Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority, Renewed Revelation, and the Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity

292 Pages·2010·1.17 MB·English

by  Hindy Najman

Past Renewals
Supplements
to the
Journal for the Study
of Judaism
Editor
Hindy Najman
Department and Centre for the Study of Religion at the University of Toronto
Associate Editors
Florentino García Martínez
Qumran Institute, University of Groningen
Benjamin G. Wright III
Department of Religion Studies, Lehigh University
Advisory Board
j.j. collins – j. duhaime – p.w. van der horst –
a. klostergaard petersen –
j.t.a.g.m. van ruiten – j. sievers – g. stemberger
e.j.c. tigchelaar – j. tromp
VOLUME 53
Past Renewals
Interpretative Authority, Renewed
Revelation and the Quest for
Perfection in Jewish Antiquity
By
Hindy Najman
LEIDEN • BOSTON
2010
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Najman, Hindy.
Past renewals : interpretative authority, renewed revelation, and the quest for
perfection in Jewish antiquity / by Hindy Najman.
p. cm. — (Journal for the study of Judaism ; v. 53)
Includes index.
ISBN 978-90-04-18046-8 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Authority—Religious aspects—
Judaism—History—To 1500. 2. Tradition (Judaism)—History—To 1500. 3. Bible.
O.T.—Criticism, interpretation, etc., Jewish—History—To 1500. 4. Bible. O.T.—Canon.
5. Rabbinical literature—History and criticism. 6. Judaism—History—Post-exilic
period, 586 B.C.–210 A.D. 7. Jewish law—Decision making—History—To 1500.
8. Rabbis—Office—History—To 1500. 9. Philo, of Alexandria. 10. Book of Jubilees—
Criticism, interpretation, etc. I. Title. II. Series.
BM529.N35 2010
221.609—dc22
2009054006
ISSN 1384-2161
ISBN 978 90 04 18046 8
Copyright 2010 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
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CONTENTS
Foreword ............................................................................................. vii
Previous Publications ........................................................................ ix
Abbreviations ..................................................................................... xiii
Introduction ........................................................................................ xvii
PART I: INTERPRETIVE AUTHORITY
Chapter One: The Symbolic Significance of Writing in
Ancient Judaism ............................................................................ 3
Chapter Two: Interpretation as Primordial Writing: Jubilees
and its Authority Conferring Strategies .................................... 39
Chapter Three: Torah of Moses: Pseudonymous Attribution
in Second Temple Writings ......................................................... 73
Chapter Four: The Law of Nature and the Authority of
Mosaic Law ..................................................................................... 87
Chapter Five: A Written Copy of the Law of Nature: An
Unthinkable Paradox? .................................................................. 107
PART II: RENEWED REVELATION
Chapter Six: Angels at Sinai: Exegesis, Theology and
Interpretive Authority .................................................................. 121
Chapter Seven: Towards a Study of the Uses of the Concept
of Wilderness in Ancient Judaism ............................................. 143
Chapter Eight: Between Heaven and Earth: Liminal Visions
in 4 Ezra .......................................................................................... 161
vi contents
Chapter Nine: Philosophical Contemplation and Revelatory
Inspiration in Ancient Judean Traditions ................................. 175
Chapter Ten: Reconsidering Jubilees: Prophecy and
Exemplarity .................................................................................... 189
PART III: SOUL FORMATION AND THE QUEST
FOR PERFECTION
Chapter Eleven: Cain and Abel as Character Traits: A Study
in the Allegorical Typology of Philo of Alexandria ................ 207
Chapter Twelve: The Quest for Perfection in Ancient
Judaism ............................................................................................ 219
Chapter Thirteen: How Should We Contextualize
Pseudepigrapha? Imitation and Emulation in 4 Ezra ............. 235
Chapter Fourteen: Text and Figure in Ancient Jewish
Paideia ............................................................................................ 243
Index of Ancient Authors and Texts ............................................. 257
Index of Modern Authors ................................................................ 264
Subject Index ...................................................................................... 268
FOREWORD
In her highly regarded book, Seconding Sinai (JSJSup 77; Leiden: Brill,
2003), Hindy Najman develops a new conception of the connection
between interpretation and text-production in Second Temple Jewish
literature. Scholars have long been aware that much of this literature
is not only interpretively intertwined with earlier traditions, but also
pseudepigraphic, i.e., presenting itself as the work of figures from the
past. But how to conceptualize this fact, without anachronistically
treating pseudepigraphic works as forgeries, has long been a matter of
scholarly dispute. Najman proposes that in such cases Second Temple
writers are claiming interpretive authority for their works by employ-
ing a “discourse tied to a founder.” More narrowly, she employs the
notion of “Mosaic Discourse” to make sense of a range of texts, from
Deuteronomy to Jubilees, all of which invoke Moses as a pseudepi-
graphic figure and as an authority for interpretations of Mosaic Law
and tradition.
The proposal is rich with implications, not only for these texts, but
also for others that may be ascribed to other discourses tied to found-
ers such as David, Solomon and Ezra. It also marks a new phase in the
