Canon and Documentary Hypothesis

[johnd]

Of course in the Hebrew Bible Ezra and Nehemiah are one book and...

Depends on the faction...

Ketuvim - The Writings Table of Contents

 

[Breckmin]

It is personally impossible for me to believe any other than the fact that the
Torah was written under the direction of Moses, Aaron and Joshua.

But the obvious question is "what does an Orthodox Jew believe?"

For many years I did not believe that Moses wrote the Torah. I was clearly
wrong.

What do mature spiritual men of God believe? What I mean is "what would
a born-again Christian who is a mature believer, who does not believe in
naturalism or universal common descent theory and is not blinded by liberal
historical induction and theories that came out of the 19th Century believe?"

The typical evangelical conservative in North America some how gets it right
along with the Orthodox Jew. The question is "why?" Why do these men/women
end up with the right conclusions most of the time....even though the means
of getting there are often over-simplistic....yet still they end up with the right
conclusion... on almost everything except "pre-tribulational rapture" (which just
happened to come out of the 19th Century, BTW - with John Nelson Darby).

Is wisdom and truth a reward for something? Or is it because of something
that trickled down from the Puritans and the culture of a once Christian nation
that rejected naturalism and materialism?

I guess my question would be to those in other countries is "what are the
percentages of evangelical conservatives among Christians in countries like
Australia and New Zealand, or European countries?" Is it possible that the
most simple way to truth as a whole (higher precentage) is through biblical inerrancy?
Through just accepting the canon? Catholic or Protestant. The "Apocrapha" doesn't
make much difference.

It is fascinating to me.

 

[mindlight]

It is personally impossible for me to believe any other than the fact that the
Torah was written under the direction of Moses, Aaron and Joshua.

But the obvious question is "what does an Orthodox Jew believe?"

For many years I did not believe that Moses wrote the Torah. I was clearly
wrong.

What do mature spiritual men of God believe? What I mean is "what would
a born-again Christian who is a mature believer, who does not believe in
naturalism or universal common descent theory and is not blinded by liberal
historical induction and theories that came out of the 19th Century believe?"

The typical evangelical conservative in North America some how gets it right
along with the Orthodox Jew. The question is "why?" Why do these men/women
end up with the right conclusions most of the time....even though the means
of getting there are often over-simplistic....yet still they end up with the right
conclusion... on almost everything except "pre-tribulational rapture" (which just
happened to come out of the 19th Century, BTW - with John Nelson Darby).

Is wisdom and truth a reward for something? Or is it because of something
that trickled down from the Puritans and the culture of a once Christian nation
that rejected naturalism and materialism?

I guess my question would be to those in other countries is "what are the
percentages of evangelical conservatives among Christians in countries like
Australia and New Zealand, or European countries?" Is it possible that the
most simple way to truth as a whole (higher precentage) is through biblical inerrancy?
Through just accepting the canon? Catholic or Protestant. The "Apocrapha" doesn't
make much difference.

It is fascinating to me.

It's all by grace in the end mate. But simply taking God at His word is probably the best way of getting to know Him better as well as being the easiest way to remember stuff. I believe Moses did it cause that's the straight forward reading of Jesus words and of the Torah itself to me. But not sure I argued that here in a way that convinced the prestigious scholars who responded to my questions and they may actually know a great deal more than I on this matter. Sometimes its just about a gut feel and just reading the verses again to check thats right.

 

[Breckmin]

It's all by grace in the end mate. But simply taking God at His word is probably the best way of getting to know Him better as well as being the easiest way to remember stuff. I believe Moses did it cause that's the straight forward reading of Jesus words and of the Torah itself to me. But not sure I argued that here in a way that convinced the prestigious scholars who responded to my questions and they may actually know a great deal more than I on this matter. Sometimes its just about a gut feel and just reading the verses again to check thats right.

