical human miracle worker.6 Rather, the sea miracles evoke the scriptural prerogatives of God and have consequently been argued to open the way for speculation beyond a merely “functional” identification of Jesus with God.7
3 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 335–336.
4 See e.g., Michael Kok, “Marking a Difference: The Gospel of Mark and the ‘Early High Christology’ Paradigm,” Journal of the Jesus Movement in its Jewish Setting 3 (2016): 102–124 at 115; Richard Bauckham “Confessing the Cosmic Christ (1 Corinthians 8:6 and Colossians 1:15–20)”, Monotheism and Christology in Greco-Roman Antiquity, ed. Matthew Novenson, NovTestSup 180 (Leiden: Brill, 2020), 139–171 at 164. Bauckham’s adoption of Ps 89:25 as a background text for Mark 4:35–41 contrasts with his two critical reviews of J. R. Daniel Kirk, A Man Attested by God: The Human Jesus of the Synoptic Gospels (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2016). See Richard Bauckham, “A Case for High Human Christology”, Expository Times 129.3 (2017): 121–124; idem. “Is ‘High Human Christology’ Sufficient? A Critical Response to J. R. Daniel Kirk’s A Man Attested by God,” Bulletin for Biblical Research 27.4 (2017): 503–525.
5 See e.g. Simon Gathercole, The Preexistent Son: Recovering the Christologies of Matthew, Mark, and Luke (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006), 61–65; Philip G. Davis, “Mark’s Christological Paradox,” JSNT 35 (1989): 7–8; Richard B. Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Gospels (Waco: Baylor University Press, 2016), 66–70; Michael F. Bird, Jesus the Eternal Son: Answering Adoptionist Christology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 94–97.
6 William F. McInerny, “An Unresolved Question in the Gospel Called Mark: ‘Who Is This Whom Even Wind and Sea Obey?’ (4:41),” Perspectives in Religious Studies 23 (1996): 259.
7 So R. T. France, The Gospel of Mark: A Commentary on the Greek Text, NIGTC (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), 225.
However, Kirk and Young argue that scholars who consider the water miracles to demonstrate some manner of divine identity for Jesus “overlook a potentially crucial piece of evidence.”8 This evidence is Ps 89:25, “I will set his hand on the sea and his right hand on the rivers” (NRSV). For Kirk and Young this text demonstrates Jewish expectation of a messiah who could control waters as part of his idealized humanity and kingship.9 This coming messiah would, like Moses (Exod 14:16, 27) and Joshua (Josh 3:7–4:19), be an agent of God’s power who could control water.10 Indeed this expectation found concrete expression in the rebel Theudas as recounted in Josephus. Ant. 20.97. This Theudas told his followers he was a prophet and would divide the river Jordan by his command.11 The possible use of Ps 89 in Testament of Judah 22 is given as evidence that the Psalm was read messianically and eschatologically in the early Roman imperial period.12 When making the same argument elsewhere, Kirk provides two further important texts. Firstly, Pesiqta Rabbati 36:1, where interpreting Ps 89:25 it reads concerning the messiah, “even the seas and rivers will stop flowing.”13 For Kirk, this later Jewish expectation for the messiah “is particularly striking precisely because it reflects the Jesus tradition in ways that later Jews may have generally been keen to avoid.”14 Secondly, Sirach 50:3 is argued to show an idealized high priest with creative power over the waters and thus is a further instance of a human with God’s authority over water.15
Despite Kirk and Young’s presentation of this evidence, it remains to be shown, even if such a belief was operative in Second Temple Judaism, that it is pertinent for interpretation of Mark 4:35–41 and 6:45–52. As noted by Kirk and Young, Mark nowhere explicitly quotes from or appears to allude to Ps 89.16 Their argument is rather that Mark has “created a discursive world that trades on a set of descriptions of God’s coming messiah similar to those found in the Psalm.”17 This point is well taken. However, for Kirk and Young the relevance of Ps 89:25 to Markan Christology is that it generates the possibility that,
A literate Christ follower who draws on Judean Scripture and associated interpretive activity for a representation of Jesus,
J. R. Daniel Kirk and Stephen L. Young, “‘I Will Set His Hand to the Sea’: The Relevance of Ps 88:26 LXX to Debates about Christology in Mark,” JBL 133 (2014): 333–340, (335). See also Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 90–92, 102–104, 434–442.
8
9 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 336.
10 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 337.
11 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 337; See also Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 103–104.
12 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 339.
13 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 104.
14 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 250.
15 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 125.
16 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 337–338.
17 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 338.
32 JJMJS No. 9
(2022)
Robinson, Reconsidering Psalm 89:25 33
such as the author of Mark, could plausibly consider God’s eschatological Davidic representative to have authority over the sea without necessarily being identified with God himself in the sense that this identification is taken by those arguing for a divine Christology in Mark.18
Such a nuanced conclusion is certainly plausible, but is it probable? Without intending to argue here for a divine Christology, however understood, I hope to show that the texts with which Kirk and Young support their conclusion do not provide the requisite evidence.
3. Evidence for a Messianic Interpretation of Psalm 89:25
The first witness, given by Kirk and Young, to a messianic interpretation of Ps 89:25 is the account of Theudas in Ant. 20.97. While Theudas (if recounted accurately by Josephus) was certainly drawing on traditions around Moses and Joshua in his promise to divide the river for his followers,19 it is not evident that in doing so he was interpreting Ps 89:25. Neither does a highly symbolic attempted crossing of the Jordan necessarily imply the expectation of general power over water in any situation. The simplest explanation for Theudas’s intent was to imitate Joshua in crossing the Jordan and conquering Canaan.20 Like Joshua, this power over water would not have been understood as an ongoing ability but as a onetime act to show God’s favour on a particular person and their course of action (Josh 3:7).21 Strikingly, it must be observed that the miracles described in the Gospels do not fit the mould that Kirk and Young have suggested. Jesus does not part the sea or the river and walk across on dry land as Moses and Joshua both did or as Theudas was hoping to do.22
On the other hand, the 6th or 7th century Pesiqta Rabbati, 23 while associating Ps 89:25 with the messiah in Pesiq. Rab. 36:1, does not relate this to human miracle working power over creation. The pertinent extract from Pesiq. Rab. 36:1 reads:
18 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 338.
19 See e.g. Martin Hengel, The Zealots: Investigations into the Jewish Freedom Movement in the Period from Herod I until 70 A.D. (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1989), 230.
20 “The symbolism of his action most obviously recalls Joshua,” John J. Collins, The Scepter and the Star: Messianism in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), 216.
21 Collins, The Scepter and the Star, 219.
22 Of course, as Josephus recounts, Theudas had his head cut off by the Romans before he had the chance to try (Ant. 20.98).
23 Daniel Sperber, “Pesikta Rabbati,” in Encyclopaedia Judaica, ed. Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnic, 2nd ed., vol. 16 (Detroit: Macmillan, 2007), 12–13. For full discussion of date and Palestinian provenance see Leon Nemoy, ed., Pesikta Rabbati, trans. William G. Braude, Yale Judaica 18, 2 vols. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968), 1.20–26.
The Holy One, blessed be He, will reply: He is the Messiah, and his name is Ephraim, My true Messiah, who will pull himself up straight and will pull up straight his generation, and who will give light to the eyes of Israel and deliver his people; and no nation or people will be able to withstand him, as is said The enemy shall not do him violence, nor the son of wickedness afflict him (Ps. 89:[22]). And all his enemies and adversaries shall be beaten before him, as is said I will beat to pieces his adversaries before him (Ps. 89:[23]). And even seas and rivers will stop flowing, as is said I will set his hand also on the sea, and his right hand on the rivers (Ps. 89:[25]).24
In the pesiqta, two verses are cited (Ps 89:22 and 23) immediately prior to Ps 89:25. In all three verses cited, the messiah is not the subject of the action. In Ps 89:23, and 25 God is the subject and in 89:22 the enemy is the subject. In each instance the messiah is the beneficiary but not the actor. The rabbinic commentary on these verses follows this scheme and does not describe any explicit action on the messiah’s part. This scheme places the unnatural behaviour of the water in the category of divinely ordained apocalyptic phenomena, similar to, for example, Joel 2:31, rather than messianic miracle working. This coheres with similar imagery in the piska (reading) on which Pesiq. Rab. 36 is an exposition, namely Isa 60:1–2, “For darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples” (Isa 60:2).25 Consequently, it is not clear how this rabbinic text can be read as “imputing control over the waters to the coming messiah”26 as no explicit mention of the messiah’s agency is made. Contra Kirk, it may even be that the rabbinic commentator consciously avoided any hint of the Messiah performing water miracles to avoid reflecting the “Jesus tradition.”27
The Testament of Judah, which following Kirk and Young we may consider a Christian text,28 is plausibly shown by Kirk and Young to draw on
24
See Nemoy, Pesikta Rabbati, 2.678. In this instance the editorial insertion goes against the flow of the immediate context and so should be discounted, “And even seas and rivers will [yield to his power and] stop flowing,” but if accepted would weaken the force of my argument here. However, such a late text can hardly be decisive either way; Kirk rightly omits the insertion when quoting the pesiqta (A Man Attested by God, 104).
25 Nemoy, Pesikta Rabbati, 2.676–677.
26 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 250.
27 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 250.
28 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 338 n. 22. See further, “The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs: Christian and Jewish: A hundred years after Friedrich Schnapp,” in Marinus De Jonge, Jewish Eschatology, Early Christian Christology and the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, NovTSup 63 (Leiden: Brill, 1991), 233–243.
34 JJMJS No. 9
(2022)
Robinson, Reconsidering Psalm 89:25 35
the language and themes of Ps 89 in T. Jud. 22:1–5.29 However, if we accept this connection it renders the absence of any reference to power over waters in T. Jud. significant. Why would early Christians, using Psalm 89 to retrospectively provide the patriarch Judah with prophetic words concerning Jesus, not seize on the opportunity to connect Jesus’ water miracles with Ps 89:25, the only (supposed) promise of messianic power over water in the Jewish scriptures? The subsequent and apparently Christianized section T. Jud. 24:1–6,30 could surely have contained a reference to its messianic figure, the “sinless man” of “the seed of Judah” (T. Jud. 24:1), walking on water or calming storms. One explanation would be that the Christian redactor of Testament of Judah did not do so because he or she did not read Ps 89:25 as promising such power nor connect that particular verse to Jesus’ earthly ministry. If, on the other hand, the connections in Testament of Judah 22 with Psalm 89 are from an earlier Jewish tradition, unnoticed by later Christian editors, the lack of interest in the water imagery of Ps 89:25, while an argument from silence, at the least does not indicate that Ps 89:25 was significant in messianic speculation.
4. Psalm 89:25 and Miraculous Power over Water
It is not clear, then, that Ps 89:25 has been previously read in the way proposed by Kirk and Young.31 When read in context of the whole of Psalm 89, verse 25 does not easily read as a promise of miracle power at all, perhaps explaining why it is not used in this way in early Jewish or Christian literature. An ancient reader could, of course, have taken Ps 89:25 out of context in order to support a belief in messianic miracle power over water. It cannot be claimed that Ps 89:25 was never read in this way. But there is no evidence that this has happened, as discussed above. On the other hand, the literary and historical context of the Psalm is critically important to Kirk and Young’s argument and so it bears some analysis here.32 The Psalm is in three distinct sections (89:1–18, 19–37, 38–48) with a small conclusion (89:49–52). All the sections follow a parallel thematic
29 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 338–339. Kirk and Young thus helpfully fill out the observations of earlier commentators, see further: the marginal notes of James H. Charlesworth, The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, Volume 1: Apocalyptic Literature and Testaments (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1983), 801; also H. W. Hollander and M. De Jonge, The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs: A Commentary (Leiden: Brill, 1985), 224.
30 De Jonge, Jewish Eschatology, 239; Hollander and De Jonge, The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, 227–228.
31 Even if Kirk and Young’s argument regarding Ps 89:25 were accepted, Mark’s sea miracles cannot be considered an example of such a use of Ps 89, as they acknowledge: “we do not intend to argue here for the presence of Ps [89:25] as an intertextual allusion in Mark 4:35–41 and 6:45–52.” Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 340.
32 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 336–338.
structure, especially in the earlier verses of each section.33 While the parallelism is not strictly adhered to, and is less obvious in the latter parts of each section, it is consistent enough to be significant for the interpretation of the Psalm. So, for example, the initial verses of the first two sections and the conclusion refer to faithfulness, while in opposition the initial verse of the lament section refers to rejection (89:1–2, 19, 38, 49). The second theme of each section is David as servant (89:3, 20, 39, 50–51), and so on. Indeed, Kirk comments on the significance of this structure several times.34
However, Kirk limits his observation of the parallelism to the first two sections and does not include the third section in his interpretation. Yet the correspondences are sometimes stronger between the second and third sections than between the first and second sections. For example, between verses 5, 22, and 41 the stronger correspondence is between enemies unable to outwit or humble (89:22) and enemies plundering and neighbours scorning (89:41); and between verses 6, 23, and 42 the stronger resonance is between enemies crushed and struck down (89:23) and enemies exalted and rejoicing (89:42). The third section, therefore, should not be discounted in the interpretation of the second section as it is sometimes more strongly linked to it than the first section. Moreover, any early Jewish or Christian reader of the Psalm who would notice the correspondence between the first two sections would also reasonably be expected to notice the correspondence between the second and third sections.
The pertinent parallelism for this study is the theme of God’s extensive dominion over the heavens and earth, including stilling the waves and crushing Rahab/chaos in 89:9–12.35 Kirk and Young rightly see this as mirrored in 89:25.36 However, their suggestion that this mirroring can be read as implying YHWHlike power over the sea and rivers for the human king is less plausible. This goes against the logic of the parallelism within the Psalm which does not promise any other miraculous power to David but only that God will faithfully grant success in the very human actions expected of a king, namely war (89:22–24) and procreation of heirs (89:29).
While Kraus asserts, regarding 89:25, that “Perfections of power which only Yahweh possesses are transferred to the ‘servant of God,’” he qualifies this immediately with, “In this way the conception of the king’s worldly dominion is suggested.”37 Tanner is surely correct to interpret Ps 89:25 alongside 1 Chr
33 Frank-Lothar Hossfeld and Erich Zenger, Psalms 2, Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005), 406–407; John Goldingay, Psalms: Psalms 42–89 (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2007), 665.
34 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 248–249, 435.
35 Mitchell Dahood, Psalms II 51–100, AB (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1968), 313–314; James Luther Mays, Psalms (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2011), 284; But see Hossfeld and Zenger, Psalms 2, 409, who argue Rahab should here be read as “Egypt.”
36 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 336.
37 Hans-Joachin Kraus, Psalms 60–150, trans. Hilton C. Oswald (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), 209.
36 JJMJS No. 9
(2022)
Robinson, Reconsidering Psalm 89:25 37
18:1–6, where David expands his kingdom from the coastal Philistine territory to the Euphrates River, and Ps 80:11, which describes Israel’s territory extending from the sea to the river.38 In terms of messianic texts, Zech 9:10 and Ps 72:8 specifically use the language of river and sea to define the messianic king’s territorial authority, not his miraculous power.39 These texts thus predispose scriptural language of river and seas to be references to messianic rule over land. For a scripturally literate early Jew to read otherwise is not impossible, but would be against the grain.
Michael Kok, in defence of Kirk and Young’s argument, dismisses the view that Psalm 89:25 is simply about earthly power: “It still seems to me that Ps 89:9–10 sets the context in the ancient Near Eastern combat myth where the celestial potentate subdues the forces of chaos symbolized in the raging waters and establishes order.”40 But this is to fail to note the clear change of context and language between the three sections of the Psalm. Following the parallelism to the third section of the Psalm, Ps 89:25 finds its own mirror in the lament of 89:44, which does not lament natural disasters, exposure to bad weather, or an inability to cross natural water obstacles. Rather, it laments the loss of sovereignty, that is, the throne being taken away from David’s line.41
Recognising the thematic parallelism between 89:25 and 44 provides an unforced interpretation through all three main sections, and suggests that 89:25, “I will set his hand on the sea and his right hand on the rivers,” is simply and straightforwardly to be understood as referring to the extent of a human king’s mundane sovereignty over territory marked by the sea on one border and a river on the other, not to miracle working power.42 The image is of the king’s reach, the extent of his arm. Within his territory his sovereignty is total, just as God is sovereign over the heavens and earth (Ps 89:11). Moreover, the previous extent of the kingdom of David is restored to Israel. It is in this way, I would argue, that the Psalm was most likely to be read and hence why there is no evidence of it being read in terms of miracle power for the messiah in early Jewish literature. I must respectfully disagree, then, with Kirk when he writes, “These very functions of ruling the world on God’s behalf, including raging waters,
38 Nacy L. deClaissé-Walford, Rolf A. Jacobson, and Beth LaNeel Tanner, The Book of Psalms, NICOT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014), 682.
39 Mark J. Boda, The Book of Zechariah, NICOT (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2016), 572; Goldingay, Psalms 42–89, 387–388.
40 Kok, “Marking a Difference,” 115.
41 Goldingay, Psalms 42–89, 687; Hossfeld and Zenger, Psalms 2, 412.
42 So Dahood, Psalms II 51–100, 317; Mays, Psalms, 285; Goldingay, Psalms 42–89, 678–679. While, against the majority view, Hossfeld and Zenger state “There is not so much thought of metaphorical statements about the geographical extension of governance” but this verse is “a mythical way of saying the king dominates chaos”, the effect is still that the king will imitate God’s subdual of chaotic forces through his military subdual of forces which threaten his kingdom, not that he will have miraculous power (Hossfeld and Zenger, Psalms 2, 410).
is part and parcel with the idealized portraits of Davidic kingship that we see in … the lyrical anticipations of Psalm 89.”43 Rather, I conclude that Ps 89:25 does not provide evidence of, or reason for, a Second Temple Jewish association of a Davidic messiah with the ability to control the sea in the way that Jesus does in his miracles.
5. Evidence of Human Power over Water from Sirach 50
A further suggestion made by Kirk is that “What Psalm 89 anticipates for a future Davidide, Sirach 50 ascribes to an idealized high priest.”44 Following Fletcher-Louis he argues that the priest’s “creation of the bronze sea” was a reenactment of the third day of creation and thus sees the priest, Simon son of Onias, acting as the warrior-creator God defeating the chaotic waters.45 The specific verse interpreted thus is Sir 50:3. In context it reads:
Sir 50
Simon son of Onias was the great priest, he who in his life repaired a house and in his days fortified a shrine. 2 καὶ ὑπ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἐθεµελιώθη ὕψος διπλῆς ἀνάληµµα ὑψηλὸν περιβόλου ἱεροῦ
And by him the height of the courtyard was founded, a high retaining structure of the temple enclosure. 3 ἐν ἡµέραις αὐτοῦ ἐλατοµήθη ἀποδοχεῖον ὑδάτων λάκκος ὡσεὶ θαλάσσης τὸ περίµετρον
In his days a cistern for water was quarried, a reservoir like the circumference of a sea. 4 ὁ φροντίζων τοῦ λαοῦ αὐτοῦ ἀπὸ πτώσεως καὶ ἐνισχύσας πόλιν ἐν πολιορκήσει
He who gave heed to his people out of calamity and strengthened the city in a siege,
Note the words I have highlighted in bold: στερεόω-strengthened, ἀνάληµµαfortified wall, ἐνισχύω-strengthen and πολιορκήσις-siege.46 These are all terms that
43 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 441.
44 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 125.
45 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 125; Crispin H. T. Fletcher-Louis, “The Cosmology of P and Theological Anthropology in the Wisdom of Jesus Ben Sira,” in Of Scribes and Sages: Early Jewish Interpretation and Transmission of Scripture, vol. 1, Studies in Scripture in Early Judaism and Christianity 9 (London: T&T Clark, 2004), 69–113, at 102.
46 In the LXX, for στερεόω compare 1 Macc 9:62, 10:50; for ἀνάληµµα, 2 Chron 32:5; for ἐνισχύω, Judg 3:12; 2 Sam 22:40; and for πολιορκήσις, compare 4 Kgdms 18:9; Isa 1:8; 9:21; 37:9. Note πολιορκήσις is the verbal noun of πολιορκέω. See further T. Muraoka, A GreekEnglish Lexicon of the Septuagint (Louvain: Peeters, 2009), 573.
38 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
Greek NETS 1 Σιµων Ονιου υἱὸς ἱερεὺς ὁ µέγας ὃς ἐν ζωῇ αὐτοῦ ὑπέρραψεν οἶκον καὶ ἐν ἡµέραις αὐτοῦ ἐστερέωσεν ναόν
Robinson, Reconsidering Psalm 89:25 39
serve to set a context of martial reinforcement.47 So Kirk and Fletcher-Louis are correct to argue that Simon is portrayed as a warrior. However, confusion is created by identifying the cistern of 50:3 as the bronze laver of the temple in order to relate it to the temple imagery found in Genesis 1. In the context of martial fortification it can be nothing less than a cistern for storing water in the event of a siege, which interpretation has the added advantage of being what the Greek of 50:3 describes.48 Indeed, far from being “bronze” the cistern is hewn from rock (λατοµέω) and the reference to sea (θάλασσα) is simply a hyperbolic description of its great size.49 What Simon’s cistern (ἀποδοχεῖον ὑδάτων, מקוה , 50:3) does clearly relate to is the cistern (κρήνη, מקוה , 48:18) built in Hezekiah’s fortification of Jerusalem recounted in Sir 48:17–18.50
That said, even if one were to follow Kirk and Fletcher-Louis in their interpretation of Sir 50:3 it would only be depicting Simon playing God’s role in, to use Kirk’s words, the “dramatic re-enactment” or “microcosm” of the temple worship, something ordained by God for the priests to do.51 The microcosmic re-enactment of cultic worship is a non-miraculous human activity. This hardly provides a paradigm of idealised humanity into which the depiction of Jesus by Mark, actually taming the chaotic sea with his powerful
47 See translation and commentary in Patrick W. Skehan and Alexander A. Di Lella, The Wisdom of Ben Sira, vol. 39, AYB (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010), 546–550, which agrees with this reading of the text and with the interpretation of water as a reservoir.
48 Notably, textual variants and other traditions are in agreement with this basic sense, see Joseph Ziegler, Septuaginta: Vetus Testamentum Graecum, 2nd ed., vol. 12, 2 Sapientia Iesu Filii Sirach (Göttingen: Vendenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1980), 357; J. H. A. Hart, ed., Ecclesiasticus, the Greek Text of Codex 248: Edited with a Textual Commentary and Prolegomena (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 22; Víctor Morla, Los manuscritos hebreos de Ben Sira: traducción y notas (Estella Navarra: Editorial Verbo Divino, 2012), 336–337.
49 This is not to contradict Fletcher-Louis’ wider thesis which at 44 pages is too large and complex to address here. However, he does assert that “both the Hebrew and Greek [texts of Sirach 50] are clearly organised along the lines of the Priestly creation-Tabernacle heptadic structure. This is more pronounced in the Greek text.” Consequently, I have restricted my analysis here to the Greek text as the presumably stronger version for Kirk’s case. Fletcher-Louis, “The Cosmology of P,” 94.
50
“The protection from capture and defense against the enemies by Simeon recall the time of Hezekiah, a figure from history who is uppermost in our minds because of the many lexical parallels that Ben Sira draws. Ben Sira’s portrayal of Hezekiah is his longest praise of a ‘Father’ apart from the priests Aaron and Simeon himself, and therefore should probably be considered of some importance.” So, James K. Aitken, “Biblical Interpretation as Political Manifesto: Ben Sira in His Seleucid Setting,” Journal of Jewish Studies 51 (2000): 191–208, at 197. The same point is made by Crispin Fletcher-Louis, “The High Priest in Ben Sira” in Atonement: Jewish and Christian Origins, ed. Max Botner, Justin Harrison Duff, and Simon Durr (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2020), 89–111, esp. 102.
51 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 127.
word or walking across the water as if on land, can fit. Rather, Simon son of Onias is depicted in Sir 5:1–4 as fortifying the temple and digging a reservoir against the prospect of a siege, an impressive, admirable, but non-miraculous, human undertaking.
6. The Paradigm of Water Miracle Texts
However, despite disregarding Ps 89:25 and Sir 50:3 as pertinent data for discussing the Christology of the Markan sea miracles, might Kirk and Young’s proposal regarding human figures with power over water still stand on the other texts mentioned, that is, Josephus’ account of Theudas and the scriptural water miracles? Are not the sea miracles ascribed to Jesus simply variants upon the theme of miraculous human control over water begun with Moses’ parting of the Reed/Red Sea?
On the contrary, Kirk and Young’s account of early Jewish texts reveal a paradigm of human power over water which is surprising in its strict repetition. Moses, Joshua, Elijah and Elisha all perform essentially the same miracle, and there is little development, only a change of narrative and geographical context.52 In each instance the miracle is presented as a one-off, with a specific purpose, and with no indication that it is a continuing ability of the prophet. Theudas was thus highly unoriginal in his stated intention as he is closely following the exact form of water miracles recounted in the tradition before him.53
Texts not adduced by Kirk and Young also support this strict paradigm. In the Lives of the Prophets 3:7–9 we read a Jewish tradition where Ezekiel made “the water stop” (ἐποίησεν στῆναι τὸ ὕδωρ) of the river Chebar so that the people could escape the Chaldeans. The Chaldeans who tried to follow were drowned (οἱ τολµήσαντες τῶν ἐχθρῶν ἐπιδιῶξαι κατεποντίσθησαν). The echoes of the Exodus are clear.
In Isaiah 11:15 and 4 Ezra 13:44, 47, there is an eschatological expectation that Israel’s God will stop the waters for his people to cross, as in the Exodus. However, given the model for this expectation is the scriptural miracle narratives, all of which involve a human figure, it is easy to see how a messianic claimant could take it upon themselves to perform such a miracle. While Theudas never got the chance to attempt his dividing of the Jordan, in the fifth century CE, an enigmatic character named Fiskis, or Moses of Crete,
52 Exod 14:15–25; Josh 3; 1 Kgs 2:8, 14, respectively.
53 Josephus also records another false prophet, “the Egyptian,” who promises a reenactment of Joshua 6, substituting the walls of Jerusalem for Jericho (Ant. 20.169–71; cf. also J.W. 2.258–60; 6.283–87). In general, there is evidence of a pattern of aspirant messianic prophets who promised to reproduce scriptural miracles as signs of their “credibility” and “indicated to observers that the drama of salvation was underway.” Collins, The Scepter and the Star, 217–219; see also P. W. Barnett, “The Jewish Sign Prophets – A.D. 40–70: Their Intentions and Origin,” NTS 27 (1981): 679–697.
