Is There Theology in the Hebrew Bible? 9781575067216

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Is There Theology in the Hebrew Bible?

C ritical S tudies

in the

H ebrew B ible

Edited by Anselm C. Hagedorn

Nathan MacDonald

Stuart Weeks

Humboldt Universität zu Berlin

University of Cambridge

Durham University

1.  A More Perfect Torah: At the Intersection of Philology and Hermeneutics in Deuteronomy and the Temple Scroll, by Bernard M. Levinson 2.  The Prophets of Israel, by Reinhard G. Kratz 3.  Interpreting Ecclesiastes: Readers Old and New, by Katharine J. Dell 4.  Is There Theology in the Hebrew Bible? by Konrad Schmid 5.  No Stone Unturned: Greek Inscriptions and Septuagint Vocabulary, by James K. Aitken

Is There Theology in the Hebrew Bible?

Konrad Schmid

Translated by Peter Altmann

Winona Lake, Indiana Eisenbrauns 2015

English translation © Copyright 2015 Eisenbrauns German original © Copyright 2013 Theologischer Verlag Zürich English edition published by permission of Theologischer Verlag Zürich All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. www.eisenbrauns.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Schmid, Konrad, 1965–   author. [Gibt es Theologie im Alten Testament? English] Is there theology in the Hebrew Bible? / Konrad Schmid.    pages cm (Critical studies in the Hebrew Bible ; number 4) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-57506-351-5 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1.  Bible. Old Testament—Criticism, interpretation, etc., Jewish—History. ​ 2.  Bible. Old Testament—Criticism, interpretation, etc.—History. ​ 3. Judaism—Doctrines.  I. Title. BS1186.S3613 2014 221.6—dc23 2014045406

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1984. ∞™

Contents Preface to the English Edition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  vii Chapter 1.  Formulating the Question and the Approach . . .   1 Chapter 2.  The Emergence and History of the Concept of Theology with Regard to the Bible . . . . . .   5

I. The Premodern Concept of Theology: From Mythology to Systematic Doctrine  5 II. The Reformation’s Reconstrual of the Concept of Theology  8 III. From Biblical Theology to the Theology of the Old Testament  11 IV. The Romantic Devaluation of the Concept of Theology  15 V. The Reception of the Concept of Theology in the “Academic Study of Judaism” and Its Application to Rabbinic Tradition  29 VI. The Devaluation of the Concept of Religion in Dialectical Theology  33 VII. The Pluralization of the Theology of the Hebrew Bible as a Result of its Historicization  39

Chapter 3.  The Emergence of Theology in the Hebrew Bible and Ancient Jewish Tradition as a Religious-Historical Inquiry . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  48

I. Processes of Theologization in the Hebrew Bible and Early Jewish Tradition  48 II. The Formation of Implicit Theology in Prophetic Literature  56 III. The Theologization of the Law  75 IV. The Theologization of Political History  81 V. Theology in the Pentateuch at Large  83 VI. Theology in the Psalter  97 v

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Contents VII. Processes of Theologization in Canon Formation 99 VIII. Theological Interpretation from the Second Temple Period  105 IX. The Septuagint’s Attempts at Theological Reconciliation with Platonic Philosophy  109 X. The Theology of Revelation in Apocalyptic Literature  110

Chapter 4.  Is There Theology in the Hebrew Bible? Striking a Balance between Conceptual History and Exegesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114 I. Theologizing in Traditional Literature  114 II. Implications for a Theology of the Hebrew Bible/ Old Testament  117

Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121 Indexes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149 Index of Authors  149 Index of Scripture  153