Knowing it is all God's grace is indeed one of the evidences of Christian
maturity. But my question - as I scan the various denominations and
churches and belief structures...is how I am often struck by the
influence of naturalism among non-protestants (as well as liberal
protestants).

When I was a theistic evolutionist I used to get upset when a believer
would claim that evolution was atheistic. Since I believed God used
evolution to bring about the different species I still argued that I was
a "creationist" - and I just believed that God used common descent with
modification as a means of bringing about all species rather than special
creation (or universal common descent theory). The problem was - at
the time - I didn't know about the circular reasoning aspect of natural
conclusions required for natural assumptions without even being able
to substantiate that natural exists independent of supernatural sustaining
power and order. Believing in natural selection was sort of cool - even
though my spin was different because I thought God was in control of
it and directing it - but I believed the mechanism of it was probable.

Here is my point....many Christians don't know anything about how to
dissect universal common descent theory at its premises nor do they
understand the tens of thousands of inductions which make this theory
"believable" - IF you interpret as though there is no other explanation.
Clearly universal common descent theory makes sense because of
speciation...but DOESN'T make sense when you factor in abiogenesis
(you have to a viable first ancestor), the distinction of species in the
fossil record, and issues of DNA mechanism and the repeated observation
that information is not added to a genome in mutations, or the language
of arranging nucleotides as information itself.

How this relates to views about the creation and documentary hypothesis
is very important. If you believe in theistic evolution, then -

ASSUMPTIONS + Historical Inductions = Historical Conclusions regarding
the veracity of what is contained in the manuscripts. To start making
comparisons about other creation accounts inductively - is consecutive
in the recontruction of the history of the manuscripts and their authors.

Theistic evolution (evolution is observed so this is a poor word to use
since it is not really in dispute and is part of creation via speciation) or
universal common descent theory makes you biased. Orthodoxy makes
you biased also....but clearly the burden of proof lies on the newer
assertion and IF scientific hermeneutics and their theories are WRONG,
then historical and manuscript criticisms can be wrongfully influenced
by these wrong assumptions which steer away from what Christ believed.

The fact is - those who charge "evolution" or universal common descent
theory as being "a-theistic" (aw-theistic) are CORRECT!!! It is not because
theistic evolutionists are atheists...this is a puerile response in under-
standing... It is because the "definition of science" which is used to
conclude only naturalistic conclusions is atheistic (without theism or
without theistic implications allowed).

Someone wrongfully defined science years ago...and everyone followed
along without questioning what they were actually testing. Creation or
nature. IF we are testing creation, then there are theistic implications.

The fact is the Creator's Existence is absolute and there is really no
such thing as anything being independent of God's creative design
(independent is imperfect in the English as it relates to choices and
evil) so creating a definition for science that eliminates theistic implication
is clearly setting yourself up for self-deception IF you base everything
on induction which is open to error and you eliminate the Creator from
your UNDERSTANDING.

I am fascinated in how this happened more prominently in the churches
that are outside of the U.S. and particularly in Europe and other countries
where erudition is heavily encouraged. Is the United States just behind
in the coming world deception?

How are fundamentalists and evangelical conservatives viewed in these
countries which stress education?

Are these people the "babes" that Jesus was talking about who get to
be right (correct).... in that the profound things are hidden from the
wise and revealed to babes.

Will the world continue to see the wisdom of God as foolishness and
continue to distance itself from the Christians who got most of it right?

 

[ittarter]

ASSUMPTIONS + Historical Inductions = Historical Conclusions regarding the veracity of what is contained in the manuscripts. To start making comparisons about other creation accounts inductively - is consecutive in the recontruction of the history of the manuscripts and their authors.

I admit, comparative literary studies are fraught with danger, especially when so few texts of a certain time period are still extant -- it's easy to say, well, the two texts are only two hundred years apart and from different subcultures in the same geographical region, let's compare!

However, it's a LOT more reliable than arbitrarily assigning Jesus' ambiguous references to "Moses" with historiographical intent. Instead of comfortably applying well-known modern assumptions, we are carefully and haltingly applying unfamiliar ancient assumptions painstakingly derived from texts about 90% closer in place and time.