40 JJMJS No.
9 (2022)
Robinson, Reconsidering Psalm 89:25 41
serves as another example of this paradigm in action. Having claimed himself to be Moses redivivus and a forerunner to the Messiah, in ca. 431 CE he reportedly convinced a large number of Cretan Jews to cast themselves into the Mediterranean Sea in expectation that they would walk back triumphantly to Palestine on dry land. The dry land did not appear and the surviving Jews had to be rescued by the Christians who had gathered to watch (Socrates of Constantinople, Historia Ecclesiastica, VII 38; John of Nikiû, Chronicle, LXXXVI.1–11).54
There is thus evidence that, while messianic expectation could and did vary greatly within early Judaism, the act of parting the sea/river to walk across on dry ground was so imprinted on the Jewish religious consciousness that when it was repeated in different traditions, prophesied for the future, or imitated by would-be messiahs, the paradigm was strictly adhered to and not varied apart from incidentals like place and persons. This adherence is even seen in one variant of Pesiq. Rab. 36:1 where Parma MS 1240 contains the additional comment, presumably echoing Joshua 3, “And even the sea and rivers will stop flowing to make it possible for the scattered children of Israel to go to the Land of Israel without let or hindrance.”55
By contrast Jesus’ sea miracles bear a much weaker resemblance to those water miracles of Moses, Joshua and Elisha. The water is not parted, nor do the prophet and people walk across on the ground beneath. Moreover, rather than a preordained miracle (like Moses, Joshua and Elisha) or a premeditated miracle (like Theudas and Moses of Crete), Jesus’ sea miracles are described as spontaneous responses to the circumstances (only Ezekiel in Liv. Pro. 3:7–9 appears similar in terms of spontaneity). When read against the background of the Jewish texts which describe human agents performing water miracles, I would argue that what is being described by Mark in Jesus’s sea miracles portrays Jesus acting well outside of any Jewish expectation for a human figure. This is not to deny the possibility of elasticity and development within the paradigm of exalted human figures in early Judaism, especially in regard to taking on characteristics usually reserved for God. This is simply to observe that in the specific case of the water miracles such elasticity and development is conspicuous by its absence in any extant non-Christian early Jewish literature.56
54 Jacob Rader Marcus and Marc Saperstein, The Jews in Christian Europe: A Source Book, 315–1791 (Pittsburgh: Hebrew Union College Press, 2015), 505–507; R. H. Charles, The Chronicle of John, Bishop of Nikiu: Translated from Zotenberg’s Ethiopic Text (London: William & Norgate, 1916), 103–104.
55 Nemoy, Pesikta Rabbati, 2.678 n 7. I mention this late text, only because it is adduced by Kirk as part of his argument.
56 The Rabbinic examples of Onias/Honi (Josephus, Ant. 14.2.1 21; m. Ta’an. 3:8) and Gamaliel (b. B. Meṣi’a 59b–f), whatever else may be said about them, do not present themselves as parallels to Jesus’ water miracles. They are both examples, rather, of God answering the prayers of a righteous man. Neither perform a miracle themselves, but only witness one in answer to prayer.
Instead we have found a striking conformity to the scriptural pattern in the early Jewish sources.
7. Conclusion
While I agree with Kirk and Young that “Jesus’ mastery over the sea in Mark does not necessarily indicate that the author of Mark thus considers Jesus to be divine,”57 I would disagree with them that Ps 89:25 or Sir 50:3 provides a plausible background for Mark 4:35–41 and 6:45–52. Thus, those texts employed by others in the early high Christology debate (e.g. Psalm 107, Jonah 1, Job 9:8), which have demonstrable lexical and thematic links with Mark 4:35–41 and 6:45–52, prima facia present as a more plausible and more significant background.58 When considering the background of Mark’s presentation of Jesus, scriptural texts that are quoted or alluded within the Gospel passage in question must be considered the most relevant. That those scriptural texts describe, not a human, but God having control over the waters must be recognised as significant, even if the precise implications of this are still moot.59 Furthermore, if my analysis of Psalm 89 is correct, it is yet another Jewish scriptural text which represents the stilling of storms as God’s unique prerogative (89:9). In the psalm this prerogative is specifically distinct from any power granted to the kingly messiah.60
Many wonderful things were predicted of and expected for the human Davidic messiah; walking on water or calming storms were not among them. There is no evidence that the water miracles of Mark’s Gospel fit within an already established Jewish messianic paradigm. Indeed, while “Mark’s Jesus is an unpredictable combination of affirmation, denial, and transformation of… early Jewish messianic expectations,”61 in the Markan sea miracles Jesus displays power unexpected of any human figure. To coin a phrase, he blows those expectations out of the water.
57 Kirk and Young, “I Will Set His Hand to the Sea,” 340. Emphasis mine.
58 A list of studies specifically on the scriptural background to these texts would include, Robert Meye, “Psalm 107 as ‘Horizon’ for Interpreting the Miracle Stories of Mark 4:35–8:26,” in Unity and Diversity in New Testament Theology: Essays in Honour of George E. Ladd (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978), 1–13; Kent Brower, “‘Who Then Is This?’Christological Questions in Mark 4:35–5:43,” Evangelical Quarterly 81 (2009): 291–305; Joel Edmund Anderson, “Jonah in Mark and Matthew: Creation, Covenant, Christ, and the Kingdom of God,” Biblical Theology Bulletin 42 (2012): 172–186; Dane Ortlund, “The Old Testament Background and Eschatological Significance of Jesus Walking on the Sea (Mark 6:45–52),” Neotestamentica 46 (2012): 319–337; Jonathan Rivett Robinson, Markan Typology: Miracle, Scripture and Christology in Mark 4:35–6:45, LNTS 678 (London: T&T Clark, 2022), 81–100.
59 Note particularly Kirk’s discussion of Richard Hays (A Man Attested by God, 23–26).
60 Pace Bauckham, “Confessing the Cosmic Christ,” 164.
61 Kirk, A Man Attested by God, 290.
42 JJMJS No.
9 (2022)
Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism, and Abuse: Morton Smith versus Morton Smith on Jesus, Secret Mark, and the Letter to Theodore
Jonathan Klawans Boston University | jklawans@bu.edu
JJMJS No. 9 (2022): 43–71
Abstract
Morton Smith’s arguments defending the authenticity of the Letter to Theodore and its depiction of an antinomian Jesus display creative and conjectural characteristics, the sort that Smith ridicules in his methodological essays. The paradox is amplified by nastiness: Smith scorns scholars for fantasy and creativity, but at times Smith deploys nastiness in defense of his elaborate argumentation. Complicating matters further, Smith conjures an antinomian Jesus who not only secretly breaks the laws he publicly keeps, but also does so in a way that we could characterize as abuse. Exploring this territory, this article identifies unnoticed interconnections among Smith’s various writings on sexual matters and his contacts with a guru known for sexual license. None of this amounts to direct evidence of forgery on the part of Smith. Indeed, it remains imperative to consider a wider range of possibilities while we ponder the irony that Smith’s creative argumentation is undermined by his own methodological rigor.
Key Words
Carpocratians, Clement of Alexandria, forgery, Gershom Scholem, Letter to Theodore, Morton Smith, Secret Gospel of Mark
1. Introduction
In 1973, Morton Smith (1915–1991) published two books that presented Jesus and at least one early wing of his movement as radically, though secretly, antinomian.1 Smith’s argument was based on the Letter to Theodore, attributed
* I would like to thank Albert I. Baumgarten, Paula Fredriksen, Jennifer Wright Knust, and Allan J. Pantuck for reading and commenting on earlier drafts of this essay. I am also grateful to the students who participated in the “Biblical Fakes and Forgeries” seminar (developed, originally, with Jennifer Knust), which I convened at Boston University, Spring 2019 and Spring 2021. A number of my teachers at Columbia University, Jewish
to Clement of Alexandria, that Smith found in a manuscript in the Library of Mar Saba in 1958. The incomplete letter was written out on the end pages of a copy of Isaac Voss’s 1646 edition of the letters of Ignatius, and fully published in the more academic of Smith’s two volumes. In the letter, Clement ostensibly praises the otherwise unknown addressee, Theodore, for his efforts to counter the deceitful and sinful Carpocratians. The letter then testifies to, and seemingly preserves fragments of, a Secret Gospel of Mark, which in turn depicts Jesus as engaging in nocturnal initiation rites with sexual overtones a striking overturning of Jewish law by Jesus himself. The impact of Smith’s provocative theories regarding early Christian libertinism have been blunted by the unsettled controversies surrounding Morton Smith and his find: is the letter preserved in this modern manuscript attributable to Clement? Are the Secret Mark fragments possible evidence of early Christian antinomianism? How can scholars assimilate these controversies in the context of Smith’s justifiable influence on the field?
In 2003, Charles Hedrick spoke of a “stalemate in the academy,” describing the then-current status quaestionis regarding Smith, the Letter to Theodore, and the Secret Gospel.2 Nearly two decades later, it is difficult to say whether that stalemate has resolved, even though there has been no dearth of efforts to do so. In 2005, Stephen C. Carlson believed he had established the case for Smith’s “hoax,”3 only to run up against Scott G. Brown’s elaborate argument for the authenticity of Secret Mark, published the same year.4 In 2007, Peter Jeffery believed that he had disclosed the psycho-sexual anachronisms proving the charge of forgery.5 In 2008, Guy G. Stroumsa published the Morton Smith /
Theological Seminary, and Union Theological Seminary (1986–97) had been students and/or colleagues of Morton Smith and I credit Smith, albeit always at one remove or more, for infusing an aura of academic suspicion into the atmosphere that engulfed my formation as a scholar; that too is reflected here. I received helpful advice from the editor and anonymous reviewers for this journal as well as reviewers for one other journal that, in the end, found this essay to be out of its scope. These readers saved me from errors and pointed me in better directions. All remaining errors of fact and judgment are mine.
1 Morton Smith, Clement of Alexandria and a Secret Gospel of Mark (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973). Important supplemental information including Smith’s narrative of discovery appears in the popular volume, The Secret Gospel: The Discovery and Interpretation of the Secret Gospel According to Mark (New York: Harper & Row, 1973). For the latter, we follow the 1982 (and 2005), reprint: (Middletown, CA: Dawn Horse Press, 2005), on which see further below.
2 Charles W. Hedrick, “The Secret Gospel of Mark: Stalemate in the Academy,” JECS 11.2 (2003): 133–145.
3 Stephen C. Carlson, The Gospel Hoax: Morton Smith’s Invention of Secret Mark (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2005).
4 Scott G. Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel: Rethinking Morton Smith’s Controversial Discovery, ESCJ 15 (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2005).
5 Peter Jeffery, The Secret Gospel of Mark Unveiled: Imagined Rituals of Sex, Death, and Madness in a Biblical Forgery (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007).
44 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse
Gershom Scholem correspondence, arguing that the documents decisively proved Smith’s innocence at last.6 But the debate continues. My approach is a skeptical one for two main reasons. Pierluigi Piovanelli has convincingly demonstrated what many have long suspected: Smith’s prior interests in the distinctive content of the find.7 Forgeries, as is known, have an established tendency to find their way to those who are most sympathetic to their content.8 The second realm of suspicion concerns the underappreciated fact that the author of the Letter to Theodore plainly professes that one is required to lie about the Secret Gospel passages, even under oath (II, 10–12); to accept authenticity, therefore, is to believe the words of a confessed liar.9 Yet Bart Ehrman’s hesitation10 and Anthony Grafton’s inclination toward innocence11 give me pause.
Scholarship does not need yet another review of the state of the question or one more large line-up of the arguments for and against.12 This is especially so given the vitriol that this debate engenders.13 Nor is scholarship
6 Guy G. Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, Correspondence 1945–1982, JSRC 9 (Leiden: Brill, 2008), esp. xv–xx. Smith met Scholem when the younger scholar was studying in Jerusalem (1940–1945); their correspondence began after Smith returned to the United States in 1945 and continued intermittently until Scholem’s death in 1982.
7 Pierluigi Piovanelli, “Halfway between Sabbatai Tzevi and Aleister Crowley: Morton Smith’s ‘Own Concept of What Jesus “Must” Have Been’ and, Once Again, the Question of Evidence and Motive,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery? The Secret Gospel of Mark in Debate, ed. Tony Burke (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2013), 157–183.
8 On patterns of forgery, see Anthony Grafton, Forgers & Critics: Creativity and Duplicity in Western Scholarship (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990); and Christopher P. Jones, “The Jesus’ Wife Papyrus in the History of Forgery,” NTS 61.3 (2015): 367–378 and “The Syntax of Forgery,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 160.1 (2016): 26–36.
9 On this, see Francis Watson, “Beyond Suspicion: On the Authorship of the Mar Saba Letter and the Secret Gospel of Mark,” JTS NS 61.1 (2010): 128–170; see esp. 138–139; the point is more fully developed in Klawans, “Deceptive Intentions: Forgeries, Falsehoods, and the Study of Ancient Judaism,” JQR 108.4 (2018): 489–501 (esp. 493–496).
10 Bart D. Ehrman, “Response to Charles Hedrick’s Stalemate,” JECS 11.2 (2003): 155–163, and “The Forgery of an Ancient Discovery? Morton Smith and the Secret Gospel of Mark,” in Lost Christianities: The Battles for Scripture and the Faiths We Never Knew (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 67–90.
11 Grafton, “Gospel Secrets: The Biblical Controversies of Morton Smith,” The Nation (7 January 2009): 25–30.
12 For a relatively balanced collection, see Burke, ed., Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery. For a bibliographic essay on the matter (one leaning toward authenticity), see Timo S. Paananen, “From Stalemate to Deadlock: Clement’s Letter to Theodore in Recent Scholarship,” Currents in Biblical Research 11.1 (2012): 87–125.
13 On this unfortunate feature of the current debate, see Paananen, “From Stalemate to Deadlock,” 114–120. It may merit noting that the scholarly discussion on this topic skews heavily toward the masculine.
45
well-served by claims to solve the matter once and for all based on a discovery or new argument.14 As Ehrman has emphasized, the matter will not be settled definitively unless the manuscript pages turn up and can be subjected, finally, to scientific testing.15 The goals here are more modest, though the present analysis starts from a position of skepticism and intends to point further in that direction. We will not, however, raise here an accusation of forgery against Smith. Nor will we debate whether Smith’s interpretations of the letter or the Secret Mark fragments are correct. Rather, the following analysis re-examines select passages from Smith’s writings to demonstrate that his creative argumentation regarding Secret Mark breaks, at key points, his own rules of the game (which we can discern from Smith’s methodological essays and reviews). The contradictions are highlighted by Smith’s rhetorical nastiness: Smith deploys scornful comments at times to chide scholars for fantasy and creativity, but at critical moments in Clement of Alexandria, he wields nastiness precisely to support his creative defense of authenticity.
The inconsistency would be less notable is any of us fully consistent or always fair? were it not for the fact that the thrust of Clement of Alexandria puts forward a vision of an antinomian Jesus who secretly breaks the laws that he publicly keeps.16 Smith, we will show, breaks academic norms in defense of the authenticity of a letter presenting evidence that Jesus was a rule-breaker. Here, too, scholarship finds itself distracted. Much ink has been spilled on the (significant) questions regarding the homoerotic elements in Smith’s understanding of Jesus.17 Yet, scholarship has not fully grasped the extent to which Smith’s Jesus not only violates ancient Jewish and early Christian sexual norms but does so in a way that we should characterize as abuse. None of this will amount to direct evidence of forgery on the part of Smith indeed, the present analysis offers nothing new on that score. What we will see does counter Guy Stroumsa’s claim echoed by Tony Burke that Smith was only doing
14 We disagree equally with Stroumsa and Watson in this respect.
15 Ehrman, “Response,” 162–163. On the 1976 transfer of the manuscript (then still embedded in the end pages of Isaac Voss’s 1646 edition of the letters of Ignatius) from Mar Saba to Jerusalem’s Patriarchal Library, see Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, xx–xxi, and “Comments on Charles Hedrick’s Article: A Testimony,” JECS 11.1 (2003): 147–153. The last scholar to consult the manuscript in the Patriarchal Library was Quentin Quesnell; see Stephan Huller and Daniel N. Gullotta, “Quentin Quesnell’s ‘Secret Mark Secret’: A Report on Quentin Quesnell’s 1983 Trip to Jerusalem and his Inspection of the Mar Saba Document,” Vigiliae Christianae 71.4 (2017): 353–378. It is impossible to know what happened next, but for reports of unsuccessful searches carried out by Agamemnon Tselikas, see Hedrick, “Appendix: Interview with Agamemnon Tselikas,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery, Burke, ed., 60–66 and Tselikas, “Summary Report,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery, Burke, ed., 142–144.
16 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 251–278; cf. Secret Gospel, 91–130.
17 See, e.g., Jeffery, Secret Gospel; cf. Brown, “The Secret Gospel of Mark Unveiled: A Review Essay,” RBL 9-15-2007 (https://www.sblcentral.org/API/Reviews/5627_5944.pdf).
46 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
what scholars do (researching finds, gradually grappling with the issues, putting books back on the shelf, and so on).18 On the contrary, we will see that Smith’s creative argumentation in defense of authenticity (especially in Clement of Alexandria) repeatedly violates the academic standards to which Smith holds others; Smith’s more popular book raises additional questions, academic and moral. As Smith’s arguments for authenticity repeatedly violate academic norms he elsewhere upholds, caution and suspicion regarding the Letter to Theodore remain in order.
2. Nastiness
Memorializing Morton Smith, Shaye J. D. Cohen identified five “central themes and concerns” that characterize Smith’s academic achievement: (1) a “determination to destroy boundaries” (disciplinary, linguistic, conventional); (2) a “concern for varieties” (of Judaism and Christianity in particular); (3) “terminological precision” (e.g., “zealot” and “gnostic”); (4) a “concern for the big picture” and (5) “scorn for pseudo-scholarship,” directed, especially against “pronouncements and opinions born of religious faith and confessional conviction but masquerading as ‘objective scholarship.’”19 Without minimizing the significance of points one through four, this fifth concerns us here. Cohen’s collection of Smith’s essays includes several of Smith’s articles in this vein, but even occasional readers of Smith’s oeuvre will surely remember one or another of his (often entertaining) anti-theological zingers.20 Grafton recalls Smith’s review of the Cambridge History of the Bible, where Smith quotes a passage of Christian piety and notes: “It remains only to notice what is perhaps a printer’s error: at the end of the book the word ‘Amen’ has been omitted.”21 Here is a less-known example that also illustrates Cohen’s point perfectly. In a paper discussing Jewish daily prayers concerning creation, Smith points out that the connection between the themes of creation and revelation is less direct than traditional Jewish commentators (and the scholars who follow them) might assume:
18
Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, xvii–xx; see also Hershel Shanks, “Was Morton Smith the Bernie Madoff of the Academy,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery, Burke, ed., 135–142 (esp. 139–141); see also Burke, “Introduction,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery, Burke, ed., 1–29 (esp. 27).
19 Shaye J. D. Cohen, “In Memoriam Morton Smith,” in Morton Smith, Studies in the Cult of Yahweh, vol 2, ed. Shaye J. D. Cohen, (Leiden: Brill, 1996), 2.279–285 (esp. 283–285).
20 See in particular Smith’s discussion of “pseudorthodoxy” in “The Present State of Old Testament Studies,” JBL 88.1 (1969): 19–35 (=Smith, Studies, 1:37–54).
21 Smith, “Review of Cambridge History of the Bible, Volume 1 (edited by P. R. Ackroyd and C.F. Evans),” American Historical Review 77.1 (1972): 94–100 (quote from 98); quoted in Grafton, “Gospel Secrets,” 28.
47
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse
Of course, to the theologian’s eye everything is necessarily connected with everything else, so creation was a necessary preparation for the giving of the Law. It was also a necessary preparation for the giving of the Marx brothers. But these two hymns never hint at either of those great, far-off events.22
A third example brings us closer to the problem at hand. In his justly famous essay on “Pseudepigraphy in the Israelite Tradition,” Smith comes right out and calls Deuteronomy a forgery after first poking fun at scholars who would admit as much in their semi-private classrooms while warning their students against saying such things in public.23 In this instance, the now-published Smith/Scholem correspondence enables us to see that Smith, at times, held his fire. Smith knew well that Scholem, his former teacher, was among those who argued for exempting religious pseudepigrapha from the charge of forgery:
Pseudepigraphy is far removed from forgery. The mark of immorality, which is inseparable from falsehood, does not stain it, and for this reason it has always been admitted as a legitimate category of religious literature of the highest moral order.24
When Smith sent Scholem a copy of his essay arguing against this view, Smith could have anticipated the elder scholar’s response:
The discussion on Pseudepigraphy has done much to enlighten me about some distinctions that could be made in this field. Still I wonder whether there are many secret25 texts which would not come under the title of pseudepigraphy, of one kind or another.
Of all people, Mohammad seems the only authentic author of a secret text who can claim full credit. And in spite of all this, we
22 Smith, “On the Yôṣēr and Related Texts,” in The Synagogue in Late Antiquity, ed. Lee I. Levine (Philadelphia: American Schools of Oriental Research [for the Jewish Theological Seminary], 1987), 87–95 (quote from 92).
23 Smith, “Pseudepigraphy in the Israelite Tradition,” in Entretiens sur l’antiquité classique 18 = Pseudepigrapha I, ed. K. von Fritz (Geneva: Foundation Hardt, 1971), 191–215, esp. 191–193 (=Smith, Studies, 1:55–77 [esp. 55–56]).
24 Gershom G. Scholem, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (New York: Schocken, 1946 [1941]), 204 (cf. 120–121); see also Piovanelli, “What Has Pseudepigraphy to Do with Forgery? Reflections on the Cases of the Acts of Paul, the Apocalypse of Paul, and the Zohar,” in Fakes, Forgeries, and Fictions: Writing Ancient and Modern Christian Apocrypha, ed. T. Burke (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2017), 50–60.
25 sic.; I wonder if “sacred” is what is meant here and throughout the passage; cf. Scholem, Major Trends, 204. Scholem wrote this letter in his rather imperfect English.
48 JJMJS No. 9
(2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 49
will go on speaking of Moshe Rabbenu [= “Moses our Teacher/Rabbi”].26
Smith never engaged Scholem’s defense of pseudepigraphy, whether in public or private; he directed his caustic sarcasm on the matter toward other targets. This is just one example of the two scholars politely talking past each other in their correspondence.27 But the larger accusation remains: for Smith, the effort to distinguish pseudepigraphy from forgery reflects theological apologetic.
Be this as it may, we do not need to search far and wide in Smith’s works to establish that the academic targets of his scorn were not all pseudoscholars arguing in defense of Jewish or Christian pieties. Two examples, in particular, should be well known to scholars interested in Judaism or Christianity in the ancient world. In an essay reviewing scholarship on ancient Jewish rebel groups (the Zealots and the Sicarii), Martin Hengel comes in for some particularly tough criticism.28 To be sure, Smith registers valid points, displaying that characteristic terminological precision: “we cannot suppose that every individual who claimed to be a ‘zealot,’ or was called so by his neighbors, was a member of an organization.”29 Hengel is not Smith’s only target.30 However, it is noteworthy that Hengel stands accused by Smith of engaging in “fantasy,” putting forward a theory that “has no substantial evidence,” albeit one accompanied by elaborate annotation that “seems a model of solid scholarship that is the great German façade.”31 All this should leave careful readers of Clement of Alexandria scratching their heads and wondering about “façades” concerning “substantial evidence.” Fantasies abound in this volume, for its central hypothesis would appear to be as baroque as academic fantasies
26 Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, 155 (July 3, 1973).
27
See Klawans, “Deceptive Intentions,” 496–497 for the back and forth on pseudepigraphy, and Piovanelli, “‘Une certaine “Keckheit, Kühnheit und Grandiosität” ...’. La correspondance entre Morton Smith et Gershom Scholem (1945–1982): Notes critiques,” Revue de l’histoire des religions 228.3 (2011): 403–429, esp. 416 (where he notes that Scholem stops replying to Smith’s protestations about objections to his work on Secret Mark).
28 Smith, “Zealots and Sicarii: Their Origins and Relation,” HTR 64.1 (1971): 1–9 (reprinted in Smith, Studies, 1:211–226). Smith’s main target here is Martin Hengel, Die Zeloten: Untersuchungen zur jüdischen Freiheitsbewegung in der Zeit von Herodes I. bis 70 n. Chr. (Leiden: Brill, 1961); English Translation: The Zealots: Investigations into the Jewish Freedom Movement in the Period from Herod I until 70 A.D., trans. David Smith (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1989).
29 Smith, “Zealots,” 3 (=Studies, 1:212).
30 Smith refers to an argument by S. G. F. Brandon to the effect that gospel references to Simon the Zealot prove the existence of a Zealot party as a “bad pun” (“Zealots,” 6 [=Studies, 1:215]). The bulk of an article by Cecil Roth is derogated as “an amazing muddle of misinterpreted texts and baseless conjectures” (“Zealots,” 9 [=Studies, 1:218]).
31 See Smith, “Zealots,” 15 (=Studies, 1:223): “fantasy”; “Zealots,” 13 (=Studies, 1:221): “no substantial evidence”; “Zealots,” 10 (=Studies, 1:219): “the great German façade.”
can be that the Secret Gospel of Mark (preserved ostensibly in a single 17th century manuscript of an otherwise unattested second-century letter) accurately describes better than any other source Jesus’s secret initiatory practices and the antinomian nature of his teaching. Authentic, historically accurate, early gospel fragments preserved only in an 17th century manuscript?32 And as for “façades,” Quentin Quesnell asked the critical question already in 1975: “Can any scholarly reason be assigned for most of the documentation the book includes?”33
Smith’s criticism of Erwin Goodenough similarly seems like stones tossed from a glass house.34 To be sure, Smith stood on methodologically solid ground criticizing the elaborate reconstruction of a Hellenized, diasporic, mystical Judaism put forward in Goodenough’s multi-volume work, Jewish Symbols in the Greco-Roman World. 35 But here again, the sharpness of Smith’s prose raises more questions than it answers. Goodenough, too, is accused of engaging in “fantasy” as his argument involves “enormous exaggerations of elements which existed, but were rare….”36 Again, readers of Clement of Alexandria do well to scratch their heads.