Preface to the English Edition This is the English translation of my book Gibt es Theologie im Alten Testament? Zum Theologiebegriff in der alttestamentlichen Wissenschaft (Zurich: Theologischer Verlag, 2013). While “theology” with regard to the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible has broadly been a Christian endeavor (and for this reason retention of “Old Testament” in the title might be justified), I have changed the title to “Is There Theology in the Hebrew Bible ?” The reason for this change is threefold. First, interest in the theology of these scriptures has increased substantially in Jewish scholarship in recent decades. Second, the terminology of “Hebrew Bible” in Englishspeaking scholarship tends to fit better with the approach of this volume, which is to elucidate the theology in these texts themselves. “Old Testament” might instead be taken as a more confessional term, intending to bridge the distance between the various texts themselves on the one side and the texts and a present-day normative meaning on the other. Third, I investigate the canonization of these texts as Torah, Neviʾim, and Ketuvim, following the canonical form found in the Hebrew Bible, not in the Old Testament. Nonetheless, I should also note that my approach also extends to texts beyond both the Hebrew Bible—such as the Apocrypha—and the Old Testament—such as the Temple Scroll, Jubilees (which is also included among the Ethiopic scriptures), and other non-biblical texts from Qumran. I am grateful to Prof. Dr. Jörg Frey (Zurich) for his suggestions on the German original; Prof. Dr. Manfred Oeming (Heidelberg) and Prof. Dr. Friedhelm Hartenstein (Munich) for our helpful conversations; and especially Dr. Peter Altmann for his work on the translation. I also thank Eisenbrauns for preparing this manuscript, especially Dr. Andrew Knapp for his meticulous work. At some points, the material in chapter 3, “The Emergence of Theology in the Old Testament and Early Jewish Tradition as a Religio-Historical Question,” reflects my earlier work in Literaturgeschichte des Alten Testaments: Eine Einführung (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2008).* All abbreviations follow the SBL Handbook of Style. Konrad Schmid *  For the English translation, see my The Old Testament: A Literary History (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2012).

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Chapter 1 Formulating the Question and the Approach The division of Old Testament studies into subdisciplines within Christian theological settings is typically threefold, consisting of the history of Israel, the introduction to the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, and the theology of the Old Testament, the last of which is traditionally regarded as the crown jewel. However, while the treatment of the history of Israel and the introduction are generally accepted as tasks—though their results are debated—the same is not the case for the theology of the Old Testament. The exact task of theology of the Old Testament has been unclear from the beginning.1 Should it reflect historical or canonical divisions? Must it consider the history of religion in ancient Israel, integrating it into the presentation? Does it involve a descriptive or a normative task?2 Must it be developed within the framework of a specific confession?3 Is it even feasible as an academic discipline?4 Or does it deserve dismissal precisely because it is theology?5 To say that these ambiguities have positively impacted Hebrew Bible studies would be unwarranted. No persuasive alternatives to the project 1.  Compare G. von Rad’s comments, “Offene Fragen im Umkreis einer Theologie des Alten Testaments,” in Gesammelte Studien zum Alten Testament II (TB 48; Munich: Kaiser 1973) 289–312 (here 289): “One cannot say that Old Testament theology has ever in its existence taken one shape that has provided the impulse for a longer period of time, that generations worked with and improved. It stands out much more to one looking back that there is a lack of continuity that impresses itself, even over the still short period of 150 years (reckoned from Vatke).” 2.  See A. de Pury and E. A. Knauf, “La théologie de l’Ancien Testament: kérygmatique ou descriptive?” ETR 70 (1995) 323–34. 3. See also M. Oeming, “Ermitteln und Vermitteln: Grundentscheidungen bei der Konzeption einer Theologie des Alten Testaments,” in Verstehen und Glauben: Exegetische Bausteine zu einer Theologie des Alten Testaments (ed. M. Oeming; BBB 142; Berlin: Philo, 2003) 9–48. 4. See N. P. Lemche, “Warum die Theologie des Alten Testaments einen Irrweg darstellt,” Jahrbuch für biblische Theologie 10 (1995) 79–92. 5. See E. Brunner, Offenbarung und Vernunft: Die Lehre von der christlichen Glaubenserkenntnis (Zurich: Zwingli-Verlag, 1941) 287; R. Gyllenberg, “Die Unmöglichkeit einer Theologie des Alten Testaments,” in In piam memoriam Alexander von Bulmerincq (Abhandlungen der Herder-Gesellschaft und des Herder Instituts zu Riga 6; ed. E. Plates; Riga: Plates, 1938) 3:64–68.