It is inductive, yes, but necessarily so, if we take the position that the Bible may be studied using similar rules and procedures with which we study other literary texts. You may reject this point for dogmatic reasons, of course, and that would give you license to interpret the Bible in whatever manner your tradition lays before you.

Personally, until I see a single good reason why we should attribute authorship of the Pentateuch, or any part of it, to Moses himself, and while I see much more reasonable albeit less conclusive approaches to issues of literary origin, I'll stick with the latter.

 

[ittarter]

It's all by grace in the end mate. But simply taking God at His word is probably the best way of getting to know Him better as well as being the easiest way to remember stuff. I believe Moses did it cause that's the straight forward reading of Jesus words and of the Torah itself to me. But not sure I argued that here in a way that convinced the prestigious scholars who responded to my questions and they may actually know a great deal more than I on this matter. Sometimes its just about a gut feel and just reading the verses again to check thats right.

Problem is, we academics have become so good at being critical that we have ceased to let the text critic us. I admire your willingness to go with your gut. I think that's a sign of putting personal engagement with the text above academic issues. That's something I don't do enough these days.

However, I also know that sometimes you need to be critical. And I guess it's up to you whether this issue is sufficiently critical to give up your "gut" feeling and use your brain.

 

[Breckmin]

However, it's a LOT more reliable than arbitrarily assigning Jesus' ambiguous references to "Moses" with historiographical intent. Instead of comfortably applying well-known modern assumptions, we are carefully and haltingly applying unfamiliar ancient assumptions painstakingly derived from texts about 90% closer in place and time.

I would suggest a couple of books like James Barr's (The Semantics
of Biblical Language or Comparative Philology and the Text of the O.T.)

The whole historical-critical approach as well as using comparative
philology is plagued with fallacies. Anytime you "induce" comparisons
in cognate languages and cultures to attempt to shed light on the
text or the intent of the author (rather than an exegetical approach)-
this runs into severe criticism (rightfully so) on both practical and
methodological grounds.

Western biases and anachronistic assumptions undermine the current
late modernistic conclusions. With this in mind it is difficult for me to
understand how you can choose historical inductions over the mindset
of Christ.

 

[Breckmin]

Personally, until I see a single good reason why we should attribute authorship of the Pentateuch, or any part of it, to Moses himself,

What is the historically Orthodox Jewish position on this? What was the
position of the Pharisees and the Sadducees? What was the position of
the Jews at the Council of Jamnia?

I used to see inductive reasons why to NOT believe Moses wrote the
Torah nor did I believe it was in his time period. God corrected me in
an interesting way... I was clearly wrong.

I know now that the historically Orthodox position was correct... if
it were not for the higher criticism that developed in the 19th and
20th Centuries... we probably wouldn't even be having this discussion.

 

[TheGMan]

Do you believe that there are good reasons for the canon to be only 66 books?

Are churches that add extra books simply wrong about this?

The one very glaring omission from the canon of the church is the (Ethiopic) Book of Enoch. Jude quotes from it directly in his general epistle and Jesus Himself seems to refer to it in Matthew 22:30.

 

[ittarter]

I would suggest a couple of books like James Barr's (The Semantics of Biblical Language or Comparative Philology and the Text of the O.T.)

The whole historical-critical approach as well as using comparative
philology is plagued with fallacies. Anytime you "induce" comparisons
in cognate languages and cultures to attempt to shed light on the
text or the intent of the author (rather than an exegetical approach)-
this runs into severe criticism (rightfully so) on both practical and
methodological grounds.

I've read Barr and am fully aware of how easy it is to conclude fallaciously based on faulty premises of historical data or the interpretative value of the semantic parallels in various "ancient literary texts." I thought I pointed that out.

