In Alter’s translation he chooses to combine the introduction to these two books of the Hebrew Bible. However, in the text he separates the books. As he explains, “There is a tradition going back to Late Antiquity that sees Ezra and Nehemiah as a single book, often simply referred to as “Ezra.” The two books, however, differ in form and are certainly not the work a single writer. Ezra is a third-person narrative reporting historical—at least possibly historical—events affecting the returned exiles in the fifth century B.C.E. It includes the only extended passage (chapters 4-6) in the Bible outside of Daniel written in Aramaic…. In all likelihood, it was composed at the very end of the fifth century…. Nehemiah was probably written a little earlier, in the last quarter of the fifth century. A good portion of it consists of Nehemiah’s memoirs, written in the first person, and there is no equivalent to this form elsewhere in the Bible. It also incorporates Persian imperial documents, and these are probably authentic.”
In his introduction, Alter next explains what unites these two books, “All this writing, moreover, is driven by a powerful political motive, which is not exactly the case in earlier Hebrew narrative…. Political power is divided between two figures working in complementary fashion—Ezra the scribe and priest, who is concerned with the all-important project of the restoration of the cult and the canonization of the newly redacted Torah through the institution of its public reading, and Nehemiah, coming to Jerusalem from a high position in the Persian court, the political leader who addresses security issues of rebuilding the walls of the city and confronting armed enemies…. The community of returned exiles found itself in sharp conflict with other groups in the country, and the ideology promoted by both Ezra and Nehemiah was stringently separatist…. Another policy dictated by Ezra and Nehemiah’s separatist view was the sweeping resistance to intermarriage…. The separatist view embodied in Ezra and Nehemiah is the one that seems to have prevailed in its time: no foreign wives, no Samaritans or others of uncertain ethnic and religious background, were tolerated in the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem and the renewal of the Temple.”
In Ezra 2:1, Alter points out the historical and linguistic fact of the returned Jews being a subject people within the Persian Empire, “the people of the province. The “province” would be Yehud, or Judah, now having the status of a province in the Persian empire.” In Ezra 2:63, he notes another linguistic point, “the satrap. The Hebrew tirshata is clearly a loanword, probably Persian, designating a high official. One may infer that the official in question was Nehemiah, appointed to govern the province of Judah.”
Alter explains the possible background process behind the canonization of the Torah detailing Ezra 7:10, “the teaching of the LORD. It is possible that this phrase, torat YHWH, is an explicit designation of the Torah, or Pentateuch, especially in light of Ezra’s role in making it canonical for the returned exiles.” Alter continues his historical explanation of Ezra 10:3, “the Teaching. By this late date, “the Teaching” (torah) was probably coming into use as a designation for the Five Books of Moses, which Ezra would endow with canonical authority.”
In Nehemiah 2:8, Alter annotates another linguistic tidbit, “the king’s park. The Hebrew term pardes is a loanword from the Persian and has entered many languages, including English, where it occurs as “paradise.” In modern Hebrew it means “orchard.”” In Nehemiah 5:4, he adds a historical note to his explanation of vocabulary, “money. In earlier texts, this Hebrew word, kesef, is consistently translated as “silver,” but the archaeological evidence is that by the fifth century B.C.E. coins were used in Judah and elsewhere in the region.”
Finally, in Nehemiah 8:1, Alter again describes the process of the canonization of the Torah, “the Book of the Teaching of Moses. The Hebrew is sefer torat mosheh. This is probably still a descriptive rubric rather than a true title. The word for teaching, torah, would in time become the standard designation for the Five Books of Moses. The Torah was evidently edited in the Babylonian exile, with Ezra perhaps playing a key role in the final compilation, and this is the text now presented to the people. If rebuilding the walls and the Temple consolidates the physical security and the cultic viability of the people returned to its land, the public reading of the Torah—essentially, a confirmation of its newly minted canonicity—consolidates the spiritual coherence of the people.”
No comments:
Post a Comment