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of a theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament have been proposed. Nor has the subdiscipline of Old Testament theology itself developed in a particularly helpful fashion. It would be possible to refrain from it altogether, as is already the case in many places. But it would be a confession of failure for Hebrew Bible studies—not only with regard to the subdiscipline of theology, but to the general field of study as well—to deal only with questions of textual origins to the exclusion of content-related reconstruction and evaluation—which is how theological questions can be outlined in preliminary fashion. Because the Hebrew Bible is in large measure concerned with Israel and Judah’s or the individual’s relationship with God, this allows for inquiry about its “theology,” depending of course on how one understands this term.6 Whether we can go beyond a descriptive understanding of “theology” is a matter of controversy and need not be settled here. Nevertheless, it is necessary to mention that descriptive approaches to theological questions of the Bible need not be deemed inherently less important or more cautious than normative approaches. They have an importance of their own.7 One naturally cannot separate completely questions of textual origin from questions of theological content since genetic questions rely upon a substantive connection to content-related inquiries, at least when carried out adequately.8 This essay does not raise the question of how a theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament should be approached or conceived.9 Such issues are especially contentious in current scholarship, since both in Hebrew Bible studies and beyond the term “theology” evokes a wide range of understandings. These differences exhibit ties to various theological-historical influences that cannot be easily bypassed in a timeless or conclusive fashion. With the rather modest inquiry in the possibility of theology in the Hebrew Bible,10 the following discussion aims to clarify how a suitable 6.  In English-speaking scholarship, the notion of ideology finds expression on occasion (e.g. S. Japhet, The Ideology of the Book of Chronicles and Its Place in Biblical Thought [2nd ed.; BEATAJ 9; Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1997]), though this term is fraught with other connotations. For Japhet it serves to render ʾemuna in the Hebrew original of her work. 7.  See de Pury and Knauf, “Théologie”; also §4.II below. 8.  For more extensive discussion on the relationship between historical and theological exegesis, see K. Schmid, “Sind die Historisch–Kritischen kritischer geworden? Überlegungen zu Stellung und Potential der Bibelwissenschaften,” Jahrbuch für Biblische Theologie 25 (2011) 63–78. 9. Along these lines, there is a helpful discussion in Oeming, “Ermitteln und Vermitteln.” 10.  Attention to this question has increased notably over the last three decades. See particularly R. Smend, Jr., “Theologie im Alten Testament” in Verifikationen (ed. E. Jün-

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concept of theology for Hebrew Bible studies can be developed on the basis of biblical studies and the evidence in the Bible. Limiting the perspective to what became the biblical canon and chiefly to the “Hebrew Bible” is not a “natural” decision. It is instead shaped by the realities of practical considerations and the organization of the field. The following study is in general also applicable to processes of theologization in postbiblical literature, but the present study addresses these only briefly. The title question, “Is there theology in the Hebrew Bible?” will, one can assume from the start, defy a simple “yes” or “no” answer. Rather, any answer will depend on how one defines the category of “theology” in view of the Hebrew Bible texts.11 The attempt to address this issue will entail consideration of two primary problems. The first is the development of the concept of theology within the framework of the history of biblical interpretation and biblical studies. This endeavor is impossible without also addressing the concept of religion, at least with regard to the past 200 years. These terms have been defined in correlation with and distinction from one another in the history of scholarship.12 The second issue involves reconstructing the compositional character of the biblical (and postbiblical) texts themselves, the nature of which has undergirded some researchers’ classification of these texts as “theological.” The first main section (chapter 2) is accordingly oriented toward the history of research covering the notion of “theology” and its use in the context of Hebrew Bible studies. The section occasionally considers connections with the wider study of theology and the humanities. It tracks the concept from its ancient beginnings through the relevant scholastic and Reformation influences up until modern developments. While this intellectual history has been treated often and in considerably more detail than gel et al.; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1982) 11–26; E. Gerstenberger, Theologien im Alten Testament: Pluralität und Synkretismus alttestamentlichen Gottesglaubens (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2001); R. G. Kratz, “Noch einmal: Theologie im Alten Testament,” in Vergegenwärtigung des Alten Testaments: Beiträge zur biblischen Hermeneutik (ed. C. Bultmann et al.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002) 310–26; G. Fischer, Theologien des Alten Testaments (Neuer Stuttgarter Kommentar: Altes Testament 31; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 2012). 11. The oft-cited introductory sentences of R. Rendtorff (Theologie des Alten Testaments: Ein kanonischer Entwurf [2 vols.; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1999– 2001] 1:1; trans. as The Canonical Hebrew Bible: A Theology of the Old Testament [trans. D.  E. Orton; Tools for Biblical Studies 7; Leiden, NL and Blandford Forum, UK: Deo, 2005]): “The Old Testament is a theological book. For this reason, the portrayal of a ‘theology of the Old Testament’ needs no special justification” cannot be accepted as written. Rendtorff’s statement does not clarify in what way the Old Testament is “theological.” Accordingly, what is needed is not only a justification a “theology of the Old Testament” but also a clear explanation of what that means. 12.  See below §§2.IV–VII.