However, you're throwing the baby out with the bath-water. Barr was responding to linguistic fallacies prevalent among biblical scholarship in the 1960's and 70's (both books you cite were written over forty years ago). Scholars are, for the most part, much more cautious in their argumentation now than they were then, thanks to Barr. I say this from personal experience. Barr's contribution to our field is almost universally recognized and it was a much needed corrective to the state of biblical studies then (and still now, sometimes!) but biblical studies continues to be an expanding and developing subject area.

If you wish to cite Barr, please tell me specifically what fallacies he identifies which are relevant to our present conversation.

Western biases and anachronistic assumptions undermine the current late modernistic conclusions. With this in mind it is difficult for me to understand how you can choose historical inductions over the mindset
of Christ.

We don't KNOW the mindset of Christ. It is a total assumption on your part, that because he says "Moses," he means, "the man Moses is immediately responsible for the writing of the whole of the text of the Pentateuch."

I have already pointed out the "anachronistic assumptions" that "undermine" belief in Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. Namely, a continuity of what might be called the ideology of historiography between the modern and ancient eras. This is why you are misreading Jesus' words in the gospels.

You, on the other hand, have not suggested ANY anachronisms on my part. If you fail to reciprocate thusly, you are merely playing with words, friend.

 

[Breckmin]

but biblical studies continues to be an expanding and developing subject area.

If you wish to cite Barr, please tell me specifically what fallacies he identifies which are relevant to our present conversation.

The suggested reading of those two works is just to note "criticism of
historical criticism" to a degree. I will not appeal to Barr...it was
suggested reading. I will identify these areas specifically and provide
justification.

We don't KNOW the mindset of Christ. It is a total assumption on your part, that because he says "Moses," he means, "the man Moses is immediately responsible for the writing of the whole of the text of the Pentateuch."

I do not believe the Moses wrote the whole text of the Torah. In fact,
I would say "I'm sure of it" that he didn't write Deuteronomy 34...that
was finished under Joshua's direction. But the fact is that the Torah
WAS written during this time period...but there is no way to prove this
to you. This IS, however, the Orthodox position.

When I believed in a specific version of Documentary Hypothesis, I
argued that when Jesus said "the Law Moses gave you" - Jesus was
referring to the Decalog as well as ceremonial laws themselves - NOT
the Torah itself which I believed were written hundreds of years later.

You can induce which ever position you desire...but think of who Jesus
was talking to and what did THEY believe. What did the Pharisees actually
believe??? If the Pharisees believed that the Torah was written during
the time of Moses then who are we to come along and rewrite history
thousands of years later?

I have already pointed out the "anachronistic assumptions" that "undermine" belief in Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. Namely, a continuity of what might be called the ideology of historiography between the modern and ancient eras.

Clearly inductive. Clearly based on finds after the 18th Century and
on interpretations which are not Orthodox.

I would add to this on another note that all comparisons to works
such as the seven clay tablets found in an Iraq ancient library, or the
Akkadian twelve tablets also published by George Smith in the middle
to late 19th Century are clearly futile and feeble attempts to make
legitimate comparisons. Let's look that the texts themselves and
see how different they actually are. You can't use this type of
useless induction unless you are impressed by weak circumstantial
evidence.

This is why you are misreading Jesus' words in the gospels.

You, on the other hand, have not suggested ANY anachronisms on my part. If you fail to reciprocate thusly, you are merely playing with words, friend.

Documentary Hypothesis

Here are some sources to check out for starters....

But I have a much better suggestion. Why don't you "pray about this?"

Ask God the Father to protect you from anything that is not from Him.
Ask God to protect you from any lies regarding higher criticism and 19th
Centuries theories which are opposed to orthodoxy.

Pray sincerely to our Heavenly Father for protection from that which is
not true and not from God...including what I write!

If you seek wisdom from above... I believe God's Spirit will over-ride
the flesh and point you to the way...('the way' of Jesus).

 

[ittarter]

The suggested reading of those two works is just to note "criticism of
historical criticism" to a degree.