Readers of Smith’s popular volume might ask different questions. In Secret Gospel published eight years after Goodenough’s death in 1965 Smith tells us that Goodenough was inclined to view Smith’s find as “important” even while doubting the attributions of the letter to Clement or the gospel fragments to Mark.37 Smith, in turn, praises Goodenough as a “non-conformist,” rightly “protesting against [his] Protestant background.”38 Smith notes that Goodenough might be “pre-disposed in favor of a discovery that revealed a hidden, potentially mystical side in early Christianity,” which, according to Smith, he was. Smith then proceeds to speak about Arthur Darby Nock’s more cautious assessment (Nock, we must recall, is the dedicatee of Smith’s academic
32 Reviewing this issue, Hedrick supplies some partial comparanda (apocrypha preserved in only late medieval manuscripts); but nothing quite compares to what Smith would have us do with the Letter to Theodore and the fragments of Secret Mark. See Hedrick, “Secret Mark: Moving on from Stalemate,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery, Burke, ed., 30–59 (esp. 41–42).
33 Quentin Quesnell, “The Mar Saba Clementine: A Question of Evidence,” CBQ 37.1 (1975): 48–67, esp. 60 (quoted above): the discussion that follows extends to 64.
34 Smith, “Goodenough’s Jewish Symbols in Retrospect,” JBL 86.1 (1967): 53–68; reprinted in Studies, 1:184–200. It bears noting that Smith published this critique two years after Goodenough’s death in 1965. Those who object to vitriolic post-mortem criticisms of Smith (e.g., Paananen, “From Stalemate to Deadlock,” 114) should take note that Smith himself operated under no such constraint, bitterly criticizing his academic opponents, living or deceased.
35 Erwin R. Goodenough, (Jewish Symbols in the Greco-Roman World, Bollingen 37) 13 vols. (New York: Pantheon Books, 1953–1968).
36 Smith, “Goodenough’s Jewish Symbols,” 58 (=Studies, 1:189): “fantasy”; “Goodenough’s Jewish Symbols,” 65 (=Studies, 1:197): “enormous exaggerations.”
37 Smith, Secret Gospel, 22–23.
38 Smith, Secret Gospel, 22.
50 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 51
volume, Clement of Alexandria). Smith concludes this discussion with a reminder to his popular readers that, for scholars, “the matter will come down, in the end, to the question of evidence.”39 But is the evidence in this case found on the side of Smith and Goodenough? Is it not strange for Smith to aspire, in his popular book, to side with Goodenough regarding evidence? Smith says nothing to his popular readers regarding his earlier, devastating refutation of Goodenough’s “fantasy.” Similarly, Smith says nothing to his academic readers regarding Goodenough’s ostensibly positive evaluation of the find, though he does cite Goodenough’s Jewish Symbols favorably in a handful of places.40
In yet one more telling disconnect that emerges from the Smith/ Scholem correspondence, Scholem puts his finger on the manifest contradictions:
My admiration for the scholarship and insight demonstrated in your book is enormous and I cannot imagine that it will not have its repercussions on future discussions… But there seems to me a great difference between the stringency of your other deductions and the hypothetical character of your assumption of Jesus as a mystical libertinist.41
Smith does not reply to this point; he seems satisfied (is he relieved?) that Scholem has, it would appear, accepted the letter as authentic.42
3. Nastiness and Nonsense
We could excuse, and perhaps even forgive, all we have surveyed above as rhetorical excess were it not that Smith deploys similarly insulting language at key points in his arguments for the authenticity of the Letter to Theodore. Smith criticizes,
The extravagance of exegetic fantasy needed to transform “Mark” from an editor or a series of editors to an author. Therefore, the question before us is not to decide the “authenticity” of the new material but to determine its
39 Smith, Secret Gospel, 23–24 (quote from 24).
40 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 177, 181, 215 n. 6; but cf. 178 where Smith notes that Goodenough’s “argument is pushed to absurdity, but not thereby wholly invalidated.”
41 Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, 159 (June 9, 1974).
42 Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, 160 (July 12, 1974). Scholem’s reticence to accept Smith’s hypotheses regarding Jesus (and pre-Christian Jewish libertinism) appears in print in Scholem, “Der Nihilismus als religiöses Phänomen,” in Norms in a Changing World [=Eranos-Jahrbuch 43 (1974)], ed. Adolf Portmann and Rudolf Ritsema (Leiden: Brill, 1977), 1–50, esp. 12–13.
relationship to the long process of writing and editing which produced the present text of the second Gospel.43
It is not unreasonable to suggest that the accusation “extravagance of exegetic fantasy” serves here to deflect readers from the very same. A more disturbing example is found when Smith pre-emptively confronts what he knows will be a likely objection to what we can, with good reason, refer to as Smith’s own “extravagance of exegetic fantasy”: Clement’s letter, if authentic, survived intact for over 1700 years without ever being quoted, referenced, or even acknowledged to exist. Smith’s treatment of this issue is elaborate and must be quoted in full (I have inserted letters in brackets to facilitate the subsequent analysis):
[A] To prevent foreseeable stupidities, it must be said at once that the lack of reference to the letter is no argument against attribution of the letter to Clement. [B] In the first place, even those who think it is not by Clement recognize it to be ancient. Völker thinks it must date from the time of the gnostic controversy (the third century); Nock thought it on stylistic grounds not later than the fourth century; Munck thought it propaganda for the church of Alexandria and would presumably not have placed it later than the Christological controversies of the fifth century. [C] Even if we accept the latest of these dates, we must admit that the letter went unmentioned for fifteen hundred years. So the attribution to Clement does not much augment proportionately the period of neglect. [D] And the neglect is easier to explain if the letter be genuine than if not. If genuine it was, to begin with, a private and confidential letter of which no mention was to be expected in the years immediately after it was written that is, if we have dated it correctly, the years before or after the Severan persecution (c. 201? or 210?). But if we can trust Origen (Contra Celsum V.62) the Carpocratians must have become rare and insignificant shortly after that persecution perhaps as a result of it. Once they had become unimportant the letter would interest no one save a historian. But historians were few in the medieval Church, and historians willing to report aberrant traditions from the early fathers were fewer. Thus, the lack of any reference to the letter would be explicable. [E] On the other hand, if the attribution to Clement be false and the letter a forgery, it must have been written and attributed to Clement for some purpose of propaganda; that is, it was intended to be
Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 97.
52 JJMJS No.
9 (2022)
43
circulated and to attract attention. In this event the failure of anyone to comment on it or at least the fact that no comment has been preserved is more difficult to explain. [F] So the total neglect of the letter through seventeen centuries argues for its authenticity. Nor is the neglect incompatible with the literary activities of the monks of Mar Saba. They excelled in hymnody and in the production of ascetic works and martyrologies…44
There are two serious interrelated problems with this passage. The pre-emptive scorn for those who might approach the matter suspiciously [A] should set off an alarm that is seconded by the logically flawed argument that follows.
Smith’s argument begins [B] with a brief listing of those scholars who questioned directly to Smith, it must be added the Clementine authenticity of the letter, with suggestions ranging into the fourth century. Since (as far as Smith acknowledges to us) no one suggested to him a later date, such a possibility is precluded. So a challenge to the purported antiquity of this ostensibly 17th century manuscript is pre-emptively set aside; given that no one thought so before Smith published his findings, why should anyone think so now? Therefore, readers are expected to accept that the letter was ignored for 1500 years, rendering the extra few hundred for attribution to Clement a mere rounding error [C]. Then we get Smith’s devious turn-around [D]: “And the neglect is easier to explain if the letter be genuine than if not.” This is because the letter was private, and the Carpocratians quickly became unimportant. But if forged (and Smith only has an ancient forger in mind now), surely the motive would involve publicity or propaganda [E]. But how could such an ancient forgery go unnoticed or unmentioned? Smith then concludes by tightening his devious inversion [F]: “So the total neglect of the letter through seventeen centuries argues for its authenticity.”
How are we to respond to this? We have already noted the aura of politeness, a courteous avoidance of controversy evident by points quietly dropped on both sides of the Smith/Scholem correspondence. The problem is larger than making sense of Smith’s epistolary dialogue with Scholem. Scholem aside, scholarly reaction to Smith’s work was quite likely tempered by Smith’s reputation for rhetorical stridency: scholars who dared to question Smith would open themselves to the kinds of attack he was already well-known for behavior that can be reasonably described as “intimidation.”45 We need no longer fear
44 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 287; cf. Smith, Secret Gospel, 135–136, where a briefer form of the argument is offered, without the introductory frame. Quesnell noted pointedly (but briefly) that Smith’s discussion in Clement of Alexandria, 287–290 “does not claim to be factual or evidential” (“Mar Saba Clementine,” 62 n. 33).
45 Piovanelli, “Keckheit, Kühnheit und Grandiosität,” 416; compare Jeffery, Secret Gospel, 147: “Smith seems positively abusive, like an angry person willing to utter any insult that might stick, no matter how far-fetched.” The stridency of the accusation naturally
53
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse
intimidation, and, sadly, the challenge we face cannot in this instance be addressed with courtesy: polite understatement will not do.
In truth, Smith’s argument quoted above is simply nonsense, a term I use advisedly, with nods to both Francis Watson and Morton Smith himself.46 Premedieval antiquity is presumed, so the letter’s “neglect” becomes a fact that is turned into an argument for authenticity. Anything could be proven ancient by such logic.47 In Smith’s own words: “With such a theory you can’t lose. The things that fit your thesis fit; the things that don’t, also fit.”48 But the problem extends beyond the nonsense. We must also address the nastiness that introduces and protects it. By “sheer stupidities,” Smith refers here to nothing other than the standard scholarly predilection for “evidence” (of which there is none) when faced with “extravagant exegetical fantasies” (which we find here in abundance). We must confront the contradiction: Smith deployed his rhetorical scorn to point out non-scholarly pieties as well as academic arguments he considered (not without reason) to involve undue scholarly creativity. Smith also employed the same kind of scorn to distract readers from his own violations of these standards.
4. Antinomianism and Abuse
So far, we have seen how Smith employs his characteristic nastiness to pre-empt objections to his own nonsense. The contradictions raise methodological and moral questions simultaneously, hovering around whether Smith considered himself exempt from the rules everyone expected him to follow. And in this respect, the Smith/Scholem correspondence is revealing. In 1945, Smith wrote rather extensively to Scholem about his fascination with the British antinomian occultist, Aleister Crowley (1875–1947), a figure that likely reminded Smith of the early modern would-be messiah (and erstwhile antinomian) Sabbatai Zevi (1626–1676).49 Some thirty years later, Smith reveals to Scholem that he “learned more about Jesus from you and Shabbatai Zvi (I’m sometimes not sure which is which) than I have from any other source except the gospels and the magical papyri.”50 These two comments bookend three decades of Smith’s fascination
boomerangs: Brown, in turn, has accused Jeffery of “Smith bashing” (Brown, “Secret Gospel of Mark Unveiled,” 45–46); see Paananen, “From Stalemate to Deadlock,” 98–99.
46 Watson, “Beyond Suspicion,” 141 n. 40: “confused nonsense” with reference to Smith’s arguments in Clement of Alexandria, 137–138. See also Smith, “Zealots,” 17 n. 91 (=Studies 1:225).
47 For a similarly complex argument for authenticity that hinges on presumptions and logical nonsense, see Clement of Alexandria, 76–77; in this case, the nonsense is not accompanied by nastiness, so it is less relevant to the present argument.
48 Smith, “On the Authenticity of the Mar Saba Letter of Clement,” CBQ 38.2 (1976): 196–199; quote from 197; here responding to Quesnell, “The Mar Saba Clementine.”
49 Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, 10–11, and see Piovanelli, “Halfway between Sabbatai Tzevi and Aleister Crowley.”
50 Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, 170 (September 27, 1976); if
54
JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 55
(on and off, to be sure) with antinomian sexual initiation rites. Indeed, it is Smith’s established fascination with such rites prior to the discovery that is, to my mind, one of the most compelling causes for suspicion.51 Things come full circle in 1982, when with Smith’s permission and knowledge, no doubt the reprint of Secret Gospel is published by Dawn Horse Press, the publishing arm of Avatar Adi Da (1939–2008), a guru who was well known at the time for advocating and practicing sexual license.52
This brings us to the matter of gay sex. Despite Scott Brown’s vigorous efforts to drive a wedge between the sexual reading of Secret Mark and Smith’s own hypothesis,53 there really can be no doubt that Smith wants his readers to consider the possibility that Jesus’s initiation involved intimate physical union.54 The discussion in Clement of Alexandria is, characteristically, scattered but that tells us more about the book and its obfuscatory style than it says about this particular point. Smith’s initial discussion (regarding Letter III, 13, “naked man to naked man”) is belabored, speaking of various erotic and sexual elements but concludes clearly enough with one key element: “In this respect, Carpocratian practices seems to have… required that both the initiate and the baptizing presbyter be nude.”55 Subsequently, Smith speaks more clearly about “sexual license,” “homosexuality,” and “physical union.”56 And here is how Smith describes the matter in his popular treatment:
Scholem ever replied to this directly, it is not in the extant correspondence.
51 Quesnell, “The Mar Saba Clementine,” 58–60; Craig Evans, “Morton Smith and the Secret Gospel of Mark: Exploring the Grounds for Doubt,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery, Burke, ed., 75–100 (esp. 81–89); Piovanelli, “Halfway between Sabbatai Tzevi and Aleister Crowley,” 169–175; Watson, “Beyond Suspicion,” esp. 156–161. We set aside the question of whether any early Christians engaged in such behavior; for a cautionary approach, see Jennifer Wright Knust, Abandoned to Lust: Sexual Slander and Ancient Christianity (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006).
52 Jeffery, Secret Gospel, 37–38; and for additional details on the background to this edition of Secret Gospel, see Shawn Eyer, “The Strange Case of the Secret Gospel According to Mark: How Morton Smith’s Discovery of a Lost Letter by Clement of Alexandria Scandalized Biblical Scholarship,” Alexandria: The Journal for the Western Cosmological Traditions 3 (1995): 103–129 (esp. 113–115). On Avatar Adi Da and his sexual teachings and practices, see Michael (Anthony) Costabile, “Sexual Practice, Spiritual Awakening, and Divine Self-Realization in the Reality-Way of Adidam,” in Sexuality and New Religious Movements, ed. Henrik Bogdan and James R. Lewis (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), 89–125 and Georg Feuerstein, Holy Madness: Spirituality, Crazy-Wise Teachers, and Enlightenment, rev. exp. ed. (Prescott, AZ: Hohm, 2006), esp. 145–179.
53 So, again, Brown, Mark’s Other Gospel
54 See also Brown, “Factualizing the Folklore: Stephen Carlson’s Case against Morton Smith,” HTR 99.3 (2006): 291–327 (esp. 313–322). For a brief retort, see Watson, “Beyond Suspicion,” 136 n. 25.
55 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 64–65 (quote from 65).
56 The first two phrases appear in Clement of Alexandria, 185, the third on 251.
It was a water baptism administered by Jesus to chosen disciples, singly, and by night. The costume, for the disciple, was a linen cloth worn over a naked body. This cloth was probably removed for the baptism proper, the immersion in water, which was now reduced to a preparatory purification. After that, by unknown ceremonies [see below] the disciple was possessed by Jesus’ spirit and so united with Jesus. One with him, he participated by hallucination in Jesus’ ascent into the heavens, he entered the kingdom of God, and was thereby set free from the laws ordained for and in the lower world. Freedom from the law may have resulted in completion of the spiritual union by physical union. This certainly occurred in many forms of gnostic Christianity; how early it began there is no telling.57
And regarding those “unknown ceremonies,” Smith adds in a footnote: “Manipulation, too, was probably involved; the stories of Jesus’ miracles give a very large place to the use of his hands.”58
Having established the sexual and homosexual overtones in Smith’s words, we should note that Smith allows that the initiation may, at times, have been heterosexual. Scott Brown describes a marginal note, added by Smith to his personal copy of Clement of Alexandria (held by the Jewish Theological Seminary Library) to the effect that women, who were the first recipients of resurrection visions, “must have been initiated by Jesus during his lifetime.”59 If this reduces the distinctly homosexual character of the rite, it does not reduce its sexual element by any measure.
Marginalia aside, let us consider more of what Smith said about these matters in his various writings. There is one largely untapped resource for considering Smith’s evaluation of homosexuality (and sexual ethics, more broadly speaking), and that is his late, strange book Hope and History60 a philosophical, political work rooted in the Cold War era and influenced to no
57 Smith, Secret Gospel, 107.
58 Smith, Secret Gospel, 107 n. 12. For an extended discussion of this passage (including Smith’s complicated n. 12 here), see Jeffery, Secret Gospel, 99–122.
59 Brown, “Question of Motive,” 364.
60 Smith, (Hope and History, an Exploration, World Perspectives 54, ed. Ruth Nanda Anshen, New York: Harper & Row, 1980). References to this book are rare in discussions of Secret Mark; Jeffery cites one extended passage (Hope and History, 90–91) in Secret Gospel, 218–219. In 1978, Smith asked Scholem to write a blurb for this book. In describing the project, Smith admits to writing the volume purely to make money (comparing himself to Moses de León [c. 1240–1305] whom Scholem determined to be the author of the medieval pseudepigraph, the Zohar); see Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, 178 (July 29, 1978). Scholem’s response to this query has not been preserved, and the book was published without any blurbs at all, even on the dust jacket.
56 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 57
small extent by Aldous Huxley’s 1932 “hedonistic nightmare,” Brave New World 61 Smith speaks of homosexuality (always using that word) many times in this work, stereotypically as a form of abnormality. Typical of his approach is a question asked (parenthetically): “is the current explosion of homosexuality in part a consequence of the spread of bottle feeding instead of breast feeding?”62 Smith speaks of homosexuality elsewhere as a choice, one driven at times by despair or, more frequently, by the practical desire to pursue sexual pleasure without risking childbirth.63 In passages influenced by Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, Smith speaks of homosexuality as a possible means of population control, rooting his contemporary ruminations on the experiences of classical Greeks (Spartans in particular).64 The one upside to homosexuality’s upswing is that it is a positive indicator of the weakening of religious puritanism (“both Christian and Jewish”).65
But Smith sees risks, rather serious ones. Again, it is necessary to reproduce a somewhat substantial portion of Smith’s prose:
However, when made both an end in itself and readily available, sexual indulgence soon produces a class of dissatisfied sensualists (e.g., Baudelaire), many of whom go on, in search of excitement, to assorted perversions. This ennui, as well as the general relaxation of sexual controls, has contributed to the increase of homosexuality…Unfortunately, homosexual play usually a harmless collection of contortions often proves inadequate as a vehicle for repressed resentment. Once the symbolic satisfaction wears thin, something worse has to be
61 Smith, Hope and History, 93; additional allusions or discussions appear on 125, 133–138; other works by Huxley are cited/discussed on 61–62, 117 n. 10, and 185 n. 13. Another influence evident in Hope and History is Emanuel Swedenborg, cited and discussed on 63, 70, 115, 200, and 220. Jeffery (Secret Gospel, 150) notes that, as a youth, Smith attended the Academy for the New Church, a preparatory school affiliated with the Swedenborgian General Church of the New Jerusalem. However, Jeffery admits to not detecting Swedenborgian influences in Smith’s writings. Here too, Hope and History fills lacunae in our understanding of Smith. One further curiosity: Smith (Secret Gospel, 5–6) speaks of the hypnotic impact of the monks’ worship on him when he first visited Mar Saba in 1941: “I knew what was happening, but I relaxed and enjoyed it.” The same phrase appears in a different context in Hope and History, 187 (“we may as well relax and enjoy it”). On this phrase (as a punchline to a crude sexual joke), see Jeffery, Secret Gospel, 125–131.
62 Smith, Hope and History, 151–152.
63 Smith, Hope and History, 71 (sex without childbirth); 210 (despair).
64 Smith, Hope and History, 71 (Sparta), 91–93 (classical Greeks, with discussion of Huxley worked in) and 185–186 (as a prescription for the 1980s); cf., more briefly, Smith, The Ancient Greeks (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1960), 27 (discussion of homosexuality in classical Greece, in a chapter entitled: “Brave New World”).
65 Smith, Hope and History, 17; cf. 178.
found, commonly sadism and masochism. And once the ego’s censorial power is undermined, deeper psychological drives come to the surface and demand actual gratification. Hence the desperate progress of the stupid from entertainment by violence to acts of violence and from acts of violence to atrocities, in futile efforts to retain the excitement of novelty. A sadist in Texas some years ago, after murdering several dozen boys, was reportedly killed while trying to handcuff, presumably with intent to murder, the boy who had been his decoy and assistant. Perhaps he felt he had come to the end of that road. No doubt even murder, reduced to a routine, becomes a bore.66
Here we have it: In Smith’s mind in the 1980s for sure, but perhaps earlier as well to engage in homosexuality was to proceed, pointlessly in his view, down a slippery nihilistic slope toward violence and abuse. To be sure, Smith does not speak explicitly of “abuse” concerning early Christian initiation. But Smith emphasizes the roles played by adolescent boys as both initiates and victims at various points in the literature we have just reviewed.67 In a curious 1949 article on pastoral care and the church, Smith seems acutely aware that some young men were typically initiated into gay sex, during their adolescence, by older men; Smith reports that one such man he knew claimed that “adultadolescent relationships” were among the “most helpful” to him. Adhering to the official church stance as he understands it, Smith also writes that this man “must be told that homosexuality is a sin far more serious than fornication.”68 Smith’s interest in homosexuality is two-pronged. First, it is an index of sexual freedom; where homosexuality is practiced, Jewish and Christian puritanism has been defeated by antinomianism. Second, it is a sign of worse things to come, for some will inevitably break more laws in seeking even more excitement. So it is fitting at this point to assert that, certainly by our standards, the sexually charged initiation rite Smith imagines Jesus practicing ought not to be understood simply as gay sex. Smith’s Jesus’s secret initiation, rather, qualifies as guru sex abuse: a religious leader using charisma and authority to lure initiates into sex acts, ones ostensibly for their own betterment.69 The list of
66 Smith, Hope and History, 18; cf. also 220: “Every beautiful object, and especially a beautiful human body, confronts us with our intense desire to do something with it, and our inability to know what we want to do. The resultant fury is the source of sadism and much vandalism….”
67 For adolescent initiates: Ancient Greeks, 27; Hope and History, 91–93; for adolescent victims: Hope and History, 18, quoted above.
68 Smith, “Psychiatric Practice and Christian Dogma,” The Journal of Pastoral Care 3.1 (1949): 12–20 (quotes from 16). For a full critical discussion of this article, see Jeffery, Secret Gospel, 151–162.
69 Amanda Lucia, “Guru Sex: Charisma, Proxemic Desire, and the Haptic Logics of the Guru-Disciple Relationship,” JAAR 86.4 (2018): 953–988. For a more sympathetic
58 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 59
gurus accused of such is long, but one name merits mention: the aforementioned Avatar Adi Da, responsible for the reprints of Smith’s Secret Gospel. 70 As we have seen in his letters to Scholem as well as in his varied public writings, Smith was recurrently fascinated and alarmed by the sexual power of charismatic leaders. So surely Smith would not have missed the 1970s publicity surrounding the religio-sexual exploits of his 1982 publisher. It is not hard to discern why Avatar Adi Da’s Dawn Horse Press would be interested in Smith’s Secret Gospel. 71 We understand that any author would want a book to remain in print, but the connections here have been insufficiently analyzed. At the very least, we have another paradox here: some theologians are the object of Smith’s scorn; others pay him royalties. Smith self-righteously objected that his opponents were acting out of religious bias; he didn’t seem to mind if his supporters were similarly motivated.72
But the connection may be deeper, more personal: the 2005 Dawn Horse Reprint includes an advertisement for Adi Da’s 18-page booklet, The Effort to “De-Mythologize” Christianity: A Critical Appraisal of the Work of Rudolf Bultmann. I would rather not send them my money, so I have not read it, but the title and length seem about right for a seminar paper. As it happens, Avatar Adi Da, under his given name of Franklin Albert Jones, attended Columbia College from 1957 to 1961 (Smith’s long tenure at Columbia began in 1957). Like most entering Columbia College students, Jones enrolled in Humanities A; Smith taught Humanities A regularly during those years, and he had 95 students enrolled in his section in the Fall of 1957.73 We should seriously wonder whether Jones was one of them. In any event, a full accounting of
exploration of such initiations, see Jonathan Cahana, “Dismantling Gender: Between Ancient Gnostic Ritual and Modern Queer BDSM,” Theology & Sexuality 18.1 (2012): 60–75; I thank Thomas Roane for bringing this article to my attention about this matter.
70 Basic internet searches of “Avatar Adi Da” will turn up relevant, lurid results, as Jeffery notes (Secret Gospel, 37–38). For a more properly documented account/accusation, see Geoffrey D. Falk, Stripping the Gurus: Sex, Violence, Abuse and Enlightenment (Toronto: Million Monkeys Press, 2009), esp. 141–157.
71 See, again, Eyer, “Strange Case,” 113–115 and Jeffery, Secret Gospel, 37–38.
72 Smith, “On the Authenticity,” esp. 197, and “Clement of Alexandria and Secret Mark: The Score at the End of the First Decade,” HTR 75.4 (1982): 449–461 (esp. 455).
73 Allan J. Pantuck lists several courses offered by Smith in 1957, including Humanities A; see Pantuck, “A Question of Ability: What Did He Know and When Did He Know It? Further Excavations from the Morton Smith Archives,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery, Burke, ed., 184–211, esp. 203–204. Smith himself speaks of 95 students in his large survey course (presumably Humanities A) in a letter to Scholem; see Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, 105–106 (December 9, 1957). Columbia Archivist, Jocelyn K. Wilk, provided a fuller list of Smith’s courses during those years (by email, June 30, 2021). The Columbia Registrar staff confirmed that Jones enrolled, as expected, in a section of Humanities A in Fall 1957 (email, July 1, 2021; pursuant to privacy policies, no information beyond the public matter of course enrollment was shared). I am grateful for the courteous help I received from these two offices of Columbia University.
Smith’s fascination with religio-sexual antinomianism begins with Aleister Crowley and Sabbatai Zevi and must continue to consider Avatar Adi Da, whose Dawn Horse Press continues to keep Smith’s Secret Gospel in print.74
So Smith’s advocates like Scott Brown are partially correct: Smith may not have been as interested in gay sex per se as others of Smith’s readers, interpreters, and critics have assumed. But some of Smith’s defenders do a disservice by turning us away from his sexually charged language. And we cannot escape the matter through Smith’s protective, evasive discussions of “probabilities.”75 At the very center of Smith’s imagination was a Jesus who initiated his mostly young male followers by sexual means. Following Smith’s own warnings and what we have learned about gurus, we do well to keep in mind the potentiality that such behaviors signal the tip of an abusive antinomian iceberg.