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will be possible here,13 the present aim is to provide a summary capable of explaining the emergence of the contemporary problem reflected in the title’s question. Especially significant will be the fact that the concept of theology in Hebrew Bible studies cannot be addressed apart from the concept of religion, particularly in view of the place of the history of Israelite religion in relation to a theology of the Hebrew Bible. The second main section (chapter 3) turns to the biblical texts and attempts, with the help of recent academic insights, to demonstrate the ways in which we might qualify these texts as (at least implicitly) “theological.” Dividing the literature according to genre, the discussion begins with the prophetic literature, which carries special relevance for our question. Comparable issues in the Pentateuch and the Psalter will then receive attention. To borrow an expression from Christoph Levin, one could describe this section as tracing the path of the Hebrew Bible to its theology.14 To be sure, this journey is not completed in the Hebrew Bible itself. Quite to the contrary, it has inspired an ongoing process of interpretation and explication that will continue into the future in accordance with the time-bound character of theological reflection. Finally, a third section (chapter 4) attempts to provide a nuanced answer to the title’s question in light of the overall discussion. 13.  Compare, e.g., H.-J. Kraus, Die biblische Theologie: ihre Geschichte und Problematik (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1970); J. H. Hayes and F. Prussner, Old Testament Theology: Its History and Development (London: SCM / Atlanta: John Knox, 1985); H. G. Reventlow, Hauptprobleme der alttestamentlichen Theologie im 20. Jahrhundert (EdF 173; Darmstadt: WBG, 1982); trans. as Problems of Old Testament Theology in the Twentieth Century (trans. J. Bowden; Philadelphia: Fortress / London: SCM, 1985); idem, Hauptprobleme der Biblischen Theologie im 20. Jahrhundert (EdF 203; Darmstadt: WBG, 1983); trans. as Problems of Biblical Theology in the Twentieth Century (trans. J. Bowden; Philadelphia: Fortress / London: SCM, 1986); and especially the brief but very incisive H.-W. Schmidt, “‘Theologie des Alten Testments’ vor und nach Gerhard von Rad,” in Psalmen und Weisheit: Theologische Anthropologie und Jeremia, Theologie des Alten Testaments, vol. 2 of Vielfalt und Einheit alttestamentlichen Glaubens (ed. A. Graupner et al.; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1995) 155–79 . 14. C. Levin, “Das Alte Testament auf dem Weg zu seiner Theologie,” ZTK 105 (2008) 125–45. Of particular import for Levin is “that religious-historical upheaval that differentiates but does not separate postexilic Judaism from preexilic Israel and Judah. Understanding this upheaval, that is the emergence of Judaism, is the most important task of Old Testament scholarship. Through [this process] the Old Testament came about” (ibid., 131). The term “theology” then appears for the first time on page 141: “A different theology developed under the Jews who were removed far away after the conquests of the Babylonians. That is probably where the earliest foundation of the Pentateuch emerged, that source that in exegesis is called the ‘Yahwist.’ ” On the issue of a completely formed theology, see ibid., 145: “The way to theology is not finished within the boundaries of the Old Testament. The Old Testament was not able to develop a uniform theological system.”

Chapter 2 The Emergence and History of the Concept of Theology with Regard to the Bible Because of the nature of the evidence, tracking the history of the concept of theology over the past 2000 years will emphasize Christian reception of the Bible. A brief section will address the usage of the concept in Judaism, focusing especially on the 19th century (§2.V below).