interpretive turn taken in the last two decades of biblical and Second
Temple scholarship. If Michael Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation in
Ancient Israel (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989), showed that biblical
texts had an inner, interpretive life, and James Kugel, In Potiphar’s
House (San Francisco, Calif.: Harper, 1990) and Traditions of the Bible
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998), showed that this
life flourished among the ancient interpreters of biblical texts, then
Najman has shown how the interpretive life of biblical traditions gave
rise to pseudepigraphic texts with specific characteristics.
Since before Seconding Sinai, and well after the book’s appearance,
Najman’s scholarly agenda has centered on a complicated set of ques-
tions which correspond to the three parts of this new book: interpretive
authority, revelation and prophecy, and moral perfection. Most of her
work exploring these questions has been published in scholarly articles
over the better part of the last decade, and it extends well beyond
the narrower treatment of Mosaic Discourse in Seconding Sinai. In
these articles, she has dealt with traditions as seemingly disparate as
viii foreword
the writings of Philo of Alexandria and the book of Jubilees. Yet, she
has shown, for example, how their strategies for claiming interpretive
authority blur the boundaries—assumed to be clear-cut by much previ-
ous scholarship—between interpretation and text production.
This volume brings together most of these articles, and it serves as an
illuminating companion to Seconding Sinai, not only because it shows
how the questions and problems that pushed Najman to develop the idea
of a discourse tied to a founder actually apply more broadly to Second
Temple Jewish literature, but also because it links this idea to other
issues, such as emulation and moral perfection, that were not discussed
in the earlier book. The associate editors of the series are delighted to
have this book in the Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Juda-
ism, where it complements her other JSJSup publication.
Florentino García Martínez and Benjamin G. Wright III
PREVIOUS PUBLICATIONS
The essays in this volume have all been reprinted with permissions
from the publishers. In some instances, I have made minor corrections,
standardized the style and have updated references. Except for these
alterations, the essays are reprinted as they were originally published.
In the case of chapter 4, 5 and 9, I have received permissions from
the current publisher of the Studia Philonica Annual, the Society of
Biblical Literature, which took over the copyright from Brown Judaic
Studies. Essays 4 and 5 were originally published with Brown Judaic
Studies and essay 9 was published with the Society of Biblical Literature.
The original publication information is as follows:
Chapter One: “The Symbolic Significance of Writing in Ancient Juda-
ism.” Pages 139–73 in The Idea of Biblical Interpretation: Essays in
Honor of James L. Kugel. Supplements to the Journal for the Study of
Judaism 83. Edited by Hindy Najman and Judith H. Newman. Leiden:
Brill, 2004.
Chapter Two: “Interpretation as Primordial Writing: Jubilees and its
Authority Conferring Strategies.” Journal for the Study of Judaism 30
(1999): 379–410.
Chapter Three: “Torah of Moses: Pseudonymous Attribution in Second
Temple Writings.” Pages 202–16 in The Interpretation of Scripture in
Early Judaism and Christianity. Studies in Scripture in Early Judaism
and Christianity 7. Edited by Craig A. Evans. Sheffield: Continuum
International Publishing Group, 2000.
Chapter Four: “The Law of Nature and the Authority of Mosaic Law.”
Studia Philonica Annual 11 (1999): 55–73.
Chapter Five: “A Written Copy of the Law of Nature: An Unthinkable
Paradox?” Studia Philonica Annual 15 (2003): 54–63.
Chapter Six: “Angels at Sinai: Exegesis, Theology and Interpretive
Authority.” Dead Sea Discoveries 7 (2000): 313–33.
x previous publications
Chapter Seven: “Towards a Study of the Uses of the Concept of Wilder-
ness in Ancient Judaism.” Dead Sea Discoveries 13 (2006): 99–113.
Chapter Eight: “Between Heaven and Earth: Liminal Visions in 4Ezra.”
Will appear in OtherWorlds and their Relation to this World: Early Jew-
ish and Christian Traditions. Supplements to the Journal for the Study
of Judaism. Edited by Tobias Nicklas et al. Leiden, Brill, forthcoming
2010.
Chapter Nine: “Philosophical Contemplation and Revelatory Inspira-
tion in Ancient Judean Traditions.” Studia Philonica Annual 19 (2007):
101–11.
Chapter Ten: “Reconsidering Jubilees: Prophecy and Exemplarity.”
Pages 229–43 in Enoch and the Mosaic Torah: The Evidence of Jubi-
lees. Edited by Gabriele Boccaccini and Giovanni Ibba. Grand Rapids:
Eerdmans, 2009.
Chapter Eleven: “Cain and Abel as Character Traits: A Study in the
Allegorical Typology of Philo of Alexandria.” Pages 107–18 in Eve’s
Children: The Biblical Stories Retold and Interpreted in Jewish and
Christian Traditions. Themes in Biblical Narrative; Jewish and Christian
Traditions 5. Edited by Gerard Luttikhuizen. Leiden: Brill, 2003.
Chapter Twelve: “La Recherche de la Perfection dans le Judaïsme
Ancien.” Pages 99–116 in Les Élites dans le Monde Biblique. Biblioteque
d’Études Juives. Edited by Jean Riaud. Paris: Honoré Champion,
2006.
Chapter Thirteen: “How Should We Contextualize Pseudepigrapha?
Imitation and Emulation in 4 Ezra.” Pages 529–36 in Flores Florentino:
Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Early Jewish Studies in Honour of Florentino
García Martínez. Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism
122. Edited by Anthony Hilhorst, Émile Puech, and Eibert Tigchelaar.
Leiden: Brill, 2007.
Chapter Fourteen: “Text and Figure in Ancient Jewish Paideia.” Will
appear in The Authoritativeness of Scriptures in Ancient Judaism: The
Contribution of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature. Supplements