5. Licit Deceits
Abuse brings us back to lies, a lesser crime by any standard. While law-breaking sex remains loosely veiled in the Letter to Theodore, the permission indeed, the obligation to lie appears plainly, with a stated purpose: to safeguard the content of the Secret Gospel of Mark even from those who already seem to know. Theodore is told (I, 7–9):
For, even if they should say something true, one who loves the truth should not, even so, agree with them. For not all true things are the truth, nor should that truth which merely seems true according to human opinions be preferred to the true truth, that according to the faith.
And some lines later (II, 10–12):
To them, therefore, as I said above, one must never give way; nor, when they put forward their falsifications, should one concede that the secret Gospel is by Mark, but should even deny it on oath.
With regard to these matters, even Smith admitted that the Letter to Theodore contradicts what we know about Clement’s prohibition of perjury, as expressed in the Stromateis (e.g., 7.8.50.1–51.8; 7.16.105–106).76 It is for this reason
74 Without reference to Jones/Adi Da, Robert M. Price recalls Smith speaking sympathetically of new age gospels: “If they [New Age Gospels] embodied someone’s faith, weren’t they authentic Gospels, no matter who wrote them or when?” See Price, “Second Thoughts on the Secret Gospel,” BBR 14.1 (2004): 127–132 (130).
75 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 290.
76 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 53–54, 84–85.
60 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 61
(among a few others) that Eric Osborn has rejected the letter’s authenticity, deeming it a “pious forgery.”77 Michael Zeddies’s attribution of the letter to Origen also focuses on this matter; in his view, the letter’s approach to deceit aligns more with Origen’s views than Clement’s.78 Watson, as we have noted, emphasized that the letter’s deceitful defense of secrecy is characteristic of pseudepigraphy.79 Recognizing the problem at the outset, Smith once again preempts by inversion: “no imitator who intended to pass his letter off as Clement’s would have included these contradictions unless he were ignorant of what the Stromateis said on these subjects, or unless the points made by the contradictory elements were his main concern.”80 However we contextualize this, herein lies the great paradox at the heart of the Letter to Theodore: Smith’s arguments require that we trust a writer who tells us that he believes it is permitted even mandatory to lie about the very secrets he discloses.
Elsewhere in his writings, Smith warns his readers to be wary of deceitful theologians. In Jesus the Magician, Smith notes: “When a theologian talks of a ‘higher truth,’ he is usually trying to conceal a lower falsehood.”81 In a late, angry, and lightly-annotated essay on the Transfiguration (Mark 9:2–10; Matt 17:19; Luke 9:28–36) published the same year as Hope and History (1980) Smith argues that the core of the story has nothing to do with resurrection (that would be “nonsense”), but everything to do with magic (and libertinism).82 Once understood, historicity can be granted. Smith describes the origin this way:
[Jesus] once took three disciples up a mountain for an initiation ceremony that led, presumably through hypnosis, to a vision of
77 Eric Osborn, “Clement of Alexandria: A Review of Research, 1958–1982,” The Second Century: A Journal of Early Christian Studies 3.4 (1983): 219–244 (esp. 223–225); cf. Clement of Alexandria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005): 195, 219.
78 Michael T. Zeddies, “Did Origen Write the Letter to Theodore?” JECS 25.1 (2017): 55–87 (esp. 63–68), and Zeddies, “An Origenian Background for the Letter to Theodore,” HTR 112.3 (2019): 376–406 (esp. 384–385). Zeddies is following a more tentative suggestion of Annick Martin, “À propos de la lettre attribuée à Clément d’Alexandrie sur l’Évangile secret de Marc,” in Colloque international “L’Evangile selon Thomas et les textes de Nag Hammadi” (Québec, 29 to 31 May 2003), ed. Louis Painchaud and PaulHubert Poirier (Québec: Presses de l’Université Laval, 2007), 277–300. For a helpful survey of early Christian approaches to deceit (licit and permitted), see Ehrman, Forgery and Counterforgery: The Use of Literary Deceit in Early Christian Polemics (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 529–548; on the views of Clement and Origen, see 542–544.
79 Watson, “Beyond Suspicion,” 138–139; cf. Price, “Second Thoughts,” 130.
80 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 85.
81 Smith, Jesus the Magician (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1978), 166 (note to p. 4).
82 Smith, “The Origin and History of the Transfiguration Story,” Union Seminary Quarterly Review 36.1 (1980): 39–44 (=Smith, Studies, 2:79–86). For “nonsense,” see: 41 (=Studies, 2:83).
him in glory with [one or] two other figures. The ceremony required silence. When one of the disciples, excited by the vision, spoke, the hypnosis was broken and the enchantment ended.
And he continues: People who tell the truth commonly improve on it. The disciples had to be identified…The interlocutors, too, had to be identified; they turned out to be Moses himself, and, of course, Elijah. The one creative thinker, not to say “liar,” who went beyond such innocent specification was, as might be expected, a theologian the libertine apologist who saw the opportunity of subordinating the Law and the Prophets to Jesus, and drove home his point by having Peter propose to make temples for all three, using this proposal to precipitate the disappearance of the Law and the Prophets, and introducing the voice of God to contradict the implication of Peter's proposal. (By these changes he produced a non-sequitur: “It’s good we’re here. And let us make three tabernacles.” No matter; theologians are tolerant of non-sequiturs.)83
If scholars are not to be tolerant of non-sequiturs, then what we find here is further confirmation that Smith well understood what should be obvious but is nevertheless put most plainly in the Letter to Theodore: that libertinist theologians might well lie or “improve the truth” by expanding upon their supposedly received traditions to create textual justifications when the need is perceived. Once more, Smith undermines his own creative hypotheses by his paradoxical deployment of methodologically motivated insults, deriding those who would disagree with him as upholders of “nonsense” whose “ignorance” renders their views a “waste of time.”84
6. Motive and Permission
In one of his vigorous defenses of Morton Smith and the Secret Mark fragments, Scott Brown focuses on the question of motive, arguing that Smith’s accusers have failed to supply a compelling motivation to explain why Smith might do what he stands accused of doing.85 While there are indeed some compelling
83 Smith, “Transfiguration Story,” 43 (=Studies, 2:85); the verse in question is Matt 17:4//Mark 9:5//Luke 9:33. See also the discussion of this passage by Jeffery, “Clement’s Mysteries and Morton Smith’s Magic,” in Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery, Burke, ed., 212–246, esp. 244–245.
84 Smith, “Transfiguration Story,” 41 (=Studies, 2:83).
85 Brown, “Question of Motive,” 351–383. See also Paananen, “From Stalemate to
62 JJMJS No.
9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse
responses to Brown’s challenge,86 we set the larger matter aside here because, as emphasized already, the present analysis stops short of any charge of forgery We remain focused on the lesser charges of violating academic norms in arguing for the text’s authenticity. But questions of motive pertain nevertheless, for one may want to ask why Smith would have violated his own rules in the ways we have argued he did.
I advocate for decentering the question of motive even concerning forgery, let alone lesser crimes on three grounds. First, scholars should reject Brown’s presumption that an academic allegation of forgery “must meet the standards of legal prosecution, which means the ‘prosecutors’ must establish beyond reasonable doubt that the letter is forgery, offer evidence connecting Smith with the manuscript, and demonstrate that the accused had the ability, and motive to produce it.”87 This approach is doubly misguided. First, it shifts the burden of proof away from where it belongs falling on those who wish to draw ancient evidence from an early modern manuscript. Suspicion remains any scholar’s rightful default (a lesson many scholars of ancient Judaism and Christianity learned from Morton Smith). Second, Brown has conflated forgerycharging with crime-solving. To be sure, forgery is a crime, and Anthony Grafton’s classic discussion of motive, means, and opportunity remains essential reading.88 Out of fairness and decency, any case against a given suspect must meet relatively high standards of argument, perhaps like an indictment. But failure to meet the standard of conviction (against a suspected forger) or sidestepping the question as we are struggling to do here does not render a suspicious object authentic. Our job as scholars is to determine whether data in this case, the Letter to Theodore and the Secret Mark fragments should be
Deadlock,” 108–110. 86 The best response to Brown, in my view, can be found in Piovanelli, “Halfway between Sabbatai Tzevi and Aleister Crowley,” esp. 181–182, which suggests that Smith’s behavior may be understood in light of Lurianic Kabbalah as developed by Sabbatian antinomianism as a “strange act”: a normally prohibited behavior performed in secret by the select, to serve some greater good, what Scholem spoke of (in 1937) as a “redemption through sin”; see Scholem, “Redemption through Sin,” in The Messianic Idea in Judaism and Other Essays on Jewish Spirituality (New York: Schocken, 1971), 78–141. In addition to the various connections and potential inspirations Piovanelli establishes, we should add this: Smith’s popular account is permeated with Smith’s recollections of dramatic mood swings in relation to his find (Secret Gospel, esp. 10–12), not all of which match his other retellings of the matter (see Jeffery, Secret Gospel, 9–11, 35). Smith’s mentor, already in 1940, characterized Sabbatai Zevi as suffering from manic-depressive psychosis, experiencing revelation (»discovery?) during periods of manic excitement, often leading to antinomian behavior; see Scholem, Major Trends, esp. 290–291. For Scholem’s later, fuller account, see (Sabbatai Ṣevi: The Mystical Messiah, trans. R. J. Zvi Werblowski, Bollingen Series 93, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973), esp. 123–138.
87 Brown, “Question of Motive,” 351. 88 Grafton, Forgers & Critics, esp. 36–68.
63
introduced into (or, in some cases, removed from) our collections of evidence. We need to critically evaluate the reliability of these texts and the evidence on which any arguments for authenticity rest; we need not accuse, let alone convict, a perpetrator. To wit: scholars have yet to determine who forged the Dead Sea Scrolls that successfully infiltrated the Green and Schøyen collections, duping experienced collectors and scholars along the way.89 But our present inability to name suspects does not render these fragments any less fake. Most crimes remain unsolved; most forgers remain unidentified. Scholars must be free to question authenticity without proving culpability.
A second objection to putting too much weight on an alleged forger’s motives concerns a vital possibility too frequently overlooked: that Smith was not the forger but a dupe; not the deceiver, but the deceived. However outlandish this may seem at first, considering the possibility has important value. Most of all, it allows for a reconsideration of authenticity while depersonalizing the matter. Those who find Smith’s possible guilt to be “unfathomable” should be able to fathom Smith’s falling into a trap.90 What is more, a good deal of the argumentation against authenticity (including, I should add, what we have surveyed here) applies equally in both scenarios. Quesnell, Evans, Piovanelli, and Watson have all (among others) repeatedly highlighted that Smith’s find suspiciously aligns with interests Smith displayed before 1958.91 We find this not only with forgers but also with their “marks,” the intended targets of deceit (the recent case of the Gospel of Jesus’s wife comes to mind).92 The forger’s mark’s excitement can similarly lead to rhetorical excess
89 See Kipp Davis, “Caves of Dispute: Patterns of Correspondence and Suspicion in the Post-2002 ‘Dead Sea Scrolls’ Fragments,” DSD 24.2 (2017): 229–270 and Davis et al., “Nine Dubious ‘Dead Sea Scrolls’ Fragments from the Twenty-First Century,” DSD 24.2 (2017): 189–228. See also the ArtfraudsInsights Final Report of November 2019: Museum of the Bible Dead Sea Scroll Collection Scientific Research and Analysis posted https://museumofthebible.cdn.prismic.io/museumofthebible/8ee1c3b3-8398-481abc7a-4da593c38728_MOTB-DSS-Report-FINAL-web.pdf.
90 For “unfathomable,” see Paananen, “From Stalemate to Deadlock,” 119. I can sympathize with those who find it impossible to imagine Smith’s guilt, but those who take this view are, in my view, obligated to consider Smith’s gullibility. Taking both possibilities off the table is a presumption of authenticity, not an academic stance. Interestingly, Smith himself provided encouragement to depersonalize the matter. Speaking of the difference between Jesus’s self-perception and external interpretations of Jesus, Smith notes (Jesus the Magician, 8): “How many of our friends do we know as they know themselves? None. Even our knowledge of ourselves is mostly incommunicable. Personality is so complex and changeable that even a good autobiography is a high-speed photograph of a waterfall: it imposes a fixed form on a process falsified by fixation.”
91 Quesnell, “The Mar Saba Clementine,” 58–60; Evans, “Morton Smith and the Secret Gospel of Mark, 101–134 (esp. 81–89); Piovanelli, “Halfway between Sabbatai Tzevi and Aleister Crowley,” 169–175; Watson, “Beyond Suspicion,” esp. 156–161.
92 For a thorough review of this forgery case, see Ariel Sabar, Veritas: A Harvard Professor, a Con Man, and the Gospel of Jesus’s Wife (New York: Doubleday, 2020). On King as the
64 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 65
and hasty arguments (made on behalf of the forgery by the over-excited mark) that divert readers from counterarguments or weaknesses in the case.93 Much of the circumstantial evidence against authenticity may also work just as well if the letter was forged for Smith, not by Smith. The bad puns observed by Carlson a bald scribe, Morton Salt could have been created by anyone who had Smith in mind (if indeed the puns were intended at all).94 Similarly, the ironic placement of the letter noticed by Ehrman the first page of which faces Isaac Voss’s closing complaint against those who interpolate falsehoods into Ignatius’s letters could easily be understood as an amusing signal meant for Smith, just as much as a joke by him.95 Even the ostensible general echoes of a 1940 novel, noticed by Watson (the plot hinges on a forged manuscript found at Mar Saba) could be explained by pointing to any post-1940 hoaxer, not just Morton Smith.96 In 1958, we should recall, Smith departed for Mar Saba on a
forger’s mark with prior interests in the fragment’s content see esp. 243–259 and 267–283.
93 In this respect, see Karen King’s defense of authenticity: “‘Jesus said to them, “My wife…”’: A New Coptic Papyrus Fragment,” HTR 107.2 (2014): 131–159, esp. 157–158: “The gravest difficulty for me lies in explaining how a forger incompetent in Coptic language with poor scribal skills (perhaps even anachronistically using a brush) was yet so highly skilled as to secure ancient papyrus, make ink with an ancient technique, leave no ink traces out of place at the microscopic level, achieve patterns of differential aging, fabricate a paper trail of modern supporting documents, and provide a good fit for an ancient historical context one that no serious scholar considers to be evidence of the historical Jesus’s marital status. In my judgment, such a combination of bumbling and sophistication seems extremely unlikely.” What King here precludes was not that far from the truth: see Sabar, Veritas.
94 See Carlson, Gospel Hoax, esp. 42–44 (bald scribe) and 58–64 (Morton Salt); against, see Allan J. Pantuck and Scott G. Brown, “Morton Smith as M. Madiotes: Stephen Carlson’s Attribution of Secret Mark to a Bald Swindler,” JSHJ 6.1 (2008): 106–125. See also Watson, “Beyond Suspicion,” 152–155. For a critical review, see Paananen, “From Stalemate to Deadlock,” 95–96 and, more fully, Paananen, “A Study in Authenticity: Admissible Concealed Indicators of Authority and Other Features of Forgeries: A Case Study on Clement of Alexandria, Letter to Theodore, and the Longer Gospel of Mark,” (PhD diss., University of Helsinki, 2019), esp. 21–29, 42–47, 65–80, 113–131.
95 See Ehrman, “Response,” 162; the photograph that shows this layout appears only in Smith, Secret Gospel, 36.
96
See Price, “Second Thoughts,” 132 and Watson, “Beyond Suspicion,” 161–170 on the possible influence of James H. Hunter, The Mystery of Mar Saba (New York: Evangelical Publishers, 1940). For a critical review, see Paananen, “From Stalemate to Deadlock,” 99–100 and, more fully, “Study in Authenticity,” 21–29, 37–42, 60–65. Beyond the general elements of the plot, Watson also identifies some linguistic parallels that would point more securely at Smith in particular (“Beyond Suspicion,” 161–166). But see Zeddies, “An Origenian Background,” 404–406 for the possibility that some of the alleged echoes of the novel find closer parallels with passages from John Marco Allegro, Search in the Desert (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1964), a book Smith likely would have read.
planned, return trip.97
Entertaining the (related, but not identical) possibility that someone else was involved with Smith in the deed, Tony Burke objects: “if [so] the forgery hypothesis becomes a conspiracy theory with its own metaphorical second shooter on the grassy knoll.”98 But we should consider that Smith’s own defense of authenticity is based, in part, on his determination that the letter, if forged, must have been forged by two different people: “No man who could write such a free and skillful imitation of so difficult an author as Clement would then write such a slavish imitation of so easy an author as Mark.”99 For the record, Smith’s observation here seems oversimplified it is one of many of his quips precluding forgery more by rhetoric than by argument. Various readers of the letter and Smith’s works have discerned a single hand here nevertheless.100 And others have argued that the letter is too slavishly Clementine (in style, not content) to be authentic.101 Moreover, if Smith could offer this argument in the 1960s, a devious forger could have conceived of it in the 1950s or earlier. Nevertheless, scholars do well to think more about Smith’s argument not only as an argument for authenticity. To those who doubt the abilities of any given individual,102 we can ask, following Smith, could multiple forgers have been involved?
If all of this seems like undue, overly suspicious creativity, I plead guilty but with an excuse. Academic defenses of suspicious objects often employ what I describe to my students as a “cooption of creativity”: elaborate theories of ancient production and preservation are accompanied by rhetorical preclusions of alternate possibilities, as if one would have to be thinking irrationally to consider any possibility other than authenticity. Its simplest version is the oft-repeated assertion that a certain object or manuscript simply could not have been forged.103 But more complicated rhetorical distractions appear throughout Smith’s Clement of Alexandria: “a forger would probably have attempted something more spectacular”; “Learned forgery was not rare in the eighteenth century, but was customarily edifying and tendentious; this text
97 Smith first visited Mar Saba in 1941; he describes his earlier experiences there in the opening chapter of Secret Gospel, 1–8.
98 Burke, “Introduction,” 26.
99 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 76; the extended argument here (the section running from the top of 76 to the bottom of 77) is as problematic as the passage we discussed above, characterized by precluded possibilities and inverted arguments.
100 See, e.g., Jeffery, Secret Gospel, 99 on this very point.
101 So, e.g., A. H. Criddle, “On the Mar Saba Letter Attributed to Clement of Alexandria,” JECS 3.2 (1995): 215–220 and Osborn, Clement, 195 n. 42.
102 E.g., Pantuck, “A Question of Ability.”
103 Examples abound. Early authenticators of the Gospel of Jesus’s Wife including Roger Bagnall and AnneMarie Luijendijk reportedly expressed this sentiment; see Sabar, Veritas, 24 (Luijendijk), 29, 32 (Bagnall).
66 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 67
is neither”; “Almost any work of ancient literature can be supposed a forgery.”104 We have already observed that Smith’s response to the letter’s contradictions with Clement’s Stromateis works similarly: “no imitator who … would have….”105 Scholars should give no heed to these distracting “Dead End” signs. No approach to the Letter to Theodore has simplicity on its side an authentic letter must be mysteriously, indeed miraculously, preserved (without ever being cited); a forgery must have been elaborately produced. Those who are suspicious must bring creativity to their side, struggling to answer such rhetorical questions as these and then weighing the results against Smith’s wildly creative arguments for Clementine (and Markan) authenticity.
There is a third reason to shift the focus away from motive, and this brings us back to one of our main themes: Smith’s Clement of Alexandria is marked, for lack of a better word, by its own thoroughgoing antinomianism. Smith repeatedly breaks his own methodological rules in defense of the authenticity of a letter ostensibly by an author who permits (indeed, demands) deceit. This letter, in turn, presents Jesus as secretly violating norms he was largely expected to maintain. Taken together, what we find in this case permits us to downplay questions of motive. We usually consider a motive to explain why someone would commit a crime, thereby violating a known and (presumably) accepted norm. But such layered, thoroughgoing antinomianism removes the need for a motive. Where permission pertains, motive recedes behind a cloud cover of nihilism.
7. Nihilism, Jonas, and Scholem
Nihilism a concept related to, but not entirely separable from, antinomianism presents an opportunity to illustrate one final (and particularly relevant) way in which Smith’s works display a selective deployment of rhetorical nastiness. When discussing the term “Gnostikos,” Smith has particularly harsh words for Hans Jonas (1903–1993), whose phenomenological approach to Gnosticism compares poorly with Clement’s understanding: “As an
104
Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 77; 85 n. 8; 88 n. 1; cf. Secret Gospel, 25: “Who would have forged a letter to a nobody?” Watson collects examples of such statements to establish Smith’s preoccupation with the forgery issue: “Beyond Suspicion,” 153–154 n. 69. Paananen has recently argued that forgery-accusers often use imprecise rhetorical questions to raise suspicion; in the case of the Letter to Theodore and Secret Mark, the guilt is surely on both sides, and, by Paananen’s own argument, Smith’s own use of what Paananen calls “unconcealed” (or even “hyperactive”) forms of questioning should raise questions about Smith’s defenses of authenticity. See Paananen, “WWFD or What Would a Forger Do: A Critical Inquiry of Poorly Argued Contemporary Cases for Forgery,” Open Library of Humanities 6.2 (2020): 22/1–28. DOI: https://doi.org/10.16995/olh.519. In the same vein, we can compare Karen King’s comments noted above (“Jesus said to them,” 157–158) with the revelations disclosed by Sabar, Veritas (see n. 93 above).
105 Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 85.
authority on gnosticism, Clement has one great advantage over Jonas he knew what he was talking about.”106 Perhaps more to the point, though, is Smith’s unhinged anger at Jonas’s heuristic deployment of a phenomenological “ideal type,” derided by Smith as “poppycock.”107 But has not Smith himself admitted (albeit candidly, and directly to Scholem) that his construct of an antinomian Jesus was based on an ideal type (of a sort) that messianic antinomian, Sabbatai Zevi?108
In certain ways, Jonas’s larger approach to Gnosticism especially regarding Gnostic nihilism109 is not entirely different from Scholem’s; the latter figure spoke of Sabbatai Zevi and Sabbatianism as both antinomian and nihilistic the terms appearing at times as hendiadys.110 And it is worth recalling one of Scholem’s early references to the Carpocratians in this respect: “In the history of Gnosticism, the Carpocratians are regarded as the outstanding representatives of this libertinistic and nihilistic form of gnosis.”111 It may be that Smith was not as interested in nihilism per se as either Jonas or Scholem. But Scholem saw the connection: Scholem’s only citation of Smith’s Clement of Alexandria is found in his 1974 Eranos-Jahrbuch essay, “Der Nihilismus,” which takes a phenomenological approach to its subject matter.112 Surely a more nuanced reading of Jonas, Scholem, and Smith would yield meaningful differences in their approaches. To Smith’s credit, Jonas’s approach to Gnosticism is hardly beyond reproach.113 Still, something in Jonas’s work on Gnosticism (and nihilism?) touched one of Smith’s nerves. Jonas believed that the radical, antinomian elements found within Gnosticism do not likely find
106 Smith, “The History of the Term ‘Gnostikos,’” in The Rediscovery of Gnosticism: Proceedings of the Conference at Yale March 1978, ed. Bentley Layton, 2 vols. (Leiden: Brill, 1981), 2:796–807; quote: 803 (=Smith, Studies, 2:183–193 [quote: 190]). Smith here is responding to Jonas, “Delimitation of the Gnostic Phenomenon Typological and Historical,” in The Origins of Gnosticism: Colloquium of Messina, 13–18 April 1966. Texts and Discussions, ed. Ugo Bianchi (Leiden: Brill, 1967), 90–108. For Smith’s earlier criticism of Jonas’s approach (kinder in tone), see Smith’s review of Bianchi’s Origins of Gnosticism, JBL 89.1 (1970): 82–84.
107 Smith, “Origins,” 796 n. 3 (=Studies, 2:183 n. 3).
108 Stroumsa, ed., Morton Smith and Gershom Scholem, 170 (September 27, 1976).
109 See Jonas, The Gnostic Religion: The Message of the Alien God and the Beginnings of Christianity, 2nd enlarged ed. (Boston: Beacon Press, 1963), esp. 320–340 (“Epilogue: Gnosticism, Nihilism, and Existentialism”).
110 Scholem, Major Trends, 300, 317
111 Scholem, Major Trends, 316; for a recent reconsideration on the degree to which Smith and Scholem may have overstated the antinomianism of this group, see Michael J. Kok, “Morton Smith and the Carpocratians,” Ephemerides Theologicae Lovanienses 97.4 (2021): 629–645.
112 Scholem, “Der Nihilismus,” 12–13; citing Smith, Clement of Alexandria, 251–278 on 13 n. 11.
113 For a recent critical assessment, see Michael Waldstein, “Hans Jonas’ Construct ‘Gnosticism’: Analysis and Critique,” JECS 8.3 (2000): 341–372.
68 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse 69
their origin within first-century Jewish circles. While such is possible, what is lacking is evidence to that effect.114 Scholem, it would appear, thought similarly.115 Jonas defined Gnosticism broadly, phenomenologically; Scholem, too, took a phenomenological approach (defining Gnosis even more broadly than Jonas) and was certainly loathe to restrict “gnosis” to groups that used that name.116 Given all this, we suspect that Smith’s ire directed at Jonas may serve as a proxy for his otherwise unstated disagreements with Scholem on these matters. In any event, Smith’s scorn stirred selectively, sparing Scholem while it ensnared others who spoke similarly. Here, however, motive does not elude us. The Smith/Scholem correspondence certainly testifies to Smith’s reverence for and loyalty to his mentor. I find nothing objectionable in this, but these disparities remind us that reading Smith is not so straightforward. At times, what he has chosen to say in one place to one audience illuminates what he has chosen to conceal elsewhere. Yet, the atmosphere of mystery only thickens as we consider the possibility that Smith’s occasional outbursts of nastiness may hide as much as they reveal.
8. Conclusion
We must reiterate three essential points. First, since we cannot subject physical evidence to scientific testing, the authenticity questions cannot be answered definitively. We are left to hover between trust and suspicion, faith and doubt. Just as we cannot move (with Watson) “beyond suspicion,” so too, we cannot let the matter drop and accept authenticity until proven otherwise (as Stroumsa and others have wished). Second, our argument stops short of any charge of forgery: our concern here has been and remains highlighting disturbing inconsistencies in Smith’s defense of authenticity. Third, Smith’s positive contributions to the study of ancient religion, as summarized by Cohen above, remain a fact. We quoted Cohen’s praise above, with good reason, and we purposely recall these words again upon concluding as we face yet another paradox: the best of Smith’s scholarship fosters a hermeneutic of suspicion.