I. The Premodern Concept of Theology: From Mythology to Systematic Doctrine 1. “Theology” in Plato, Aristotle, Josephus, and Philo The concept of theology originates from philosophical discourse. Viewed historically, this fact is simply a matter of chance, but it still carries significance. It appears first in Plato with the meaning “legend of the gods,” that is, “myth” (Plato, Republic, 379A). For him, the noun θεολογία denotes the critically evaluated myths that should only be used selectively in the process of education.1 In Aristotle (Metaphysics, 1026a, 18–19; 1064b, 1–3), θεολογία can be named one of the three “theoretical philosophies” alongside mathematics and physics, but he also uses it primarily to describe mythology. θεολογία also occurs in texts from Josephus and Philo.2 Josephus (C. Ap. 1.225) uses the expression “our theology” for the Jewish religion, while Philo (Mos. 2.115) in an analogous way calls Moses a “theologian.” 1. Cf. G. Ebeling, “Theologie I: Begriffsgeschichtlich.” RGG (3rd ed.) 6:754–69 (here 754). On Plato and Aristotle, see also F. Kattenbusch, “Die Entstehung einer christlichen Theologie,” ZTK 38 (1930) 161–205 (here 162–68). 2.  Josephus, C. Ap. 1.78, 225, 237; Josephus, B.J. 2.158; Philo, Opif. 12. Cf. the term theólogos in the following texts: Philo, Mos. 2.115; Praem. 53; QG 2.59; 3.21. Cf. also Josephus, C. Ap. 260 n. 51. See also F. Siegert, “Die hellenistisch–jüdische Theologie als Forschungsaufgabe,” in Internationales Josephus-Kolloquium Münster 1997: Vorträge aus dem Institutum Judaicum Delitzschianum (ed. F. Siegert and J. U. Kalms; Münsteraner judais­ tische Studien 2; Münster: LIT, 1998) 9–30 (here 22–24). For these references, I thank René Bloch (Bern) and Hindy Najman (Yale).

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This terminology, does not, however, imply a reflective or synthesizing approach to religion. It is instead an alternative term for religion itself. The similarity to the term’s usage in Greek philosophy is quite evident. 2. The Bible and the Early Church Neither the Greek Old Testament nor the New Testament use the term θεολογία. Although absent in Paul3 and John,4 their comprehensive intellectual efforts in both letter and narrative forms have been highly significant for the later development of the concept of theology. Noteworthy along these lines is the fact that John the Evangelist has borne the designation “the theologian” since Origen, an epithet that still endures in the Orthodox Church.5 Nonetheless, the concept of theology was not accorded central importance in the first centuries of the Christian church.6 It was mainly in 3.  Cf. S. Vollenweider, “Paulus,” RGG (4th ed.) 6:1035–65 (here 1042–44); see also P.-G. Klumbies, “Die Freiheit, Gott anders zu denken: Paulus und die Theologie,” in Studien zur paulinischen Theologie (ed. P.-G. Klumbies; Schriftenreihe der Evangelischen Fachhochschule Freiburg 8; Münster: LIT, 1999) 34–39. 4.  Cf. J. Frey, “ ‘Ich habe den Herrn gesehen’ (Joh 20,18): Entstehung, Inhalt und Vermittlung des Osterglaubens nach Johannes 20,” in Studien zu Matthäus und Johannes: Études sur Matthieu et Jean (ed. A. Dettwiler and U. Poplutz; ATANT 97; Zurich: TVZ, 2009) 267–84; idem, “Die johanneische Theologie als Klimax der neutestamentlichen Theo­logie,” ZTK 107 (2010) 448–78. 5.  In his RGG article addressing the historical development of the concept, Gerhard Ebeling goes so far as to say: “The phenomenon of ‘Th[eology],’ which in High Scholasticism took on a methodologically reflective form, but in principle similarity can also be designated by other forms, only appears in Christianity” (“Theologie,” 759, emphasis original). The fourth edition of RGG also remains in this tradition, though not programmatically. There is no article treating the theology of the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible (cf. for this topic B. Janowski and M. Welker, “Biblische Theologie,” RGG [4th ed.] 1:1544–52). There is reference to “Theologie, islamische” (U. Rudolph, “Islam: II. Lehre, 3. Islamische Theo­ logie” RGG [4th ed.] 4:259–62, but the article does not specifically treat the usage of the concept of theology in Islam. On the demarcation of philosophy from theology in Islam, see idem, Islamische Philosophie: Von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart (Munich: Beck, 2004) 21–23. To be sure, the terminological usage required by Ebeling has expanded in the past decades. “Theology” is detectable in religions and cultural contexts outside Christianity (see, e.g., H. von Stietencron and J. Assmann, ed., Theologen und Theologien in verschiedenen Kulturkreisen [Dusseldorf: Patmos, 1986]; J. Assmann, Ägypten: Theologie und Frömmigkeit einer frühen Hochkultur [2nd ed.; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1991]; A. Berlejung, “Theologie in Babylon? – Theologien in Babylonien!” in Theologie in Israel und in den Nachbarkulturen: Beiträge des Symposiums “Das Alte Testament und die Kultur der Moderne” anlässlich des 100. Geburtstags Gerhard von Rads (1901–1971), Heidelberg, 18.–21. Oktober 2001 [ed. M. Oeming et al.; Altes Testament und Moderne 9; Münster: LIT, 2004] 105–24). With such an expanded definition of the term, opinions regarding the initial appearance of theology diverge from the first appearances of the word. 6.  Cf. J. Wallmann, Der Theologiebegriff bei Johann Gerhard und Georg Calixt (BHT 30; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1961) 11: “Until the Middle Ages, the Western church [em-