I fully support Barr's contentions in this regard, both generally and specifically.

I do not believe the Moses wrote the whole text of the Torah. In fact, I would say "I'm sure of it" that he didn't write Deuteronomy 34...that
was finished under Joshua's direction.

Why? The "Orthodox" position states that Moses wrote that chapter "with tears."

The fact of the matter is that no one claims authorship. We have no title and author at the beginning or end of the book. All we have is a major character named "Moses," and a first-person narration of the fifth book using the voice of that character. THESE are facts. Everything else is theoretical.

But the fact is that the Torah WAS written during this time period...but there is no way to prove this to you. This IS, however, the Orthodox position.

It isn't fact. It's tradition. Whatever your commitment to a certain Christian heritage, there is no call to identify tradition with fact. "Fact" relates to scientific or historical argumentation. You can provide NOTHING from science or history to substantiate your position.

You can induce which ever position you desire...but think of who Jesus was talking to and what did THEY believe. What did the Pharisees actually believe??? If the Pharisees believed that the Torah was written during the time of Moses then who are we to come along and rewrite history thousands of years later?

Where exactly do the Pharisees claim that "the Torah was written during the time of Moses"? Mere speculation, friend.

Clearly inductive. Clearly based on finds after the 18th Century and
on interpretations which are not Orthodox.

Since I was speaking about YOUR reading of Jesus' words and not mine, I fail to see how my criticism was "clearly" based on "finds after the 18th century." Please substantiate what you are saying. If your only complaint is that my position is unorthodox, our conversation should take a different direction entirely.

I would add to this on another note that all comparisons to works
such as the seven clay tablets found in an Iraq ancient library, or the
Akkadian twelve tablets also published by George Smith in the middle
to late 19th Century are clearly futile and feeble attempts to make
legitimate comparisons. Let's look that the texts themselves and
see how different they actually are. You can't use this type of
useless induction unless you are impressed by weak circumstantial
evidence.

Adding the word "clearly" to your statements does not make them any more impressive. And I find it ironic that you choose to interpret the synoptic gospels using a hermeneutic designed for modern historiographical texts.

Documentary Hypothesis

Here are some sources to check out for starters....

Please. If you're not willing to debate with me and just want me to carry out my own research, there's no point for me to even respond.

But I have a much better suggestion. Why don't you "pray about this?"

Ask God the Father to protect you from anything that is not from Him.
Ask God to protect you from any lies regarding higher criticism and 19th
Centuries theories which are opposed to orthodoxy.

Pray sincerely to our Heavenly Father for protection from that which is
not true and not from God...including what I write!

If you seek wisdom from above... I believe God's Spirit will over-ride
the flesh and point you to the way...('the way' of Jesus).

The outcome of this discussion is IRRELEVANT to religious or spiritual pursuits. It's like asking God, "Please let the Oklahoma Sooners win tomorrow." Whether Moses wrote the Old Testament or didn't write it, we can all still read it and choose to live by it in whatever manner our traditions dictate.

 

[mindlight]

The outcome of this discussion is IRRELEVANT to religious or spiritual pursuits. It's like asking God, "Please let the Oklahoma Sooners win tomorrow." Whether Moses wrote the Old Testament or didn't write it, we can all still read it and choose to live by it in whatever manner our traditions dictate.

I agree with you that what I thought was obvious at the beginning of this OP is not without controversy. However in my view Moses is the inspirational personality behind the Torah and I continue to believe is the principle contributor to it whether directly or through some kind of secretary. This is also the mainstream traditional point of view. However as you state so well above it is not essential to believe this for any key doctrine of Christian faith or practice.

The view that scientific or histographical argument is necessarily more significant than a straightforward reading of the text is perhaps our main point of difference.

 

[ittarter]

I agree with you that what I thought was obvious at the beginning of this OP is not without controversy.

I think this thread did quite well, and I'm glad you started it.

Thanks for providing me with an opportunity for some healthy debate

When it's healthy, everybody wins