Smith abjures his readers to be alert to fantasies and façades; one finds both in Clement of Alexandria. Smith warns his readers not to give way to theologically motivated apology; Clement of Alexandria’s hypothesis rests on a theologian telling the secret truth even as he advocates lying to protect the secret.
114 Jonas, “Delimitation,” 102, 105, and 108; cf. Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, Merkabah Mysticism, and Talmudic Tradition (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1965), esp. 1–2, 10.
115 Scholem, “Der Nihilismus,” 12–13.
116 See, e.g., Scholem, Jewish Gnosticism, esp. 1–2, 10. On Scholem’s complicated (and somewhat inconsistent) understandings of Gnosticism, see Moshe Idel, “Subversive Catalysts: Gnosticism and Messianism in Gershom Scholem’s View of Mysticism,” in The Jewish Past Revisited: Reflections on Modern Jewish Historians, ed. David N. Myers and David B. Ruderman (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), 39–76 (esp. 46–56).
At the center of Smith’s creative hypothesis lurks an antinomian religious charismatic, whose sexual rites ones that qualify as abuse by our standards are ever so loosely veiled; Smith’s book was republished by a modern avatar of just such a figure.
In that popular book, Smith recalls his conversation with Arthur Darby Nock (the dedicatee of the denser book), who, according to Smith’s account, quickly reviewed the find and deemed it a forgery, although a late ancient one: “They made up all sorts of stuff in the fifth century.” But along the way, Nock supposedly said something like this: “Good heavens, a Gospel Quotation! Oh no, this is too much!”117 Yes, too much indeed. The gospel fragments are too Markan to be Mark (as Smith himself all but admitted); the letter is too Clementine to be Clement (as Criddle, Osborn, and others maintain). We are left to ponder the conundrum of relying on Smith to relay Nock’s suspicion. Smith undermining Smith is a mysteriously recurring pattern.
The forgery charge against Smith remains unproven and unprovable, and nothing we have offered here changes that fact. Even so, a great deal of circumstantial evidence raises questions about the letter and Smith’s own problematic defense of it. Modern forgery by one culprit or more should remain on our radar, along with other possibilities, including forgery in late ancient times (as Nock suggested, followed by Zeddies), early modern times, or any time in between. The most important circumstantial evidence matches patterns in the history of forgery and applies to more than one of these possibilities: the letter’s rhetoric of deceit is characteristically pseudepigraphic; its discoverer had an established prior interest in antinomian sex rites (which renders him, if innocent, the perfect dupe). I have tried to show that various conundrums surrounding Secret Mark and the Letter to Theodore are suspiciously implicated by Smith’s words, uttered within these books and elsewhere in his dense and diverse oeuvre. Smith violates his own methods when defending the authenticity of a letter by a deceit-permitting theologian maintaining Jesus’s secret antinomianism. Scholars should not accept the Letter to Theodore as authentic when relying only or even primarily on Smith’s problematically contradictory arguments.
We who doubt the authenticity of the Letter to Theodore display what we have learned from one Morton Smith (the scholar modeling methodological rigor and suspicion) when evaluating the other Morton Smith (who indulged creative fantasies obscured by academic façades). In recognizing this duality, we credit Smith’s mentor, Scholem, who long ago put his finger on the contradiction between Smith’s creative hypotheses regarding an antinomian Jesus and the stringency more typical of Smith’s scholarly achievement. Clement of Alexandria and the Secret Gospel of Mark is one deeply flawed book, and Secret Gospel especially the Dawn Horse Press reprint may be flawed even
117 Smith, Secret Gospel, 24.
70 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Klawans, Nastiness, Nonsense, Antinomianism and Abuse
more. Imagine: had one of Smith’s contemporaries (other than Gershom Scholem!) authored either book, Smith’s reviews would have been devastating. The irony of this mind game encapsulates the paradoxes of Morton Smith and the enduring enigmas encircling the Letter to Theodore
71
Origen and Hebrew: Reading and Possessing the “Hebrew Scriptures” in Late Antique Christianity
Chris Keith
MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society Oslo, Norway | chris.keith@mf.no JJMJS No. 9 (2022): 72–91
Abstract
This essay argues that, in certain circumstances, Hebrew literacy and engagement with Hebrew manuscripts played a crucial role in the construction of elite Christian identity in late antiquity. More specifically, it argues for the rhetorical role of the Hebrew language in claims for Christian superiority to Jews and their texts. Particular attention is given to the role of Hebrew knowledge in the legend of Origen’s production of the Hexapla and Origen’s Epistula ad Africanum.
Keywords
Origen, Septuagint (LXX), Hexapla, Hebrew language, book culture, manuscripts, parting of the ways
1. Introduction
This essay focuses upon the rhetorical value of the Hebrew language for the construction of a certain elite brand of Christian identity in late antiquity and, more specifically, the contribution of third-century material supersessionism to the so-called parting of the ways, ways that never parted, and ways that often parted between Jews and Christians.1 I address two sources the legendary
1 The phrases are taken from the titles of key contributions to the discourse: James D. G. Dunn, The Parting of the Ways between Christianity and Judaism and Their Significance for the Character of Christian Identity, 2nd ed. (London: SCM, 2006); Alan H. Becker and Annette Yoshiko Reed, eds., The Ways that Never Parted: Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003); Lori Baron, Jill HicksKeeton, and Matthew Thiessen, eds., The Ways that Often Parted: Essays in Honor of Joel Marcus, ECL 24 (Atlanta: SBL, 2018). This essay was originally offered as a paper at the Association for Jewish Studies annual meeting in 2021. I thank the panelists Susannah
accounts of Origen’s production of the Hexapla and the Epistula ad Africanum and two interrelated issues: (1) Origen’s Hebrew literacy and (2) Origen’s consultation, and possession, of what he called “Jewish Scriptures,” manuscripts of the Hebrew Scriptures written in Hebrew, in contrast to the Greek manuscripts of the Septuagint. The discourse surrounding these issues illustrates the malleability of the social capital associated with aspects of ancient book culture. Origen and his later devotees alternately maximize and minimize his facility with Hebrew and, in so doing, reveal the porous border between Jewish and Christian book cultures.
2. Origen and the Hexapla
In book six of his Ecclesiastical History, likely written in the closing years of the third century CE,2 Eusebius of Caesarea praises Origen of Alexandria’s creation of the Hexapla with the following statement:
Origen undertook such an accurate examination of the divine words that he even (ὡς καὶ) learned the Hebrew language (τὴν Ἑβραΐδα γλῶτταν) and made the original writings preserved among the Jews in the Hebrew wording itself his own possession (τάς τε παρὰ τοῖς Ἰουδαίοις φεροµένας πρωτοτύπους αὐτοῖς Ἑβραίων στοιχείοις γραφὰς κτῆµα ἴδιον), and searched out the versions of the sacred writings of other translators besides the Seventy, and went beyond well-worn translations those of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion to find others, searching out what had long escaped notice in what recesses I know not and bringing it out into the light. About these, on account of their being utterly unknown and not knowing who [had made the translations], he indicated only, for example, that he found this one in Nicopolis near Actium, and that one in some other place. Indeed, in the Hexapla of the Psalms, after the four famous versions he includes not only a fifth, but a sixth and a seventh translation, and he has indicated that one was found in Jericho in a wine cask during the time of Antoninus, the son of Severus. He gathered all of these in the same [place], diving them by cola and placing
Heschel, Eva Mroczek, and Noam Siena for their helpful feedback. I offer this study in gratitude for the opportunity to deliver an Oslo New Testament and Early Christianity (ONTEC) lecture at the University of Oslo in May 2022.
2 Timothy D. Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1981), 128, dates books 1–7 to “before the end of the third century”; cf. also p. 111.
Hubertus R. Drobner, The Fathers of the Church: A Comprehensive Introduction, trans. Siegfried S. Schatzmann (Peabody: Hendrickson, 2007), 228, dates the writing of books 1–7 to “before 303,” and the addition of books 8–10 to “by 325.”
73
Keith, Origen and Hebrew
(2022)
them opposite each other along with the Hebrew signifiers themselves (αὐτῆς Ἑβραίων σηµειώσεως), and has left us with the copies of what is called the Hexapla, and also arranged the version containing Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion together with the Seventy, separately, in the Tetrapla. 3
This account of Origen was repeated, sometimes verbatim, numerous times in subsequent centuries4 and it has relevance for several topics relating to early Christian book culture.5 For present purposes, I underscore the role that Hebrew and Hebrew manuscripts played in Eusebius’s curation of Origen’s reputation as a scholar. Eusebius considers Origen’s usage of Hebrew and even possession of Hebrew manuscripts to be outside the norm, an extraordinary measure reflecting his abnormally high devotion to Scripture. According to Eusebius, Origen loved Scripture so much, that he “even” studied Hebrew! Eusebius twice uses the intensive αὐτός for the Hebrew letters on his manuscripts “Hebrew itself” or, as Oulton translated in the LCL edition, “actual Hebrew.”6 Although the intensive αὐτός may function in a mundane fashion to distinguish between the Hebrew words in Hebrew letters in the first column of the Hexapla and the Hebrew words in Greek letters in the second column,7 it is also clear from the context and the reception history of this tradition that the emphasis on Origen’s usage of “actual Hebrew” underscores the novelty and significance of the Hebrew language for these Christians.8 Eusebius rhetorically deploys Origen’s engagement with Hebrew to paint Origen as the scholar’s scholar.
3. The Rarity of Hebrew Eusebius is right to highlight the novelty of Origen’s Hebrew. By the time of Origen in the third century, literate abilities in the Hebrew language were severely restricted among Christian intellectuals to the point of extinction and
3 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.16.1–4 (Schott). Greek text is from Oulton, LCL.
4 Epiphanius, Panarion 64.3.5–7; Rufinus, Hist. 6.16.4; Jerome, Comm. Tit. 3.9; Jerome, Vir. ill. 54.6–8.
5 See especially Anthony Grafton and Megan Williams, Christianity and the Transformation of the Book: Origen, Eusebius, and the Library of Caesarea (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2006), 86–132; John D. Meade, “Hexapla,” in The Dictionary of the Bible and Ancient Media, ed. Tom Thatcher et al. (London: T&T Clark, 2017), 170–172.
6 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.16.1–4 (Oulton, LCL).
7 This distinction is more evident in the later reception of this tradition in Epiphanius, Panarion 64.3.5–7 (Williams): “Thus this is, as is called a Hexapla, and besides the Greek translations <there are> two parallel texts, of the Hebrew actually in <Hebrew> letters, and of the Hebrew in Greek letters (Ἑβραϊκῆς ... δι᾽ <Ἑβραϊκῶν> στοιχείων καὶ Ἑβραϊκῆς δι᾽ Ἑλληνικῶν στοιχείων).” For Greek, see Epiphanius 2: Panarion haer. 34–64, ed. Karl Holl and Jürgen Dummer, 2nd rev ed., GCS (Berlin: Akademie, 1980), 407–408
8 Again, see Epiphanius, Panarion 64.3.5–7; Rufinus, Hist. 6.16.4; Jerome, Comm. Tit. 3.9; Jerome, Vir. ill. 54.6–8.
74
JJMJS No. 9
had been for some time. Kamesar even opens his monograph on Jerome by identifying Origen as “the first Christian scholar to concern himself in a serious fashion with the text of the Old Testament,” by which he refers to Origen’s inclusion of Hebrew with Greek in the production of the Hexapla.9 Devotion to Jesus began in Palestine in the first century CE, and already among the Jewish population at that time and place advanced Hebrew abilities, such as would be required to read or copy the Torah or compose literary texts in Hebrew, were restricted to the educated elite.10 Aramaic was the colloquial language of Jews in Palestine,11 and the practice of providing Aramaic translations in some synagogues had likely begun.12 Koine Greek was the language of Diasporan Jews such as Philo,13 the lingua franca of the Empire, and possibly the language of some synagogues in Palestine, depending on what one thinks of the linguistic practices of the Synagogue of the Freedmen in Acts 6:9 or the synagogue attested by the Theodotus Inscription.14
9 Adam Kamesar, Jerome, Greek Scholarship, and the Hebrew Bible: A Study of the Quaestiones Hebraicae in Genesim, OCM (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 4. 10 See the classic study of Joseph A. Fitzmyer, “The Languages of Palestine in the First Century A.D.,” CBQ 32 (1970): 501–530; repr. in A Wandering Aramean: Collected Aramaic Essays, combined ed. in The Semitic Background of the New Testament, BRS (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 29–56, the update to the discussion that comes to largely the same conclusions by John C. Poirier, “The Linguistic Situation in Jewish Palestine in Late Antiquity,” JGRChJ 4 (2007): 55–134, and now Holger Gzella, Aramaic: A History of the First World Language, trans. Benjamin D. Suchard, ELR (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2017), 109–110; Annette Yoshiko Reed, Demons, Angels, and Writing in Ancient Judaism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020), 54–59; Michael Owen Wise, Language and Literacy in Roman Judaea: A Study of the Bar Kokhba Documents, AYBRL (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2015), 279–355. Sang-Il Lee, Jesus and Gospel Traditions in Bilingual Context: A Study in the Interdirectionality of Language, BZNW 186 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012), 77–212, provides an intricate and helpful discussion of bilingualism (and multilingualism) in first-century Palestine and the Diaspora. Alan Millard, Reading and Writing in the Time of Jesus, BS 69 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 123–125, shows that at least some knowledge of Hebrew is attested at the popular level on ossuaries and masonry markings.
11 Gzella, Aramaic, 110–113.
12 Fragments of targumim of Leviticus (4Q156) and Job (11Q10) were discovered at Qumran.
13 See further John M. G. Barclay, Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora: From Alexander to Trajan (323 BCE–117 CE) (Berkley: University of California Press, 1996), 30–31.
14 Cf. Wise, Language, 335. Further on the possibility of Greek-speaking Palestinian synagogues, see Stephen K. Catto, Reconstructing the First-Century Synagogue: A Critical Analysis of Current Research, LNTS 363 (London: T&T Clark, 2007), 120–121; Charles Perrot, “The Reading of the Bible in the Ancient Synagogue,” in Mikra: Text, Translation, Reading and Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity, ed. Martin Jan Mulder (Peabody: Hendrickson, 2004), 155; cf. however, Lee
Keith,
75
Origen and Hebrew
In the first century CE, Latin in Palestine was primarily restricted to the Roman bureaucracy. It is in such a context of government-sanctioned execution that Latin makes an appearance on Jesus’ trilingual titulus in John 19:20. Texts that became part of the Bible were translated into Latin in North Africa by the end of the second century, and in the third century, North African church fathers Tertullian and Cyprian were writing in Latin.15 Most church fathers of the second and third centuries still preferred to write in Greek, but during this period it remains that Greek and Latin were the two main languages of the Christian educated, as was the case for their pagan counterparts. The reason is simple: followers of Jesus never developed a primary education system of their own, so what literate education future church leaders received was normally gained outside the church, often pre-conversion.16 As one moves geographically and chronologically away from first-century Palestine, therefore, the general presence of Semitic languages among followers of Jesus wanes significantly.
Centuries before the emergence of the Christ cult, beginning in the third century BCE, the Jewish Scriptures were translated into Greek in a collection of texts that came to be known as the Septuagint (LXX).17 The LXX continued to circulate among Greek-speaking Jews, and by the second century CE, revisions of the Greek Jewish Scriptures attributed to Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion were also in circulation.18 Shortly after these revisions were
I. Levine, Judaism and Hellenism in Antiquity: Conflict or Congruence? (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1998), 161–162.
15 Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, “The Latin Bible,” NCHB 505–506.
16 Harry Y. Gamble, Books and Readers in the Early Church: A History of Early Christian Texts (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), 6, 10. See also H. I. Marrou, A History of Education in Antiquity, trans. George Lamb (London: Sheed and Ward, 1956), 325. Eusebius notes that, initially, Origen needed to teach literacy to those who came to study with him, a practice that he eventually passed to Heraclas (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.3.8–9; 6.15.1). In the fourth century, Julian, Adv. Galil. 229e–230a challenges Christians to provide their children with their own education system and then compare them to those receiving a pagan education. More generally on the relationship between Christians and pagan education, see M. L. W. Laistner, Christianity and Pagan Culture in the Later Roman Empire (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1951); E. G. Weltin, Athens and Jerusalem: An Interpretive Essay on Christianity and Classical Culture, AARSR 49 (Atlanta: Scholars, 1987), 5–20.
17 The legendary account of this translation in the Letter of Aristeas sets it in the context of Ptolemy II and at the prompting of Demetrius, head of the Alexandrian Library (Let. Aris. 9). See further Francis Borchardt, “The LXX Myth and the Rise of Textual Fixity,” JSJ 43 (2012): 1–21. For the relevance of this legend for matters discussed below, see Judith Lieu, “The Early Christian Reception of the Legend of the Greek Translation of the Scriptures,” in The Reception of Jewish Tradition in the Social Imagination of the Early Christians, ed. John M. G. Barclay and Kylie Crabbe, RJT 8 (London: T&T Clark, 2022), 15–30.
18 Kristin de Troyer, “Septuagint,” NCHB 267, 280–286.
76 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Origen and Hebrew
made, the rabbinic reading circles associated with the Tosefta (ca. 300 CE) permitted the reading of the Scriptures in Greek and other vernacular languages as long as the reading begins and ends in Hebrew. Yet it specifies that if even one man can read Hebrew, that is what should be read: “A synagogue comprised of those who speak a foreign language if they have someone who can read Hebrew, they begin in Hebrew and conclude in Hebrew. If they have only one who can read, only one reads.”19 These instructions reflect the reality of the colloquial diminishment of Hebrew, but equally the resilient prominence of and preference for Hebrew as the special language of the Scriptures and their public reading in assembly, a preference reflected much earlier in the manuscript collection of the Qumran community, which included Greek and Aramaic manuscripts but was overwhelmingly Hebrew.20
As noted, this preference for Hebrew as a sacred language was not replicated among later, Greek-speaking Christians.21 When Origen included the Scriptures in Hebrew in the first column and a Greek transliteration of that Hebrew in the second column of his Hexapla, he seems to have reinvigorated interest in the Hebrew language among at least some Christian intellectuals, though the extent of genuine reinvigoration is open to debate.22 At least until Jerome, Origen’s interest in Hebrew and willingness to learn it to whatever extent he did was, in the words of Elliott, “almost unknown.”23 Jerome himself
19 t. Meg. 3:13 (Neusner). Cf. also the observation of Wise, Language, 303: “If Greek was the language in which Josephus told their story to the Romans, Hebrew was the language in which the Judaeans told it to themselves.” Wise continues, “As with Romans on the path to literary literacy, so, too, Judaean elites would need to master a difficult body of literature presented in a challenging format and learn to reanimate it with a pronunciation markedly different from that of ordinary speech” (305).
20 Poirier, “Linguistic,” 69, estimates that over 82 percent of the Qumran collection was Hebrew.
21 Similarly, John C. Poirier, The Tongues of Angels: The Concept of Angelic Languages in Classical Jewish and Christian Texts, WUNT 2.287 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010), 29: “Despite their conviction that Hebrew was the language of creation, the church fathers did not translate their conviction that the scriptures were written in Hebrew into any sort of concern to preserve Hebrew within the church....”
22 Cf. Kamesar, Jerome, 40, “Between the time of Origen and Jerome, there was little movement in the direction of the Hebrew text.”
23 C. J. Elliott, “Hebrew Learning among the Fathers,” in A Dictionary of Christian Biography, Literature, Sects, and Doctrines, ed. William Smith and Henry Wace, 4 vols. (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1877–1887), 2:851–872. See also Ronald E. Heine, Origen: Scholarship in Service of the Church, OCTC (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), vii: “It was in Alexandria that Origen did what no other Christian theologian of his day had done, and very few did after him in the Patristic period. He learned the Hebrew language so that he could work with the Hebrew Scriptures.” As I will show, Origen was not exactly alone in his acquisition of Hebrew abilities, but one can trace the notion that Origen went against the grain of Christian culture in this regard at least back to Jerome, Vir. ill. 54.6–8. Kamesar, Jerome, 38–40, notes Eusebius of Emesa, Diodore of
77
Keith,
reflected this opinion when he said of Origen: “Who does not also know that he was so assiduous in the study of the Holy Scriptures that contrary to the spirit of his time and of his people, he learned the Hebrew language.”24 Origen’s interaction with Julius Africanus, discussed below, shows that he was not entirely alone in this regard, but he was a rarity.
4. Hebrew, Greek, and Whose Are the Scriptures
Prior to Origen, then, knowledge of Hebrew among followers of Jesus was scarce. This is not to say that there is no evidence that pre-Constantinian Jesus followers interacted with the Hebrew texts scholars often make arguments that a given citation of the Scriptures in a first- or second-century text reflects familiarity with the Hebrew rather than the Greek of the Jewish Scriptures.25 But generally speaking, the “Old Testament” of followers of Jesus was the LXX.26
The dominance of the LXX among later Christians is partially reflective of the general linguistic situation of Koine Greek dominating the broader imperial literary scene but also partially reflective of a theology of the text. The rendering of the Jewish Scriptures into Greek, a Gentile language, and commissioned by a Gentile according to legend (Ptolemy II Philadelphus),27 led some later Christians to claim the LXX as their own, which allowed them “to claim a historic” and Jewish “heritage” as their own.28 Thus, in the third century, Origen refers to the LXX as “ours” frequently and says that it was given to Christians through God’s providence.29 Throughout the Epistula ad Africanum, he consistently refers to the LXX as unqualified “Scriptures” but Hebrew-language authoritative texts as the “Hebrew Scriptures,” and I will return to this matter. In the early fourth century, Eusebius gave clear
Tarsus, and Theodore of Mopsuestia as exceptions between Origen and Jerome who, to different extents and for different reasons, took an interest in Hebrew.
24 Jerome, Vir. ill. 54.6–8 (Halton, FC).
25 For a study of Paul’s engagement with LXX and Hebrew tradition, see Francis Watson, Paul and the Hermeneutics of Faith (London: T&T Clark, 2004); more briefly on Paul’s usage of the LXX, see Timothy Michael Law, When God Spoke Greek: The Septuagint and the Making of the Christian Bible (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 105–111. Richard Bauckham, “Monotheism and Christology in the Gospel of John,” in his The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007), 246–247, argues that the author of John’s Gospel worked with both the LXX and the Hebrew (cf. Gospel of Glory: Major Themes in Johannine Theology [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2015], 49, 52, 54; “Jewish Messianism according to the Gospel of John,” in Testimony, 229).
26 See especially on this topic Law, When God Spoke
27 Let. Aris. 9. Irenaeus, Haer. 3.21.2, instead attributes the commissioning to “Ptolemy son of Lagus,” cf. Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 1.22.
28 Law, When God Spoke, 5. See further on the idea of a “gentile chain of transmission of the Old Testament,” see Kamesar, Jerome, 29–34, quotation from p. 30.
29 Origen, Ep. Afr. 4.
78 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
articulation of the view that the LXX was part of God’s plan to prepare the world for Christianity and that the prophecies relating to Jesus were not clear in the Hebrew language while they were clear in the Greek.30 In providing his adaptations to a Latin translation of Eusebius’s Ecclesiastial History, Rufinus similarly mentions the LXX but adds, “which is our own” (quae nostra est).31 Well before these Christians, Justin Martyr in his second-century Dialogue with Trypho, which portrays his conversation with a Jewish interlocutor, refers to “your Scriptures, or rather not yours, but ours.”32
The inherent ambiguity reflected in Justin’s statement specifically how he affirms that the Scriptures are, in some sense, the Jews’, but, in another sense, the Christians’ enabled various exploitations of the book culture(s) around those Scriptures. It is precisely in the crosshairs of this kind of rhetoric that I place the significance of Origen’s Hebrew language abilities. De Troyer is correct that Justin’s statement shows “that both Jews and Christians were using the Septuagint,”33 but we can observe further that it was sometimes a touchstone of contention and difference. When late antique Christians claim divine inspiration for the LXX or attribute its composition to providence,34 from one perspective, they are doing nothing more than the author(s) of the Letter of Aristeas had implied or Philo had claimed outright.35 From another perspective, however, the claim could take on a different inflection when deriving from Christians. For them, it has sometimes functioned as a claim that God inspired their LXX, and it allowed them to construct the LXX and its Greek in contradistinction to the Hebrew-language Scriptures (in a way that is not
30 Eusebius, Praep. ev. 8.1 (Gifford): “For when the salutary preaching of our Savior was all but ready to shine forth unto all men in the Roman empire, more than ordinary reason required that the prophecies concerning Him, and the mode of life of the pious Hebrews of old, and the lessons of their religious teaching, hidden from long ages in their native tongue, should now at length come forth to all the nations, to whom the knowledge of God was about to be introduced; and then God Himself, the author of these blessings, anticipating the future by His foreknowledge as God, arranged that the predictions concerning Him who was to appear before long as the Savior of all mankind, and to establish Himself as the teacher of the religion of the One Supreme God to all the nations under the sun, should be revealed to them all, and be brought into the light by being accurately translated, and set up in public libraries.”
31 Rufinus, Hist. 6.16.4. For Latin, see Eusebius Werke 2:2: Die Kirchengeschichte, ed. Eduard Schwartz and Theodor Mommsen, 2nd unchanged ed., GCS 6:2 (Berlin: Akademie, 1999), 553.
32 Justin Martyr, Dial. 29 (ANF 1:209).
33 De Troyer, “Septuagint,” 279. Justin is likely referring to the LXX, but the text does not specify.
34 Irenaeus of Lyons, Haer. 3.21.1–2; Eusebius, Praep. ev. 8; Origen, Ep. Afr. 4; Cyril of Jerusalem, Lectures 4.34. Cf. Jerome, preface to Chron. 2; preface to Qu. hebr. Gen.
35 Let. Ari. 301–311; Philo, Mos. 2.25–44, respectively. Cf. Josephus, Ant. 12.5–13 §40–109. See further Law, When God Spoke, 129–131. Augustine eventually articulated a theory of two revelations, one in Hebrew and the other in Greek, in Civ. 18.43.