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the following period, from late antiquity into the High Middle Ages, that it attained a preeminent status.7 Especially important for this process was the adoption of the philosophical conception of God in Christian doctrine during the second century c.e.8 Drawing a programmatic boundary against traditional pagan usages of the concept of theology, Eusebius of Caesaria held that the gods of myths and cults are not the focus of theology but rather the one God whom the church recognizes as creator.9 Therefore, rather than writers of myths and mystical teachers qualifying as theologians, this category applies to the prophets, Paul, and John.10 3. Scholasticism and the Emergence of [Academic] “Theology” In terms of the concept’s reception, it was not so much the developments of antiquity and late antiquity but rather of the Middle Ages that proved decisive for how “theology” is understood. Only in the High Middle Ages11 does theology start to resemble the conceptual contours common in modern understandings. The dimensions of the concept expand from a narrower focus on the doctrine of God to a broader inclusion of the entirety of Christian doctrine.12 This extension of the concept is intrinsically linked to the contemporaneous reception of Aristotle, with the help of which Christian doctrine was systematically expounded and treated as an academic task.13 Especially conspicuous in this context are the schools of theology in the universities emerging in the eleventh and twelfth centuries that deal with Christian ployed] the word ‘theology’ primarily with the narrow meaning of the doctrine of God and worship,” with reference to Kattenbusch, “Entstehung.” 7.  Cf. the overview in O. Bayer and A. Peters, “Theologie,” Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, 10:1080–95; Ebeling, “Theologie.” In their treatment of the history of the theology of the Old Testament, Hayes and Prussner (Old Testament Theology) forgo an historical clarification of the concept. 8. Cf. H. Balz, “Theologie II / 1.2. Neues Testament” TRE 33:268–72 (here 268); S. G. Hall, “Theologie im spätantiken Christentum,” TRE 33:272–76. Additionally, see W. Pannenberg, “Die Aufnahme des philosophischen Gottesbegriffes als dogmatisches Problem der frühchristlichen Theologie,” ZKG 70 (1959) 1–45; repr. in Grundfragen systematischer Theologie: Gesammelte Aufsätze (3rd ed.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1979) 296–346; and C. Markschies, Hellenisierung des Christentums: Geschichte und Bedeutung eines umstrittenen Konzepts (Forum Theologische Literaturzeitung 25; Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2012). 9.  Cf. e.g. Hist. eccl. 2.1.1. 10. C. Schwöbel, “Theologie,” RGG (4th ed.) 8:255–306 (here 257–58). 11.  But note the reference to Augustine in Bayer and Peters, “Theologie,” 1083. 12. Note Wallmann, Theologiebegriff, 12: “The expansion of the nature of the concept of theology beyond the bounds of the doctrine of God to the entirety of Christian doctrine was an achievement of the scholasticism of the Middle Ages.” 13.  Ebeling, “Theologie,” 758.