Keith,
Hebrew 79
Origen and
entirely different from how Christians may have used the codex for their authoritative writings in order to distinguish their Scriptures from Jewish Scriptures in bookroll format).36 Eusebius, for example, explicitly places God on his own side of an us/them dichotomy when he states that “God himself” inspired King Ptolemy to order the translation of the LXX, “for we should not otherwise have got from the Jews those oracles which they would have hidden away for their jealousy of us.”37
Collectively, this evidence points to several features of the reading culture of late antique Christian intellectuals such as Origen, Eusebius, and Jerome. To read the Jewish Scriptures in Hebrew was, in some circumstances, to do what Jews did. For a Scripture manuscript to be written in Hebrew instead of Greek was to render it automatically a “Jewish” rather than a “Christian” manuscript. For the sake of clarity, the present point concerns not whether there is an intrinsic connection between language choice, manuscript usage, and “ownership,” but how this confluence of factors can be portrayed or viewed from specific perspectives. From at least one such perspective, that of some followers of Jesus in late antiquity, to study Hebrew manuscripts was to occupy space on the border of two reading cultures or, better stated, to pass through the permeable border.
5. Origen’s “Actual Hebrew”
Regarding Origen’s Hebrew, prior scholarship has addressed a number of matters, such as his knowledge of Hebrew or possibly lack thereof,38 the significance of Hebrew in Origen’s production of the Hexapla,39 Origen and
36
For this possibility, see Chris Keith, The Gospel as Manuscript: An Early History of the Jesus Tradition as Material Artifact (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020), 223–230. 37 Eusebius, Praep ev. 8.1 (Gifford).
38 Elliott, “Hebrew,” 2:851–872 covers Origen’s Hebrew in the context of a dated, but still valuable, discussion of Hebrew knowledge among church fathers from Justin Martyr to Bede. He concludes that only Jerome, and possibly Origen, “possessed any knowledge of Hebrew that was worthy of the name” (2:872), and that Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Irenaeus, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria, the Clementine Homilies, Eusebius of Caesarea, Ephraim the Syrian, Cyril of Jerusalem, John Chrysostom, and Augustine show various levels of familiarity with Hebrew words and their meaning (for example, the nameישראל ), as well as Jewish interpretive traditions, but do not provide clear evidence of their ability to consult Hebrew manuscripts themselves, and often show evidence of the contrary. Similarly, Epiphanius had some familiarity with Hebrew, “but not of a critical character” (2:864), and Theodoret knew some Hebrew, but it was a “superficial acquaintance” (2:869), as did Bede (2:872). Jerome exceeded all, for Elliott, but the exact limits of his ability are also hard to determine.
39 Ruth A. Clements, “Origen’s Hexapla and Christian-Jewish Encounter in the Second and Third Centuries,” in Religious Rivalries and the Struggle for Success in Caesarea Maritima, ed. Terence L. Donaldson, ESCJ 8 (Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2000), 303–329; “Peri Pascha: Passover and the Displacement of Jewish Interpretation
80
JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Scripture generally,40 and Origen’s references to and contact with Jews.41 To address the initial matter in an anachronistic manner, we can at least say that Origen had a facility for Hebrew. Even if the first two columns of the Hexapla were acquired prior to his move to Caesarea or created later by “Jewish members of his scribal staff,”42 either of which theory removes responsibility for their direct production from Origen, his inclusion of them in the Hexapla reflects an effort to interact with the Hebrew language. I consider two brief examples of Origen’s engagement with Hebrew textual variants and etymology before giving more extended consideration to his engagement with Hebrew in Epistula ad Africanum.
6. Hebrew Variants
In his writings, Origen gives evidence of some facility with Hebrew manuscripts and the Hebrew language.43 In his Homiliae in Jeremiam, Origen discusses the variant readings of the LXX and Hebrew manuscripts at Jer 15:10:
For the Scripture is in two texts. In most copies there is, I have not helped; no one has helped me, but in the most accurate copies of and in accord with the Hebrew is, I have not owed, no one has owed me. So it is necessary both to discuss the text most common and carried in the churches, and not to leave undiscussed the view from the Hebrew Scriptures.44
This type of textual conundrum is precisely what the Hexapla was designed to help address. Origen identifies the two differing LXX readings as “the Scripture” and the Hebrew-language manuscripts as “the Hebrew Scriptures,” specifying that the former is what circulates “in the churches.” His description of the LXX as unqualified Scripture and his location of it in Christ assemblies reveal an assumed distinction between a Christian reading culture associated with the
within Origen’s Exegesis” (ThD diss., Harvard University, 1997); Grafton and Williams, Christianity, 23–132; Kamesar, Jerome, 4–28.
40 Heine, Origen, 65–82; Peter W. Martens, Origen and Scripture: The Contours of the Exegetical Life, OECS (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012).
41 Paul M. Blowers, “Origen, the Rabbis, and the Bible: Toward a Picture of Judaism and Christianity in Third-Century Caesarea,” in Origen of Alexandria: His World and His Legacy, ed. Charles Kannengiesser and William L. Petersen, CJA 1 (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988), 96–116; Heine, Origen, 147–151; N. R. M. de Lange, Origen and the Jews: Studies in Jewish-Christian Relations in Third-Century Palestine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976).
42 Clements, “Origen’s Hexapla,” 327. Similarly, Elliott, “Hebrew,” 2:859 posits “Origen’s Jewish amanuenses” as responsible.
43 I present several examples in the main text but draw readers’ attention to the stillvaluable study of Kamesar, Jerome, 4–28.
44 Origen, Hom. Jer. 14.3.1 (Smith, FC).
Keith, Origen and Hebrew 81
LXX and a Jewish reading culture associated with the Hebrew. The problem for Origen is that the LXX tradition attests to two readings in this case, the most common of which is “I have not helped; no one has helped me.” Origen, however, describes the less common reading (“I have not owed, no one has owed me”) as the one found in manuscripts that are “most accurate” and “more accurate,” and notes that this reading also “accords with the Hebrew.”45 In this case, then, Origen employs the Hebrew in order to choose between two readings in the Greek, ultimately siding with the reading that aligns with the reading of Jewish manuscripts over “the text most common and carried in the churches.”46 As Kamesar observes, this position stands in tension with Origen’s theological assertion of the superiority of the LXX and his allowing the Hebrew to correct the LXX is “the furthest he moves towards recognition of the importance of the original.”47
7. Hebrew Etymology
At one point in his commentary on the Gospel of John, Origen solves a problem of variant readings by invoking the Hebrew meaning of words in transliterated Greek.
We are not unaware that “these things were done in Bethania” occurs in nearly all the manuscripts. It also seems likely that, in addition, this was the earlier reading. And to be sure, we have read “Bethania” in Heracleon. But since we have been in the places, so far as the historical account is concerned, of the footprints of Jesus and his disciples and the prophets, we have been convinced that we ought not to read “Bethania,” but “Bethabara.”48
He then supports this argument with an etymological argument: “In addition, the meaning of the name Bethabara is appropriate for the baptism of the one who prepares for the Lord a prepared people, for it is translated, ‘house of preparation.’ Bethania, however, means ‘house of obedience.’”49 As Knust and
45
Origen, Hom. Jer. 14.3.1, 4 (Smith, FC).
46 Origen, Hom. Jer. 14.3.1. As Kamesar, Jerome, notes, “As far as his textual position is concerned, there is a tension between the support of a LXX ‘corrected’ according to the Hebrew on the one hand, and of a ‘pure’ LXX on the other” (6), and, “From Origen’s own perspective, this method is not self-contradictory” (18); cf. also Kamesar’s description of Origen’s “conflicting tendencies” that are “perceptible in Origen’s work” (28).
47 Kamesar, Jerome, 20.
48 Origen, Comm. Jo. 6.204 (Heine, FC).
49 Origen, Comm. Jo. 6.206 (Heine, FC).
82 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Origen and
Wasserman observe, “Origen is arguing from the Hebrew, though he does not supply” the Hebrew.50
8. Susanna
In another famous example, Julius Africanus and Origen correspond over the latter’s acceptance of Susanna, an account of a young Jewish woman and voyeuristic elders that appears in the LXX tradition of Daniel but not in Hebrew manuscripts.51 The battleground for the dispute includes a wordplay in the Greek of Sus 54–59. Africanus asserts that the wordplay does not work in Hebrew and thus shows that Susanna is “plainly a more modern forgery”52:
And when the one said, “Under a holm-tree” (prinos), he answered that the angel would saw him asunder (prisein); and similarly menaced the other who said, “Under a mastich-tree” (schinos), with being rent asunder (schisthenai). Now, in Greek, it happens that “holm-tree” and “saw asunder,” and “rend” and “mastich-tree” sound alike, but in Hebrew they are quite distinct. But all the books of the Old Testament have been translated from Hebrew into Greek.53
Africanus’s logic is clear: Susanna cannot have been in the Old Testament because it was composed in Greek, as this wordplay shows. Africanus ends the correspondence by inviting Origen’s response: “I have struck the blow; do you give the echo; answer, and instruct me.”54
Origen’s response is fascinating in several ways, but perhaps most so concerning the current topic because of the sheer amount of knowledge about Hebrew, Greek, and Hebrew and Greek manuscripts he marshals, implicitly asserting his status as an expert on such matters without ever actually answering Africanus’s question. He starts by moving away from the specific issue of the (im)possibility of a Hebrew wordplay and onto other LXX additions to Daniel, such as Bel and the Dragon,55 and then even further to “thousands” of passages where the LXX and Hebrew do not align: “thousands of other passages also which I found in many places when with my little strength I was collating the
50 Jennifer Knust and Tommy Wasserman, To Cast the First Stone: The Transmission of a Gospel Story (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019), 86.
51 According to Origen, Ep. Afr. 1, he wrote to Africanus from Nicomedia; acknowledging the considerable difficulties in dating the correspondence, N. R. M. de Lange, “The Letter to Africanus: Origen’s recantation?” StPatr 16.2, ed. Elizabeth A. Livingstone (Berlin: Akademie, 1985), 242–243, suggests the late 230s at the earliest.
52 Julius Africanus, Ep. Orig. 1 (ANF 4:385).
53 Julius Africanus, Ep. Orig. 1 (ANF 4:385).
54 Julius Africanus, Ep. Orig. 2 (ANF 4:385).
55 Origen, Ep. Afr. 2.
83
Keith,
Hebrew
Hebrew copies with ours.”56 Origen here portrays himself as virtually surrounded by manuscripts and refers to his “little strength” with about as much seriousness as he refers to his response to Africanus which is over ten times longer than Africanus’s initial “blow” as written with his “little ability,” and written in the “little time” he had.57 Later in the letter, he brags to Africanus about his work in the Hebrew texts:
Nor do I say this because I shun the labour of investigating the Jewish Scriptures, and comparing them with ours, and noticing their various readings. This, if it be not arrogant to say it, I have already to a great extent done to the best of my ability, labouring hard to get at the meaning in all the editions and various readings.58
After his reference to the “thousands” of manuscripts he has consulted, he gives some examples of LXX/Hebrew disagreements from Daniel and then offers a catalog of similar examples from “many other sacred books” where he found them.59 After the tour of his accomplishments as a collator of Greek and Hebrew manuscripts, Origen eventually makes his way back to the wordplay in Sus 54–59 with the closest he comes to answering Africanus directly:
You say that you can see how this can be in Greek, but that in Hebrew the words are altogether distinct. On this point, however, I am still in doubt; because, when I was considering this passage (for I myself saw this difficulty), I consulted not a few Jews about it, asking them the Hebrew words for prinos and prisein, and how they would translate schinos the tree, and how schisis. 60
Origen explains that his conversation with his Jewish interlocutors led nowhere since the Hebrew terms for σχῖνος and πρῖνος do not occur anywhere in their Scriptures and concludes: “This, then, being what the Hebrews said to whom I had recourse, and who were acquainted with the history, I am cautious of affirming whether or not there is any correspondence to this play of words in the Hebrew. Your reason for affirming that there is not, you yourself probably know.”61 Origen then relays two accounts of consulting “Hebrew” intellectuals.62
56
Origen, Ep. Afr. 2 (ANF 4:386).
57 Origen, Ep. Afr. 1 (ANF 4:386).
58 Origen, Ep. Afr. 5 (ANF 4:387).
59 Origen, Ep. Afr. 3 (ANF 4:386).
60 Origen, Ep. Afr. 6 (ANF 4:388).
61 Origen, Ep. Afr. 6 (ANF 4:388).
62 Origen, Ep. Afr. 7–8.
84 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
A certain brand of theological argument runs through Origen’s response to Julius Africanus, namely that the LXX, including its additions, cannot be inferior to the Hebrew because the LXX is “ours.” He frames his response to Africanus on the wordplay with these theological categories at the outset by foregrounding the fact that Greek texts are accepted among Christians: “In answer to this, I have to tell you what it behooves us to do in the cases not only of the History of Susanna, which is found in every Church of Christ in that Greek copy which the Greeks use, but is not in the Hebrew….”63 For Origen, then, this discussion is not simply about the LXX and the Hebrew manuscripts, but about Christians, Jews, and whose texts are (most) authoritative. At two different locations, he invokes the theological supremacy of “our” LXX to chide Africanus based on the implication of Africanus’s argument, namely that the LXX is inferior. In Ep. Afr. 4, he asks a rhetorical question that juxtaposes the LXX, delivered by providence to the churches, with the Jewish copies of their Hebrew Scriptures: And, forsooth, when we notice such things, we are forthwith to reject as spurious the copies in use in our Churches, and enjoin the brotherhood to put away the sacred books current among them, and to coax the Jews, and persuade them to give us copies which shall be untampered with, and free from forgery! Are we to suppose that that Providence which in the sacred Scriptures has ministered to the edification of all the Churches of Christ, had no thought for those bought with a price, for whom Christ died . . .?
Africanus must have wondered how the argument made it from a Greek wordplay to questioning the efficacy of Christ’s death, but such an argumentative sleight of the hand shows the stakes of the interchange for Origen. The expected answer to Origen’s rhetorical question is obviously “no,” since he later charges Jews with having tampered with their manuscripts, taking the theological supremacy of the LXX over the Hebrew to the level of textual conservation.64 At this point, two other ironies associated with Origen’s portrayal of Hebrew and Jews come into clear focus: first, Origen strenuously asserts the superiority of the LXX despite, at other points (see above discussion of Hom. Jer. 14.3.1–4), using Hebrew to correct it; and, secondly, Origen denigrates Jewish scholars, charging them with textual infidelity, despite having just invoked three of them to contradict Africanus.65
63 Origen, Ep. Afr. 2 (ANF 4:386).
64 Origen, Ep. Afr. 9.
65 That Origen elsewhere defers to, and possibly models his work after, Jewish experts does not dilute the present point. (See, for example, on Origen and Philo, Jennifer Otto, Philo of Alexandria and the Construction of Jewishness in Early Christian Writings, OECS
Keith,
Hebrew 85
Origen and
In this entire fascinating interchange, Origen deftly avoids proposing Hebrew vocabulary that could match the Greek wordplay, which would have been the most direct way to respond to Africanus’s charge. Instead, he attempts to drown the question with assertions of just how many manuscripts he has collated and how many other linguistic problems of which he is aware. Regarding the wordplay itself, he implicitly confesses that such vocabulary was beyond his knowledge because he had to consult Jewish scholars who knew the Hebrew text. Thus, he invokes his manuscript work, consultation of Jewish scholars, and the theological primacy of the LXX to sidestep the main issue and bludgeon Africanus with a conclusion that reinforces Origen’s original statement that Susanna should be accepted.
9. Origen’s Hebrew Illiteracy
Based on the above evidence, we might conclude that Origen at least could have put Hebrew on his CV as a research language. Alongside such examples, however, and congruent with Origen’s deft avoidance of directly addressing possible Hebrew words under the Greek wordplay at Sus 54–59, is evidence that suggests that Origen’s knowledge of Hebrew was open to question. In 1880 Elliott produced an essay on “Hebrew Learning among the Fathers” that amounts to an exasperated point-by-point correction-in-minutiae of multiple church fathers’ Hebrew abilities.66 He included extensive comments on examples from Origen and concludes,
Although Origen acquired a high reputation as a scholar amongst his own contemporaries and was held in equally high estimation by later writers, especially by Jerome, it needs but a slight acquaintance with his works to perceive that his Hebrew scholarship was rather of a traditional than of a critical character, and that he was indebted for the criticisms which he introduced into his writings rather to the information of others than to any original research.67
Elliott later drops any pretense: “Origen’s Hebrew scholarship was of a very defective nature.”68 More recent scholars have concluded similarly. Grafton and [New York: Oxford University Press, 2018], 91–135; Ilaria L. E. Ramelli, “Philo as Origen’s Declared Model: Allegorical and Historical Exegesis of Scripture,” Studies in Christian-Jewish Relations 7 [2012]: 1–17.) Quite to the contrary, it further illustrates that point, which is that Origen can and does alternately amplify his dependence upon or independence from Jewish scholars.
66 Elliott, “Hebrew,” 2:851–872.
67 Elliott, “Hebrew,” 2:856.
68 Elliott, “Hebrew,” 2:857.
86 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Williams, for example, say, “He seems never to have learned much Hebrew.”69 Similar is the assessment of Dorival: “Origen does not appear to have known either the Hebrew language or Hebrew characters.”70 The evidence most cited for Origen’s illiteracy in Hebrew is a passage in his Homilies on Numbers. Likely written during his preaching in Caesarea in the late 230s or early 240s CE,71 in this text Origen locates himself outside those who can read Hebrew when discussing the tetragrammaton. The relevant section begins,
In the literature of the Hebrews, the name of God, that is, God, or Lord, is said to be written in different ways. For anything that is called a god is written one way, and the God himself... is written another way. Thus, that God of Israel, the one God and Creator of all things, is written with a certain determinate symbol comprised of letters, which they call the “tetragrammaton.”72
Significantly, “the literature of the Hebrews” functions as the photographic negative of his reference to the LXX as unqualified “Scripture” or “Scriptures in use in the Churches” or “in our churches.”
69 Grafton and Williams, Christianity, 83. Similarly, Megan Hale Williams, The Monk and the Book: Jerome and the Making of Christian Scholarship (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006), 72: “But even Origen, for all his interest in the Hebrew text and Jewish traditions of interpretation, seems to have had only limited knowledge of Hebrew.”
70 Gilles Dorival, “Origen,” in The New Cambridge History of the Bible: From the Beginnings to 600 C.E., ed. James Carleton Paget and Joachim Schaper (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 608. Kamesar, Jerome, 26, fails to consider the role that Origen’s limited Hebrew abilities might have played in his general preference for the LXX in his textual work. In discussing Origen’s dependence upon the LXX revisions, he says, “Origen’s dependence on the later versions, i.e. at least three different texts, is such that it seems to have obviated a sustained, comprehensive perception of the Hebrew text as a separate entity. For he does not normally employ the recentiores to understanding the Hebrew but bases his exegesis on a very literal reading of the Greek. The reason for this may be that his reliance on the letter of the Greek text, which… is a feature of his exegesis of the LXX, was unconsciously retained when he moved over to treat the other versions.” I suggest a simpler solution: Origen’s Hebrew was functional rather than fluent, and thus he depended upon the LXX and its revisions in Greek to navigate the Hebrew. He was always more heavily anchored in the Greek tradition because that is where his linguistic abilities primarily resided.
71 Heine, Origen, 170, dates the authorship of Origen’s homilies to his preaching in Caesarea, “probably between 239 and 244.” Similarly, Joseph W. Trigg, Origen, ECF (London: Routledge, 1998), 38–39.
72 Origen, Hom. Num. 14.1.3 (Scheck, ACT).
87
Keith, Origen and Hebrew
After this reference to the tetragrammaton, Origen explains that “whenever God is written in the Scriptures by this symbol,” it refers to the Creator God, but when it is not, it is not clearly referencing that God.73 He then cites 1 Cor 8:5–6, which includes references to “gods” and “God” after quoting the Shema at 1 Cor 8:4.74 Returning to the account of Balaam and his donkey in Num 22, in which “God” speaks to Balaam, Origen says, “Thus, those who read Hebrew literature say (aiunt ergo qui Hebraicas litteras legunt) that in this passage God is not recorded by the symbol of the tetragrammaton. Let this matter be investigated by one who is able.”75 One can, though does not necessarily have to, read this passage in such a way that Origen locates himself outside the group of “those who read Hebrew letters” (qui Hebraicas litteras legunt). On this basis, scholars regularly point to this specific passage to observe that “Origen is so unaware of Hebrew that he was not able to read even the Tetragrammaton.”76
10. Hebrew and the Management of Origen’s Reputation
If one interprets this passage as such, Origen’s reference to others as “those who read Hebrew letters” and seeming exclusion of himself from that group is odd given that this homily on Numbers was written in the Caesarean stage of his career when his work on the Hexapla was either completed or actively underway.77 Elliott, the aforementioned nineteenth-century assessor of Origen’s “defective” Hebrew, was particularly perplexed by the fact that Origen was capable of producing the Hexapla when he was seemingly “so unequal to the task.”78 It is also possible, however, to read this passage as Origen’s invocation of other scholars’ opinions (“those who read Hebrew literature say”) with no
73 Origen, Hom. Num. 14.1.3. (Scheck, ACT).
74 1 Cor 8:4–6 (NRSV): “Hence, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that ‘no idol in the world really exists,’ and that ‘there is no God but one.’ Indeed, even though there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth as in fact there are many gods and many lords yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.”
75 Origen, Hom. Num. 14.1.3 (Scheck, ACT).
76 Dorival, “Origen,” 608.
77 Following Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.15–16, Heine, Origen, identifies the Hexapla as Origen’s “first scholarly work” and argues that it was likely finished before he left Alexandria (76); he dates his settling in Caesarea to “around AD 232” (1). Dorival, “Origen,” dates the commencement of work on the Hexapla to “215–217” and claims that work on it “occupied him for about thirty years” (608), which would indicate that his final work on it was in Caesarea, as Dorival dates the move to Caesarea to 234 CE (607). Martens, Origen and Scripture, dates the move to Caesarea to 231/232 CE (18, 35) and attributes the Hexapla to his Caesarean period (18) but also says he likely began work on it in Alexandria (45).
78 Elliott, “Hebrew Learning,” 2:859.
88 JJMJS
No. 9 (2022)
explicit statement about his inclusion in or exclusion from that group, followed by a general invitation for his reader to investigate matters for themselves. Origen’s actual level of Hebrew literacy, and thus whether his reference to “those who read Hebrew letters” is an implicit admission that he cannot read Hebrew or is a stock appeal to other scholars with no implications for his own abilities, is less important for the present argument than the way he represents knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures. For, what is clear is that Origen’s reference to others’ expertise concerning this textual feature in “literature of the Hebrews” contrasts rather strongly with his personal claims for knowledge of Hebrew textual variants, Hebrew etymology, and consultation of “thousands” of “Hebrew Scriptures” as well as the subsequent lauding of his exemplary Hebrew abilities by Eusebius, Jerome, et al. Origen seems to have rhetorically distanced himself from Jewish book culture in some cases and rhetorically associated himself in others.
I, therefore, emphasize once more the value of invoking the Hebrew language and Hebrew manuscripts for Origen.79 Similar to the children of the Egyptian school papyri whom Cribiore studied, who practiced writing their names prior even to being able to read so that, if their education did not progress further, they could at least display signature literacy and be counted among the literate,80 I suggest Origen made use of, and displayed in his writings, whatever level of accomplishment he had in Hebrew literate education because there was an inherent cultural value in even that level. Hebrew was a barbarian language for Romans, but it was the language of the “Hebrew Scriptures” for Origen81 and, as such, a crucial factor in discussions about “Scripture” with Jews and in reference to Jews. Origen’s facility with Hebrew enabled him and others to display it prominently as categorical evidence of the high quality of his scholarship. That Origen’s Hebrew abilities may have been, by other standards, mediocre at best is irrelevant to an extent they were still more advanced than anyone else in his Christian reading culture.82 In the construction, maintenance,
79 More broadly on this matter, see also Edmon L. Gallagher, Hebrew Scripture in Patristic Biblical Theory: Canon, Language, and Text, VCSup 144 (Leiden: Brill, 2012), which I became aware of too late to include in this study.
80 Raffaella Cribiore, Writing, Teachers, and Students in Graeco-Roman Egypt, ASP 36 (Atlanta: Scholars, 1996), 10: “There can be no doubt that the inhabitants of GraecoRoman Egypt preferred to sign documents and letters in their clumsy, belabored characters than be considered among illiterates. It was better to possess and exhibit the skill in limited and imperfect degree, however difficult and unpleasant to the eye their efforts were.” See further Rafaella Cribiore, Gymnastics of the Mind: Greek Education in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001)
81 Origen, Hom. Jer. 14.3.1.
82 Cf. Meade, “Hexapla,” 172: “The layout and contents of the Hexapla are best understood if we assume that Origen and later scholars could read some Hebrew but needed much help.... As special kind of media, the Hexapla reveals that only a few ancient Christians in the third and fourth centuries could read the Hebrew version, and these
89
Keith, Origen and Hebrew
and expression of this Christian reading culture, any ability with Hebrew could vault one to a high position as Scripture expert when those fashioning the image had even less ability.83
For this reason, it is unsurprising that subsequent descriptions of Origen’s Hebrew abilities point unequivocally to his knowledge of Hebrew precisely to paint him as the preeminent Christian scholar of his day and several later days.84 It is important to observe that each biographer of Origen is carefully managing Origen’s enmeshment within a Jewish reading culture from which the church including Origen himself is often trying to distinguish itself. Yet, Origen’s Hebrew, as well as his contacts with Jewish scholars and possession of Jewish manuscripts, appears from our perspectives like an insect that has flown into thick sap. Try as it may to separate itself, the asserted distance also reveals more clearly just how connected it still is. The metaphor breaks down on several levels, and I would not push it further, but the point remains that it is precisely in this context of efforts-at-distinction within realities-of-connection that ironies associated with Origen’s Hebrew make sense: he may have severely limited Hebrew abilities but was regarded by others who knew even less (other than perhaps Jerome) as a master of Hebrew.
In this context, I return to where this essay began and draw attention to a detail in Eusebius’s reproduction of the Hexapla legend that, until Schott’s 2019 translation, had gone overlooked. In describing the Hebrew-language manuscripts of the Scriptures that Origen consulted, Eusebius is fairly nuanced. He states that these manuscripts circulated “among the Jews” (παρὰ τοῖς Ἰουδαίοις); that is, they were produced by and part of a Jewish reading culture. Yet Origen was so committed that he, according to the 1932 LCL translation of Oulton, “got into his own possession” the original manuscripts. Oulton’s translation has slightly misrepresented the grammar. There is no prepositional phrase (“into”), the object of the participle φεροµένας is not in the dative case, and the sense of personal ownership is conveyed not by the personal pronoun αὐτός in the genitive (“of him”) or the dative (“to him”) but by the adjective ἴδιος (“his own”).85 Origen did not, therefore, according to Eusebius, “get” the manuscripts “into his possession” in the sense that he merely moved them into his library or collected them so much as he appropriated them or took ownership of them.
readers were mainly aided by Greek transliteration and the other Greek versions in the synopsis.”
83 I thus affirm, from this separate perspective, the observation of Martens, Origen, 46: “The desire to know the Hebrew text for his discussions with the Jews was perhaps a reason for constructing the Hexapla (or a happy result of the construction) but it was not the only one, and probably not the most important one.” Martens makes this observation about Origen’s philological work with the LXX, but it applies equally to the issue of Origen’s reputation within Christian reading communities.
84 Epiphanius, Panarion 64.3.5–7; Rufinus, Hist. 6.16.4; Jerome, Comm. Tit. 3.9; Jerome, Vir. ill. 54.6–8.
85 BDAG, “ἴδιος, ία, ον.”
90 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
Literally, he “rendered them his own possession” (φεροµένας ... κτῆµα ἴδιον). Eusebius uses κτῆµα, which technically refers to what can be possessed or even deeded.86 Origen made the Hebrew manuscripts his property. Schott is thus correct to translate “made the original writings in the Hebrew wording itself his own possession.”87
10. Conclusion
Significantly, therefore, we must note that Eusebius does not describe the manuscripts as circulating among Jews and Origen. That obviously was happening both in this case and in Origen’s own description of consulting Jewish manuscripts and scholars. Yet to describe the scenario as such would imply that Origen was part of that Jewish reading culture. It would open Origen to the charge of Judaizing, as it would later open Jerome to that charge in the fifth century CE. Instead, Eusebius claims that Origen took possession of Jewish material artifacts as evidence of Origen’s firm location within his Christian reading culture. Eusebius has fully absorbed and redeployed the rhetoric that Origen himself used to manage his occupation of this borderland. Eusebius’s language amounts to a visualized material culture incarnation of Justin Martyr’s reference to the LXX as “your Scriptures, or rather not yours, but ours,”88 a visualized material culture incarnation of Origen’s own admission of dependence on Jewish teachers yet denigration of them, or even a visualized material culture incarnation of his consultation of Jewish manuscripts and occasional privileging of their readings, yet theological elevation of the LXX. Origen was not part of Jewish reading culture; he owned it. What could be viewed as enmeshment in shared territory, then, is instead articulated as material supersessionism.
86 BDAG, “κτῆµα,” “(1) that which is acquired or possessed... (2) landed property, field, piece of ground.”
87 Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.16.1 and n. 66. 88 Justin Martyr, Dial. 29. (ANF 1:209).
Keith, Origen and Hebrew 91
Per Jarle Bekken’s Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article
Karl Olav Sandnes
MF Norwegian School of Theology, Religion and Society Oslo, Norway | Karl.O.Sandnes@mf.no JJMJS No. 9 (2022): 92–110
Abstract
This article reviews Per Jarle Bekken’s recent book on Philo and Paul (Galatians 3) on Abraham. As a seminal work in Pauline studies, a longer review is justified, delving into Philo and Paul from my own perspective. Bekken is commended for having explored Galatians in light of Philo’s view on Abraham as the model convert. Hence, proselytism becomes a key notion in his reading of Galatians. The gentile Christ-believers are included, not as gentiles, but as Jewish proselytes, in analogy with how Philo conceives of proselytes after the model of Abraham. In my view, Bekken’s investigation makes Philo too Pauline and Paul too Philonic.
Key words
Abraham, proselytism, law, Spirit, Israel, paideia, Paul, Philo of Alexandria
1. Introduction
“Of making books there is no end” (Eccl 12:12). The truth of this ancient dictum is certainly felt in Pauline studies. In the flow of new books and contributions, some stand out, though, due to method, viewpoints, or claims implying a shift in the interpretation of Paul and/or his letters. In a special way, these contributions deserve the attention of fellow scholars. They present fresh readings not only on specific passages or details in the Pauline epistles, but they claim to alter the larger picture or framework of understanding within which present-day Pauline research is taking place. Per Jarle Bekken, Professor at Nord University, Bodø, Norway, has presented such a study. It justifies more than an
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 93
ordinary review and prompts an extended response to his book Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham in Galatians 3 in the Jewish Context 1
2. Presentation
Bekken’s book enters hotly disputed topics in recent Pauline scholarship and claims to have identified keys to unlock the so-called “gentile problem” in Galatians: What do Christ-believing gentiles become? Paul calls them “children of Abraham” in Galatians 3, but how can that be understood? Against the majority view that gentiles are included as gentiles, Bekken contends that they are seen as Jewish proselytes “apart from circumcision and a way of life under the jurisdiction of the Law”2. They receive a Jewish identity since they share fundamental traits with Abraham, the model convert or proselyte. The fundamental traits shared are two. Firstly, they receive, as did Abraham, the Spirit (Gal 3:1–5), and secondly, they are transformed according to virtue, which is also the focal point of how Philo conceives Abraham’s biography. Thus, Bekken’s study places itself at the center of the Abraham discourse in the Galatian debate.3
Philo is not only the material to which Paul is compared here; he is more or less the method by which Paul is interpreted. The Pauline passage Gal 3:6–29 is scrutinized with the Philonic Abraham treatises as mirrors. Bekken shows himself as a student of a doyen within Philonic New Testament studies, Peder Borgen; albeit he also differs from his teacher.4 Bekken argues that Paul and Philo are not as different as often claimed by scholars who traditionally contrast the reading of Gen 15:6 in Paul (Gal 3) with that found in Philo. Bekken illustrates this by citing various scholars like H. Najman. Najman says, with regard to Philo, “the perfect authoritative copy of the Law of Nature is to be found, not only in the unwritten law, exhibited by the life of the sage (=Abraham), but also in the written law of Moses.”5 Bekken argues against this by pointing to the two jurisdictions “which Philo is careful to keep apart, i.e.,
1
Per Jarle Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham in Galatians 3 in the Jewish Context: The Galatian Converts Lineal Descendants of Abraham and Heirs of the Promise, BZNW 248 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2021).
2 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 2.
3
Per Jarle Bekken, “Abraham og Ånden: Paulus’ anvendelse av Genesis 15:6 i Galaterbrevet 3:6 belyst ut fra jødisk materiale,” Tidsskrift for Teologi og Kirke 71 (2000): 265–276 gave a first presentation of the thesis which he now develops in detail.
4 Per Jarle Bekken had previously published two studies in which Philo plays a similarly significant role; see his ‘The Word is Near You’: A Study of Deuteronomy 30:12–14 in Paul’s Letter to the Romans in a Jewish Context, BZNW 144 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2007) and The Lawsuit Motif in John’s Gospel from New Perspectives: Jesus Christ, Crucified Criminal and Emperor of the World, NovTSup 158 (Leiden: Brill, 2014).
5 H. Najman, “The Law of Nature and the Authority of Mosaic Law,” SPhiloA 11 (1999): 55–73 (59).
between the divine Law in Nature manifested in Abraham’s life, and the written Law revealed through the particular ordinances of Philo.”6
Regarding Philo and Paul, he also refers to, e.g., Karl Olav Sandnes, “Philo offers extensive testimony to an interpretation of the Abraham biography where all parts are coming together, forming a continuum of events that Paul emphatically keeps apart.”7 Bekken concurs that this view was commonly held in Paul’s Judaism as attested in, e.g., 1 Macc 2:52; Sir 44:19–22, and Jub. 18:15–16 and 21:2–3,8 and among the later Rabbis. With Philo, however, it is different. According to Bekken, these scholars, and most Pauline scholars, fail to account for Philo’s intramural Jewish debate with interlocutors. Now there enters a fundamental distinction for Bekken’s study, between two views on Torah being kept apart, namely the “Abraham jurisdiction” versus the “Moses jurisdiction.” Bekken argues that previous research has not taken this distinction into account. What happens if Philo’s view on Abraham is compared to Paul’s in Galatians 3? In opposition to the view that “Paul appeals to Abrahamic texts and disjoins them from Torah,”9 Bekken argues that Abraham is “a legal norm that served to define the identifying marks of Abrahamic kinship and descent from him.”10
Informed by Philo’s reading of Gen 15:6, Bekken argues that the Galatian converts are not, as frequently argued, included as gentiles but “as Jewish proselytes to the Jewish community.”11 Two distinct jurisdictions are discerned in Philo’s concept of the Torah, and this distinction paves the way for much in the Bekken’s study. The latter is the law of Moses, while the first, attributed to Abraham, is his trust in the promise of God as his adherence to the natural law. The latter jurisdiction, to which both Philo and Paul testify, albeit in somewhat different terms, becomes a biblical warrant for Paul to claim that his Galatian converts have status as legitimate descendants of Abraham. Paul interpreted the death of Jesus as grounded in God’s initial promise to Abraham (Gen 12:1–3) and his trust in God (Gen 15:6). His death as Abraham’s ultimate “seed” brought the blessing of the Spirit to all descendants, be they Jews or gentiles.
3. Two Jurisdictions
As pointed out by Bekken, many scholars find that Paul in Galatians 3 opposes Abraham and Torah or Moses. The argument is that the apostle thus sets himself
6 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 95.
7 Karl Olav Sandnes, Paul Perceived: An Interactionist Perspective on Paul and the Law, WUNT 412 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2018), 150.
8 Abraham’s abandoning idolatry (Jub. 11:14–17 and 12:12) is seen as anticipating his obedience to Torah.
9 Thus, e.g., John M. G. Barclay, “Paul, the Gift and the Battle over Gentile Circumcision: Revisiting the Logic of Galatians,” ABR 58 (2010): 36–56 (44).
10 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 20.
11 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 151.
94 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
apart from how the Abraham biography was commonly understood in contemporary sources, namely a tradition in which Gen 15:6, 22:16–18, and 26:3–5 were seen as a continuum of events that together made up Abraham’s biography. Thus, Abraham’s trust in Gen 15:6 emerges as faithfulness, according to the Torah. This is stated explicitly in Gen 26:5, “since your father Abraham obeyed (ὑπήκουσεν) my voice and kept my ordinances and my commandments and my statutes and my precepts” (NETS) (ἐφύλαξεν τὰ προστάγµατά µου καὶ τὰς ἐντολάς µου καὶ τὰ δικαιώµατά µου καὶ τὰ νόµιµά µου).
This tradition conveys that Torah was more or less identical to the natural law and that Abraham observed the law of Moses. According to Bekken, Philo was familiar with this tradition but deviated from it as he engaged it in a way that may be compared to how Paul reads the Abraham biography. Thus, Philo serves to root Paul’s Abraham biography firmly within a Jewish tradition, albeit different from the dominant one: “Philo argues, Against the view that Abraham was a worthy recipient of the promise because of his observance of the Law of Moses (Gen 26:5) even before it was written. To the extent that Abraham was described as ‘lawful,’ I [i.e., Bekken] shall argue that Gen 26:5 is rather attributed by Philo to Abraham’s adherence to the divine Law in Nature, manifested in his trust in the promise (Gen 15:6).”12 To substantiate Philo’s distinction between an Abraham and a Moses jurisdiction, Bekken turns primarily to Abr. 275–276. From this closing of De Abrahamo, it is worth quoting the last line on which Bekken’s interpretation depends: “Such is the life of the first (τοῦ πρώτου) and founder of the nation as some would have it (ὡς µὲν ἔνιοι φήσουσι), one who obeyed the law (νόµιµος), as (δ ) my account has made clear, himself a law (νόµος) and an unwritten statute.”13 Bekken finds that Philo here sets himself against “interlocutors” or “opponents.” Thus, Philo finds himself in a situation to be compared with Paul in Galatians. Greek δέ involves a contrast which “some will say” fills in. Furthermore, Philo, like Paul, separates the law of Moses from Abraham: “By claiming that Abraham was himself a law and an unwritten statute (Abr. 276), Philo delineates Abraham as distinct from the written Law of Moses, as one who was not living under the Law of Moses, because his own instincts matched the divine Law in Nature.”14
Philo’s “some will say” paves the way for seeing a contrast involved here. Is Bekken here overdoing his case? How much can be deduced from Philo’s “some say”? Bekken refers to Maren Niehoff, who has worked out the dialogical nature of Philo’s work, as he was engaging other Jewish interpreters of Scripture in Alexandria as “quarrelsome.” Niehoff refers to a group of literal exegetes
12 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 95–96.
13
Translation of Ellen Birnbaum and John Dillon, On the Life of Abraham: Introduction and Translation, Philo of Alexandria Commentary Series 6 (Leiden: Brill, 2021).
14 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 110.
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 95
whom Philo dismissed.15 This may be exemplified with Abr. 178, where these “quarrelsome” exegetes compare the story of Isaac’s binding (Akedah) to cases of child sacrifice in the ancient world. In Migr. 89–92, however, Philo’s colleagues are found to be too spiritual or one-sided allegorical in their interpretation of circumcision. This shows that Philo faced different kinds of colleagues.
In her book Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship, Maren Niehoff works out the complexity of Jewish exegesis in Alexandria when applying practices from Homeric exegesis to the Bible.16 According to Niehoff, Philo engaged the literal exegetes in De Abrahamo since their historical perspective was a challenge to “his own strategy of anchoring Scripture in Nature.”17 This runs against Bekken’s reading of the closing of De Abrahamo since he holds that they argued exactly what Niehoff defines as Philo’s point. Furthermore, the level of disagreement cannot be taken for granted by Philo mentioning that “some say.” Worthy of notice is that Niehoff, in her book, does not mention Abr. 275–276. On the contrary, she argues that Philo links the laws of nature with the divine commandments of Torah: “Philo insists on an intrinsic connection between Nature, Mosaic Law and the lives of the patriarchs.”18 She finds this not only in De Abrahamo but also in Somn. 2.174–175, where it says that God delights “when the human race turns away from its sins and inclines and reverts to righteousness, following by a free-will choice the laws and statutes of nature. ‘For the Lord, thy God,’ he says, ‘will turn to be glad over thee for good, as He was glad over thy fathers, if thy shalt hear His voice, to keep all His commandments and ordinances and the judgments which are written in the book of his law (ἐν τῷ βιβλίῳ τοῦ νόµου τούτου). What could be better able to implant the yearning for virtue or an ardour for noble living than this?” Niehoff comments: “It is implied that keeping the Divine commandment and living in accordance with Nature are virtually identical. Nature is moreover identified now in typically Stoic fashion with righteousness.”19
According to Niehoff, Philo grounds Jewish law in Greek moral principles, as seen in his exposition of the Ten Commandments. These unfold as targeting desire (“you shall not covet…”) or as conforming to natural impulses, as, e.g., to reciprocate parental care (the commandment to honor the
15 Maren Niehoff, “Homeric Scholarship and Bible Exegesis in Ancient Alexandria: Evidence from Philo’s ‘Quarrelsome’ Colleagues,” Classical Quarterly 57.1 (2007): 166–182.
16 Maren Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis and Homeric Scholarship in Alexandria (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011).
17 Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, 96.
18 Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, 97; thus, also Sze-Kar Wan, “Abraham and the Promise of Spirit: Points of Convergence Between Philo and Paul,” in Things Revealed: Studies in Early Jewish and Christian Literature in Honor of Michael E. Stone, ed. Esther G. Chazon et al., JSJSup 89 (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 209–224 (220–221).
19 Niehoff, Jewish Exegesis, 97.
96 JJMJS No.
9 (2022)
parents).20 While Niehoff argues that De Abrahamo attests that Philo in effect identified the law of nature with Torah, Bekken argues, with reference to “some say,” that this is the view of opponents to which Philo objects. We cannot assume the same people behind every critical question, and Bekken seems to bring Niehoff’s “quarrelsome exegetes” into “some say” in Abr. 276, but that is not warranted.
Furthermore, “some will say” is not necessarily to be taken agonistically, as Bekken does. The recent commentary On the Life of Abraham says, with reference to Abr. 276, that Philo here puts forward two somewhat different notions. On the one hand, the early figures themselves were laws; on the other hand, they followed particular laws before they were written. Philo acknowledges the difference and says he holds Abraham himself “a law and an unwritten ordinance.”21 Birnbaum and Dillon say that “though different, the two rationales are compatible…”22 There are certainly passages in Philo where the unwritten laws are actually laws themselves. It is worth considering that Philo wants to add a more philosophical argument to the view that the ancestors followed particular laws. What separates him from the other shadowy exegetical figures is the philosophical tint he adds with reference to Stoic universalism. The importance given to the slightly different notions in Abr. 276 can hardly carry the weight Bekken gives this observation.
With Niehoff, I also find that De Abrahamo attests that the law of nature, to which Abraham adhered, and the Mosaic law are not two different jurisdictions. The law of Moses is instead a copy (εἰκων) of the life that Abraham and the patriarchs lived.23 Without learning, instruction, and paideia (see about this below), they “embraced the conformity with nature, accepting that nature itself was as in truth it is the eldest of statutes, and thus they were subject to good rule all their lives long” (Abr. 6). Abraham is in Abr. 276 called νόµιµος, clearly because he obeyed God’s τὰ νόµιµά, as it says in Her. 8–9, where Gen 26:3–5 sums up the obedience of Abraham toward Torah.
In short, Abraham fits nicely into how Philo introduces De Opificio Mundi, arguing that the world’s creation is in harmony with nature. Hence, “that man who observes the law (τοῦ νοµίµου ἀνδρὸς) is constituted thereby a loyal citizen of the world, regulating his doings by the purpose and will of Nature, in accordance with which the entire world itself also is administered” (Opif. 3). To
20 Maren Niehoff, Philo of Alexandria: An Intellectual Biography (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2018), 149–170. I find it unwarranted when Bekken refers to Niehoff to substantiate his interpretation of Abr. 275–276.
21 Birnbaum and Dillon, On the Life of Abraham, 8, 407.
22 Birnbaum and Dillon, On the Life of Abraham, 10. They refer to their comments in § 275 (p. 406), where this view is demonstrated about Sir 44:19–29; CD 3:2; m. Qidd. 4.14 etc., where laws in the Pentateuch are included.
23
Birnbaum and Dillon, On the Life of Abraham, 407 says that Philo “ends by declaring of Abraham what he set forth about several ancient figures at the beginning of the treatise.”
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 97
sum up so far, the distinction between the two jurisdictions which Bekken insists on, based on Abr. 275–276, seems to be strained and too much inspired by Paul. The way Philo brings together the law of Moses with Abraham through the law of Nature is downplayed in Bekken’s study.
4. A Subtle Distinction
Bekken is, of course, sensitive to Philo’s concern to bring the law of nature into harmony with Torah and is aware that his interpretation of De Abrahamo runs the risk of disturbing this. In several places, we notice his concern with defining the relationship between his exegesis and the nature-oriented view of Torah in Philo in meaningful ways. Here are some examples on p. 95: According to Philo, “the Law of Moses is not identical [Bekken’s emphasis] with the divine Law of Nature, but in conformity with it….”24 Similarly, on p. 107, he says that “the Law of Moses is not identical (Bekken’s emphasis) with the divine Law in Nature, but is rather consistent (Bekken’s emphasis) with Nature and the legal normative force of Abraham.”25 According to p. 109, “the unwritten divine laws are embodied in the form of Abraham’s life as part of the written code of Moses, and thus as congruent, consistent, and in harmony with the norm of divine Law enacted in Nature.” According to p. 112, the law of Moses was to Philo “the best possible written imitation and authentic source of the divine Law in nature.” Page 114 says that against a too literal understanding of the Torah and Abraham, “Philo hellenizes Judaism by advocating that the Law of Moses is not identical with the divine Law in Nature, but that it is nevertheless fully in conformity with the unwritten statutes in Nature.” Page 170 says that the law of Moses is “the best way to get access to the unwritten Law of Nature” and that “Philo can even compare the obedience to Abraham to the divine Law and adherence to the Mosaic Law.” Page 181, however, says that Philo and Paul, despite their differences, both “separate Abraham’s trust in the promise from his obedience to the Law.” How “distinctive” these two jurisdictions are in Philo is, therefore, not apparent to me.26 It is difficult to capture Philo’s concern both to Judaize Hellenism and to Hellenize Judaism, and I appreciate Bekken’s attempts to do so. I get lost somewhere in Bekken’s distinctions, since the distinguishing line
24
Birnbaum and Dillon, On the Life of Abraham, 152, define this in the following way: Abraham’s conformity with nature is “according to Philo embodied both by the early biblical figures and the later Mosaic laws.”
25
On this page, Bekken also says that to regard the Law of Moses as a written copy of the Law of Nature “goes too far.” This is stated pace H. Najman, Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple Judaism, JSJSup 77 (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 99.
26
On pp. 4 and 192, Bekken speaks about “two distinctive jurisdictions in the Torah and Scripture.” Especially from p. 223, this combination of two jurisdictions in “Torah and Scripture” becomes increasingly frequent. I miss some clarifications on how two jurisdictions of Torah relate to two jurisdictions in Torah and Scripture. My impression is that as Paul increasingly moves into focus, the terminology becomes more ambiguous.
98 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
between the law of nature and Torah becomes so thin that his exegesis of Abr. 275–276 is jeopardized. Even more, I wonder what help such a subtle distinction offers the exegesis of Paul in Galatians 3.
We noticed above that Philo presents Abraham as the “first νόµιµος” (Abr. 276). The term “first” is in itself indicative of people following in his footsteps (cf. Rom 4:12: “who follow the example of the faith that Abraham had before he was circumcised”). Hence, this adjective implies, by necessity, a continuation. From the beginning of Philo’s biography, we know that Abraham was also distinguished from later observants of the Torah. For sure, there is a distinction here. But this distinction is primarily formulated in terms of Abraham being “not taught by any other,” (Abr. 22–24, 30,66–67), implying that Abraham’s followers, different from himself, were subjected to instruction. 27 Here lies, in my view, an important distinction that is not sufficiently addressed in Bekken’s study. While Abraham was self-taught, his followers were in Torah given the means for developing the piety he attained before the law of Moses. From the ancient discourse on paideia, Philo adopted the idea that encyclical studies, or learning in general, were stepping stones to real knowledge. Ps. Plutarch takes Homer’s Odyssey (i.e., a journey narrative; see below) as an allegorical illustration of the pro-paideutic role of encyclical studies (Mor. 7C–E). Penelope represents philosophy, or the goal of the journey, and her maidservants the studies which are not estimated as highly as philosophy.28 Philo takes Gen 16 with Hagar and Sarah similarly, corresponding to the maidservants and Penelope, respectively, when he works out the pro-paideutic role of Greek learning in his De Congressu Quaerendae Eruditionis Gratia, well formulated in the English title On Mating with the Preliminary Studies. 29 To Philo, the summit or the goal of the Odyssey’s nostos (homecoming motif) was the life taught by the law of Moses, which is achieved as “seeing God” (see later). Abraham, however, was exempt from this progressive learning toward “seeing God.”
Bekken’s understanding of the relationship between the law of Moses and natural law as two separate entities might find some support in Ios. 28–31, though he does not mention this text. There Philo gives his allegorical interpretation of the Joseph story. It goes like this: The world (ὁ κόσµος) has a single law of Nature, “commanding what should be done and forbidding what should not be done.” However, the local cities are subjected to diverse laws since “different peoples have different customs and regulations which are extra inventions and additions.” The laws of the different states are additions to the reason, which is in accordance with nature. The diversity of local laws causes a lack of fellowship, which is caused by greed (πλεονεξία) and mutual mistrust.
27 Birnbaum and Dillon, On the Life of Abraham, 152–153.
28 Karl Olav Sandnes, The Challenge of Homer: School, Pagan Poets and Early Christianity, LNTS 400 (New York: T&T Clark, 2009), 59–61, 64–66, 188–195.
29 Sandnes, Homer, 68–78, Birnbaum and Dillon, On the Life of Abraham, 199–200, 371.
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 99
From this text, one might think that Philo considered the law of Moses a similar local law to which the Jews were subjected. Hence, this might exemplify the distinction urged by Bekken. However, Philo claims superiority for the law of Moses (Mos. 2.12–30). Moses “was the best of all lawgivers in all countries, better in fact than any that have ever arisen among either the Greeks or the barbarians, and that his laws are most excellent and truly come from God.” Likewise, Mos. 2.44 says that all people embraced the law of Moses because it represents “the purest of Spirit.” Under inspiration, Moses spoke the Law (Mos. 2.37–40), and Philo envisages each people to leave behind their own laws to honor “our laws alone” (Mos. 2.44). The proof given for this claim is its ability to master desires, excess and lavishness, and greed mentioned above (see also Mos. 1.154). The safest way to master the desires is to follow the law of Moses or for gentiles to become proselytes.30 Failure to master the desires is precisely the weakness Philo pointed out regarding the laws to which different cities were subjected in De Iosepho. At first sight, Ios. 28–31 seemingly supports Bekken’s view, but after more consideration, I do not think so.
According to Bekken, Philo and Paul are analogous, not only concerning the two jurisdictions but also that both developed this distinction within a context of a dispute or debate on the conditions for being “children of Abraham,” an “inner Jewish debate on Abraham.”31 Hence, the colleagues of Philo hinted at in “some say” in Abr. 275–276 corresponds to Paul’s opponents in Galatia. When Bekken envisages that a “similar discussion is attested in Philo’s writings,”32 I find that the evidence for that is scant and questionable. Paul’s engagement with the Abraham biography is “within Judaism,” since he addresses an issue, albeit differently, which is also addressed by Philo, namely the question of how the law of Moses and Abraham in Gen 15:6 relate. Ole Jakob Filtvedt has made a good case that when Paul and his contemporary Judaism are compared, it is helpful to distinguish between questions or issues raised and the answers given.33 This means that even when his answers may be labeled distinctive, Paul remains “within Judaism.” When Paul raises issues hardly addressed by others, it becomes relevant to consider how he might have “separated” himself from his Jewish context.
5. Abraham A Model for What?
In Bekken’s book, Abraham is primarily the model proselyte, a gentile who leaves behind idolatry to embrace the one God of Israel, as found in, e.g., Virt. 175–186 (περὶ µετανοίας). This picture of Abraham finds an analogy in the
30 See Karl Olav Sandnes, Belly and Body in the Pauline Epistles, SNTSMS 120 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), 108–132.
31 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 247, 275. 32 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 247. 33 Ole Jakob Filtvedt, “Jødedom eller jødedommer i det første århundre?” Teologisk Tidsskrift 4 (2015): 238–252.
100 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
situation of the addressees of Galatians, illustrated in 4:8–9: “Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to beings that by nature are not gods. Now, however, that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and beggarly elemental spirits? How can you want to be enslaved to them again?” Intuitively, Bekken’s analogy between Philo and Paul on Abraham is, therefore, adequate. This is also, in my view, the merit of this study, to have scrutinized this relationship closely.
Why am I not convinced, then? I do not contest that Abraham is a model proselyte.34 My hesitancy grows out of the way Abraham is portrayed in Galatians. For sure, Abraham is a model to the addressees of this epistle. However, I find that this is attached primarily to his πίστις, his trust, mentioned in Gen 15:6, not to his being a proselyte as such, albeit it is not irrelevant as the addressees are gentiles. Fundamental to Philo’s portrayal of Abraham is his journey from Haran, which symbolizes his turning to God. This is an everpresent aspect in Philo’s use of Abraham. The journey motif may be identified in Gal 4:8–9, but it is not spelled out in a way that is analogous to Philo, even if one accounts for the difference in the genre (biography and epistle). Furthermore, this journey is absent in Galatians 3, where Abraham’s biography is at the center of Paul’s discussion. This is worth noticing since Bekken argues that the entire chapter 3 of Galatians is an exegetical paraphrase or treatise of Gen 15:6. In my view, it is Abraham’s πίστις that holds center stage. This observation finds corroboration in Paul’s reading of Gen 15:6 together with Hab 2:4 (Gal 3:11), which emphasizes πίστις with no connection to proselytism. Paul’s mentioning of Hab 2:4 indicates what aspect in Abraham’s narrative Paul is working with here, and the linkage between Gen 15:6 and Hab 2:4 is no other than faith or trust. Neither in Romans 4 is Abraham’s journey a motif addressed by Paul. It is worth taking a closer look at how Abraham’s journey works in Philo’s texts.
6. Journey
Bekken considers the journey motif connected primarily to Abraham as a model for proselytes. This does not give justice to the way this motif deserves. “Journeying” was in antiquity a standard motif in another discourse as well, undoubtedly well documented also in Philo, that of paideia. Journey and knowledge interconnect as knowledge and are thereby conceived as progress or growth in life experience and a motif at home in educational discourses.35 The
34 Karl Olav Sandnes, A New Family: Conversion and Ecclesiology in the Early Church with Cross-Cultural Comparisons, Studies in the Intercultural History of Christianity 91 (Bern: Peter Lang, 1994), 41–46.
35 Chiara Ferella and Cilliers Breytenbach, eds., Paths of Knowledge: Interconnection(s) Between Knowledge and Journey in the Graeco-Roman World, Berlin Studies of the Ancient World 60 (Berlin: Topoi, 2018). In this volume, Albert Joosse, “Philo’s De
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 101
journey motif as progress in knowledge permeates all Abrahamic treatises of Philo. Being a model for proselytes is connected to his growth in knowledge, which culminates in Torah paving the way for God to be seen: “Throughout his works, Philo understands Abraham to be not only the historical personage described in the Bible, who, for him, represents the ideal proselyte, but he also interprets the biblical character as symbolizing a type of soul, which learns through teaching in order to progress toward perfect virtue.”36
By framing Abraham’s life in these terms, Philo can portray him not only as a proselyte but also as a person mastering his desires and striving for the knowledge so highly valued in the surrounding culture. The beginning of Abr. (7) speaks about the first steps on this “road” (ὁδός), which is a cultural stereotype for discourses on progress toward knowledge.37 It reappears at the end of this treatise (Abr. 269–270), soaked in the metaphor of road and walking the road. Worth noticing is that the context in which this metaphor works is precisely Philo’s interpretation of Gen 15:6 (Abr. 262–276), a passage carrying much weight in Bekken’s analysis. But his analysis does not account for this aspect.38
Philo’s allegorical interpretation serves to generalize Abraham’s biography in which Greek virtues are prominent: “The migrations set forth on the literal level of the text were performed by a wise man, but in accordance with the laws of allegory by a virtue-loving soul in search for the true God” (Abr. 68). It is about journeying roads that are uphill, toilsome and slow, thus climbing toward the peak which is “to see God” (Abr. 56–59). Climbing to the top is, like the road, a stereotype in ancient discourses on paideia. 39 Raffaella Cribiore introduces her book on Greek education by pointing out the importance of the road metaphor.40 The progress in knowledge toward “seeing God” comes to full expression in Philo’s treatise on the encyclical studies (De Congressu), particularly in the idea, inherited from Greek paideia discourses, of instruction taking place in progressive steps, from pro-paideia, toward full knowledge (see above).41
Migratio Abrahami: The Soul’s Journey of Self-Knowledge as Criticism of Stoic oikeiôsis,” 111–136, reads Philo along these lines.
36 Phoebe Makiello, “Abraham and the Nations in the Works of Philo of Alexandria,” in Abraham, the Nations, and the Hagarites: Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Perspectives, ed. Martin Goodman et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 139–162 (139).
37 Sandnes, Homer, 33–36, 180–181.
38 This is pointed out by Wan in “Abraham and the Promise of the Spirit,” 214–217 as well, as she addresses this as progress through different stages to the higher stage, which is to perceive God.
39 See Karl Olav Sandnes, “Markus en allegorisk biografi?” DTT 69 (2006): 275–297 (277–285).
40 Raffaella Cribiore, Gymnastics of the Mind: Greek Education in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001), 1–12, 45.
41 See also Erkki Koskenniemi, “Philo and Classical Education,” in Reading Philo: A
102 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
By keeping in mind that paideia frames Philo’s reading of the Abraham narrative, the distance to Paul, in my opinion, grows. Abraham is in Galatians not the patriarch embarking on a journey, an educational road toward Torah and knowing God in full. Growth and progress are certainly Pauline notions, but they hardly grow out of the role he assigns to Abraham. Abraham served different intertwined purposes for Paul. He was, as made most evident by Bekken, a model proselyte. Paul calling Abraham “godless” (Rom 4:5) is probably an example of that. But Abraham was also a figure of trusting in God (πίστις), connected particularly to Gen 15:6. Finally, he was also an example of God’s grace, as pointed out in Rom 4, and most pointedly stated in the language of God calling into being what did not exist (v. 17).42 Perhaps Rom 4:17 brings out what is implicit already in Galatians, namely that Abraham is a model of grace, which comes into being as a result of God who calls into being what is not there beforehand.
7. Abraham and Spirit
Bekken is to be commended for addressing the unsolved question of Abraham and Spirit in Galatians 3. Bekken reads Gal 3:6, which introduces Gen 15:6, as a scriptural reference for the claim presented in the preceding verses, namely that the Galatians had received the Spirit. This view finds support in Gal 3:14, where the blessing promised to Abraham is the Spirit given by faith. This raises the question: Where in the Abraham tradition is the idea of him receiving the Spirit at home? There is, of course, a possibility that this idea was Paul’s own creative scripture-based invention.43 Bekken, however, seeks antecedents for Paul’s argument and finds that Philo’s reading of the Abraham biography provides a key here. This is one of the most intriguing parts of Bekken’s book.
Handbook to Philo of Alexandria, ed. Torrey Seland (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2014), 102–128.
42 See Karl Olav Sandnes, “Justification and Abraham: Exegesis of Romans 4,” in God’s Power for Salvation: Romans 1,1–5,11, ed. Cilliers Breytenbach, Colloquium Oecumenicum Paulinum 23 (Leuven: Peeters, 2017), 147–181 (170–172); Karl Olav Sandnes, “Resurrection on the Road to Damascus: Exploring Paul’s Purview on His Damascus Experience,” Sacra Scripta 19 (2021): 158–174 (Festschrift Karl-Wilhelm Niebuhr)
43 Wan, “Abraham and the Promise of Spirit,” 212: “At the end, however, the most probable author of the ‘promise’/‘Spirit’ equation is Paul.” Chee-Chiew Lee, The Blessing of Abraham, the Spirit & Justification in Galatians: Their Relationship and Significance for Understanding Paul’s Theology (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2013), 193–198 argues that it refers to the fulfillment of the prophetic promises in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Joel.
Inspired by Richard B. Hays, she refers to Isa 44:3 (“For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground; I will pour my spirit upon your descendants, and my blessing on your offspring”) to exemplify how these promises realize the Abraham blessing for the nations. I find her suggestion attractive as it coincides with my emphasis on the Spirit-reception as a matter of identity in Galatians; pace Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 197.
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 103
The biblical Abraham narrative shows no sign of the patriarch receiving the Spirit. However, Bekken argues that in the Jewish exposition of Gen 15:6, Abraham’s trust in God led to his reception of the Spirit.44 For this, he refers to Virt. 217: “Everything in him changed to something better, eyes, complexion, stature, carriage, movements, voice. For the divine spirit which was breathed upon him from on high made its lodging in his soul, and invested his body with singular beauty, his voice with persuasiveness, and his hearers with understanding.” This is a most interesting and relevant passage in Philo’s Abraham narrative. Bekken sees the role of the Spirit at home in how proselytes are transformed by joining the fellowship of Israel’s God, as is the case with Abraham. Seemingly, Bekken has identified an analogy between Philo and Paul. The following will argue that while Paul’s use of the reception of Spirit is an issue of identity, an identity marker, so to say (Gal 3:29–4:7), Abraham’s reception in Philo is more about being inspired; in short, identity versus ability. Abraham’s reception of the Spirit in Philo is not only a proselyte motif but intrinsically tied up with the journey as progress in wisdom toward perfection. This context offers a somewhat different interpretation of his reception of the Spirit. Worth noticing in the quotation given above from Virt. 217 is the importance of sight or seeing, a recurrent motif in texts associating Spirit with Abraham.45 The Spirit reception in this text marks the peak of Abraham’s progress toward wisdom (Virt. 215–216).
As in De Virtutibus, large parts of Quis Rerum Divinarum Heres are occupied with interpreting Gen 15:6. Here, his journey is perceived as having its goal in prophetic inspiration, through which God is known and seen (Her. 69–70). Hence, prophets are called “seers” (οἱ ὁρῶντες) (1 Sam 9:9), says Philo (Her. 78). This inspiration, a God-given virtue, comes as the culmination of ancient paideia which Philo portrays as a movement from Hagar to Sarah (Her. 258–259). Abraham is portrayed as a sage on whom a prophet-like inspiration or the divine Spirit has fallen (Her. 265–266).46 Philo envisages this as a heightened level in paideia, as stated directly in Her. 272–274, where the encyclical studies are seen as preparing the ground for this more revelatory insight. Hence, Philo calls this education ἀποσκευή, which announces the stereotype pro-paideutic perspective. Philo takes this from Gen 15:14 and sees the lore of the schools as giving a longing for higher contemplation (θεωρία). This propaedeutic logic, which in Gen 15:14 is spelled out in terms of baggage that the nations bring,47
44 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 152–158.
45 See also Abr. 57–59, 164; Virt. 179; Congr. 143; Her. 98.
46 Walter T. Wilson, Philo of Alexandria On Virtues: Introduction, Translation, and Commentary, Philo of Alexandria Commentary Series 3 (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 408 understands Abraham’s possession of the Spirit in terms of prophetic inspiration.
47 This brings to mind how “the gold and silver of the Egyptians” (Exod 3:21–22; 11:2; 12:35–36) in early Christian interpretation justified the need for making use of pagan knowledge; Sandnes, Homer, 144–147; Joel S. Allen, The Despoliation of Egypt in Pre-
104 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
echoes Philo’s De Congressu, which follows this pattern in how it conceives of paideia and Torah for those following in the footsteps of Abraham.
Gaining a higher sight or contemplation is an issue in Congr. 20–23 and 71–73, where Abraham’s relationship to Hagar and Sarah is laid out, i.e., his relationship to ancient paideia. His perceptions are formed by Sarah, who is virtue, and Hagar, as concubine or encyclical studies. Sarah alone begets higher wisdom, albeit Hagar prepares for it (pro-paideia). These two are not women, says Philo, “it is minds–on the one hand the mind which exercises itself in the preliminary learning, on the other, the mind which strives to win the palm of virtue and cease not till it is won” (Congr. 180). Hagar and Sarah, respectively representing pro-paideia and full knowledge, are Philo’s Scripture-based correspondence to the role assigned to Penelope and the suitors in ancient discourses on paideia (Ps. Plutarch, Mor. 7C–E; see above).
The palm of virtue, the peak, so to say, is to reach the full meaning of IS-RA-EL, “a man who sees God” (Congr. 51). This is a frequently used motif or notion in Philo’s writings.48 Israel is the name given to Jacob, meaning seeing God, since it is “identical with knowledge which opens wide the soul’s eye” (Migr. 39–40). Accordingly, Abraham represents not only IS-RA-EL but also the perfection of the Greek philosophical legacy abbreviated in the Delphic maxim “Know yourself” (Somn. 1.55–60). This demonstrates Philo’s overall purpose in bridging his Judaism and the Greek philosophical legacy. In a passage heavily marked by educational language, Philo presents Abraham as having progressed and improved “toward the acquisition of the highest knowledge,” abbreviated in the maxim. According to Philo, this is Nature’s law to know oneself in such a way that it paves the way for knowing “He who IS.” However, this law of nature is in basic agreement with Torah to Philo (see above).
In Migr. 127–130, he addresses the means how perfection is reached, and he does so by turning to Gen 12:4, according to which “Abraham journeyed (ἐπορεύθη).” This paves the way for the road metaphor and other terms for “walking,” but also for Gen 26:5, cited here. Thus, the meaning of Gen 12:4 is spelled out in Gen 26:5. The two passages are bridged by the verb, which brings to mind that the ethical commandments of Torah were called halakah, derived from the Hebrew verb halak 49 The Greek verb is used in this way also in Congr. 86: “You shall do (ποιήσετε) my judgments and you shall keep (φυλάξεσθε) my ordinances, walk (πορεύεσθε) in them…” which cites Lev 18:1–5.50 Philo
Rabbinic, Rabbinic and Patristic Tradition, Supplements to VC 92 (Leiden: Brill, 2008). Philo, however, takes these references quite literally. The Egyptians were indebted to the Jews (Mos. 1.141–142).
48 E.g., Abr. 57; Migr. 39, 201; Praem. 43–47; Somn. 2.177; Ebr. 82–83.
49 Karin Finsterbusch, Die Thora als Lebensweisung für Heidenchristen: Studien zur Bedeutung der Thora für die paulinische Ethik, SUNT 20 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996), 113–118.
50 See Preston M. Sprinkle, Law and Life: The Interpretation of Leviticus 18:5 in Early
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 105
considers πορεύεσθαι identical with φυλάσσειν and ποιεῖν, words closely attached to observing Torah. Through Gen 12:4, Abraham is written into this, which undermines Bekken’s idea of two more or less separate jurisdictions regarding the law.
Furthermore, Migr. 127–130 is interesting as Abraham’s way to Torah is given in detail: As a life praised by philosophers, Abraham lived in accordance with nature (ἀκολούθως τῇ φύσει ζῆν). A term for “walking” occurs here and forms a bridge to Philo, citing Gen 12:4 about Abraham’s journeying, which is then connected to Gen 26:5 and Lev 18:1–5 with explicit references to Torah. The law of Nature,51 Abraham’s journey, and Moses’ law form a continuum here. A certain tension comes into view in how Philo portrays Abraham’s relationship to Torah. On the other hand, precisely as a model for proselytes, he illustrates the need for proper instruction given by the law of Moses. On the other hand, he is self-taught.
Keeping in mind Ole Jakob Filtvedt’s distinction between questions/issues addressed and answers in Paul vis-à-vis other relevant Jewish sources, it is worth noticing that although Paul separates Gen 15:6 from Torah obedience, this example demonstrates that he engages a question to which also Philo had an answer, albeit another one. In other words, although the two had different answers, they still address the same question: At what time in his life did Abraham become obedient to the Torah?
This Philonic context for Abraham’s reception of the Spirit should not be overlooked before comparing it with Paul. A possible link between Philo and Paul could be the miraculous aspect in Gal 3:1–5. Nonetheless, I find that the context and use of Abraham’s reception of the Spirit are so different that it hardly warrants considering Philo a backdrop for an exegesis of Gal 3:6–9. The tradition which comes into play in Philo, developed most certainly from Gen 15:12 LXX (ἔκστασις ἐπέσεν τῷ Αβραµ), may well have inspired Paul to interpret the blessing in terms of Spirit-reception. But to Paul, this idea is rooted in the question of the identity of his gentile converts, not in a progress toward perfection provided in full only by Torah, as we saw above in Mos. 2.38–44.
8. Gal 3:28: “Neither Jew nor Gentile”
Bekken’s emphasis on a Jewish identity for the gentile Christ-believers, due to their status as proselytes, is worthy of some consideration. I think it blurs a key issue in Galatians, namely the issue of a Christ-based identity for all, be they Jews or gentiles. I find that καινὴ κτίσις in Gal 6:15 is hardly accounted for by saying that it refers to proselytes who have embraced Judaism, albeit without being circumcised. The passage in Gal 3:26–29 naturally holds a significant place in Bekken’s study. His view is summarized on p. 265. He claims that the ethnic
Judaism and in Paul, WUNT 2.241 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), 101–114. Sprinkle’s focus is primarily on life, not “walking.”
51 For nature as teaching without teachers, being self-taught, see Migr. 29.
106 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
distinction between Jew and Greek should be understood in the context of Jewish proselytism. This distinction has been relativized in light of the superiority of spiritual kinship with Abraham and the emphasis on unity within the Jewish community.
Philo, as well as Paul, take the national lineage of Abraham’s descent seriously. Hence, they both had to solve the problem of the non-Jewish lineage of the proselytes: “Unlike Philo, who defends the inclusion of the proselytes by granting them fellowship and citizenship within the Jewish community on the basis of virtues in accordance with the law of Moses, Paul carves out a room for the Jewish converts by linking them to Abraham through their trust in Christ and reception of the Spirit, so that he can claim that they too were descendants of Abraham in spite of their lineage.”
This summary is interesting and clarifying but also confusing. The interesting and clarifying part is that Bekken claims that Gal 3:28 somehow relativizes the ethnic distinctions between Jews and gentiles. By saying this, he separates himself from the view held by most advocates of “Paul within Judaism,” namely that Paul’s theology in Galatians is not involved with Jews at all.52 It is simply a theology for non-Jews. In the quotation given above, Bekken distances himself from that view. However, there is a confusing part here as well. As I read Bekken throughout his book, and well captured in his quotation above, the Abraham discourse is more or less reserved for “the gentile problem.” Abraham serves to include gentiles among the Jews, “transforming a non-Jew into a Jew.”53 It is all about the “Jewish identity” of the gentile Christ-believers. His thesis is about the room carved out by Paul for the converts who have no biological Abrahamic descendance, to use his own metaphor. In this way, Bekken seems to walk in the footsteps of “Paul within Judaism.” Hence, my question is the following: Is Galatians 3:28 only about this room? Is this epistle only about “the gentile problem”? I am not sure that Bekken intends to reserve the Abraham discourse in Galatians for non-Jews, but he comes close to doing precisely that. His study is not sufficiently clear on what Abraham’s interpretation of Paul does to the Jews. Bekken might have said with “Paul within Judaism” that Paul’s theology, including his Abraham discourse, applies to non-Jews only since the letter was written to them. He might join Karin B. Neutel in arguing that Abraham is a “universal” ancestor, uniting Jews and gentiles.54 Or that Gal 3:28 coins the primary identity of all Christ-believers,
52 E.g., Magnus Zetterholm, “Paul Within Judaism: The State of the Questions,” in Paul Within Judaism: Restoring the First-Century Context to the Apostle, ed. Mark D. Nanos and Magnus Zetterholm (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2015), 31–51.
53 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 252.
54 Karin B. Neutel, “‘Neither Jew Nor Greek’: Abraham as a Universal Ancestor,” in Abraham, the Nations, and the Hagarites: Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Perspectives on Kinship with Abraham, ed. Martin Goodman et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 291–306; see also Karin B. Neutel, A Cosmopolitan Ideal: Paul’s Declaration ‘Neither Jew Nor Greek,
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 107
be they Jews and gentiles, over against all other secondary identities, including also ethnic identities such as being a Jew.55 In Bekken’s study, this burning issue remains hanging in the air.
I am not claiming that it is evident what Paul says here. His dictum’s visionary and rhetorical nature in Gal 3:28 is undoubtedly beyond the obvious. But Paul’s involvement with Abraham’s traditions in Galatians 3 ends in that verse; at least it reaches a summit in this dictum. In other words, we know where Paul’s argument about Abraham is heading. Therefore, it is of help to start unwinding the matter from there and consider how Bekken’s exegesis sheds light on that passage. His overstated emphasis on the proselytism issue shows that the Jews themselves become only shadowy figures in Gal 3:28’s claim that there is neither Jew nor gentile in Christ. In my view, this undercuts the message of Galatians. Galatians 6:16 (“As for those who will follow this rule peace be upon them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God”) is an enigmatic passage raising questions both regarding the method (is the phrase to be interpreted in light of Galatians alone or may anticipate Romans 9–11?) and content (what is really said here, or in short, who is “God’s Israel”?). Without entering the debate on these issues,56 it is worth considering why this dictum comes at the very end of the letter, and in a way which with no regard to how Gal 3:28 is interpreted seems to destabilize the unity claimed there.
The best explanation is that Paul, at the end of this very situational letter, realizes that Gal 3:28 may be taken as doing away with Jewish identity.57 Galatians 6:16 indicates an awareness that this epistle has questioned the role of Israel. I think that is precisely what happens in the argument which leads up to Gal 3:28. This is nagging to Paul, and, therefore, he throws in a blessing with no or little foundation in the letter, but which needs to be elaborated elsewhere. Galatians 6:16 is Paul’s attempt to balance Gal 3:28, thus foreshadowing “for the Jews first” in Romans. This can, of course, be challenged and discussed on
Neither Slave Nor Free, Nor Male and Female’ in the Context of First-Century Thought, LNTS 513 (London: Bloomsbury, 2015).
55 William S. Campbell, Paul and the Creation of Christian Identity, T&T Clark Biblical Studies (London: T&T Clark, 2008), 156–158.
56 Susan Eastman, “Israel and the Mercy of God: A Re-reading of Galatians 6.16 and Romans 9–11,” NTS 56 (2010): 367–395; Ole Jakob Filtvedt, “God’s Israel in Galatians 6.16: An Overview and Assessment of Key Arguments,” Currents in Biblical Research 15 (2016): 123–140.
57 Daniel Boyarin, A Radical Jew: Paul and the Politics of Identity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), 152–157, 232–251 argues that Paul’s emphasis on equality (Gal 3:28) involved a “human sameness” which by necessity deconstructed Jewish identity as in some way distinctive. Although he does not use the term “theological holocaust,” Boyarin’s argument implies that Paul’s “sameness” is a theologically grounded abandonment of Jewish identity. For Gal 6:16, as an unexpected passage in Galatians, if judged by the letter itself, see Karl Olav Sandnes, Var Paulus kristen? Har kirken forstått hans teologi og tro (Follese: Efrem, 2021), 140–143.
108 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
various grounds. If there is some truth in that, Gal 6:16 requires an interpretation of 3:28 which affects Jewish identity in such a way that Paul, already within Galatians, finds it necessary to add a note on Israel. I notice that Gal 6:16 does not figure in Bekken’s study,58 and I am curious about how he might have dealt with it in a framework that is all about proselytes. The question is then: Is the “Abraham’s children” notion in Galatians reserved for Galatian “proselytes”? Or put another way: Is οἱ ἐκ πίστως to be understood exclusively against the backdrop of Jewish proselytism with Abraham as the model proselyte? This question comes from Bekken’s narrow emphasis on proselytism and his logic that the Abraham story used by Paul primarily revolves around proselytism.
According to Bekken, the backdrop for Paul’s use of Abraham is that the Galatian converts are not Abraham’s natural descendants. Hence, “a special provision” warrants that they are not only legitimate proselytes but Abraham’s children and partakers of the promise. “A special provision” holds a key in Bekken’s analysis of Galatians59 and refers to how Paul solves “the problem of non-Jewish lineage of the Jewish proselytes.”60 This may be read as though Paul’s use of Abraham is meant solely for gentiles who become Jewish proselytes through the death of Christ, Abraham’s offspring. Hence, they become οἱ ἐκ πίστως. How exclusive is this? Is the only purpose of Abraham in Galatians 3 to warrant how gentiles become Jewish proselytes and children of Abraham (the gentile problem), or does it in any way also apply to Jews?
However, Bekken points out that Gal 3:26–28 unites both Jews and Greek, as Jewish identity is not defined by Abraham’s genealogical kinship and physical descent. In terms that bring to mind Campbell’s primary Christidentity, he says that physical descent and ethnic origin are relativized precisely in a “discussion of who belongs to Abraham’s true kinship.”61 In a way analogous to Philo’s emphasis on equal rights for the proselytes as citizens within the Jewish politeia, Paul likewise makes ethnicity irrelevant because Abraham has formed “a new basis for kinship ties within the lineage of Abraham.” Thus, it is clear that Bekken also gives the Abraham story relevance for Jews. However, the way he lays out the Abraham story in Galatians as “a special provision” for gentiles leaves a gap in his study since this is not sufficiently addressed, and it calls to question how Gal 6:16 (God’s Israel) is to be interpreted.
9. Conclusion
58 See his index.
59 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 247, 277, 282. 60 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 265. 61 Bekken, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham, 249–250.
Sandnes, Paul’s Negotiation of Abraham: A Review Article 109
Bekken’s book is an impressive and erudite work demonstrating familiarity with both Philo and Paul in Galatians. Nonetheless, my impression is that Paul has provided too much of the agenda for the Philonic reading and Philo too much when Paul’s gentile Christ-believers become Jewish proselytes. Surely, Bekken has noticed some similarities between the two that are worth investigating, but more sensitivity to the discourses in which these similarities work is wished for. Naturally, the question of proselytism can be seen as bridging Philo and Paul in their treatment of the Abraham figure. But the paideia discourse, which is so important in Philo’s exposition of Abraham’s biography, seems not to fit Paul’s use of Gen 15:6.
Furthermore, Bekken has downplayed Philo’s overall purpose of grounding Torah in the natural law. Progress in research depends on scholars’ willingness to explore new grounds and see where overlooked perspectives might lead, and Bekken is to be commended for having done precisely that in this book. In this case, however, this was not as fruitful as claimed.
110 JJMJS No. 9 (2022)