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doctrine: these bore the name facultas theologica.14 This development laid the foundation for the further predominance of the concept of theology in the history of Christianity. More than anything else, this development resulted in the concept obtaining its academic connotation, which would remain intact in the following period. Theology became a process involving reason and systematic reflection, to which the modern period would add the methodological principle of criticism and doubt. It thereby pertains to a meta level of lived religion. The character of theology influenced by scholasticism and the early universities prepared the foundation for the later historical development of the concept. Particularly in the English-speaking realm, the scholastic connotations of “theology” persist into the modern period, consisting of intellectualizing and systematizing. For this reason, “theology” as a subject of investigation has occasionally been rejected in biblical studies from various perspectives and motivations, sometimes vehemently. For example, theology does not do justice to the diversity of the witnesses of faith; it leads to reductionism; and it is an inappropriate subject for historical inquiry.15 What is crucial to note, however, is that this predominantly scholastic understanding of theology is only one possibility among numerous other understandings, as the following section will demonstrate. Such sweeping critiques will be qualified as a result.

II. The Reformation’s Reconstrual of the Concept of Theology 1. The Existential Reinterpretation of the Concept of Theology in the Reformation The roots of the Reformation movement were planted in academic context, and, if only for this reason, the movement was quite familiar from the beginning with the scholastic conceptualization of theology. But the Reformation introduced an influential modification to the concept, without which one cannot understand the contemporary debates regarding its usage. This shift in meaning involved defining “theology” no longer as the doctrine of God but rather of faith: 14. B. Geyer, “Facultas theologica: Eine bedeutungsgeschichtliche Untersuchung,” ZKG 75 (1964) 133–45. For the early history of the schools of theology at European universities, see also M. Asztalos, “Die theologische Fakultät,” Geschichte der Universität in Europa (4 vols;. ed. W. Rüegg et al.; Munich: Beck, 1993) 1:359–85. 15.  See, for example, J. D. Levenson, “Warum Juden sich nicht für biblische Theologie interessieren,” EvT 51 (1991) 402–30; N. P. Lemche, “Warum die Theologie des Alten Testaments einen Irrweg darstellt,” Jahrbuch für biblische Theologie 10 (1995) 79–92.

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Luther deviated . . . in the determination of the object of theology from the scholastic Thomist tradition. God was not the object of theology, but rather God’s relationship to humans as revealed in God’s Word.16 Luther correspondingly describes theology as a scientia practica (practical science), not speculativa (speculative science; Martin Luthers Werke: Tischreden [Table Talk] 1, 72, 16, num. 153).17 In this respect it is noteworthy that, despite his rejection of Aristotelian-influenced scholasticism, Luther continued to hold firmly to the notion of theology. Ultimately, the haziness of the distinction between theology and religion is grounded in this move by Luther that became indicative of Protestant theology in general. If theology is no longer concerned with a speculative doctrine of God but is essentially a matter of faith (these elements were not opposites for Luther; see Die Bekenntnisschriften der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche: 560:21f.: “Gott und Glaube gehören zuhauf ” [“God and faith belong in one heap”])—namely, the relationship with God in both its practical and existential dimensions—then the later applicability of its focus also moves in the direction of the notion of religion. The interchangeability of theology and religion emerged in the period of the Reformation, which did not have a problem with this overlap. The Reformation’s new definition of theology arose in part through a new understanding of the Bible, which was read anew as a testimony of faith experiences. It no longer sufficed simply to use the Bible for illustrating the pre-established correctness of doctrine. Quite the opposite, doctrine was now to be measured by the Bible, not least with a view to how Christian teaching as a whole ought to be understood. In this sense, the Reformation can be seen as having developed out of attention to the distinction between Bible and doctrine. The gap between church practice and theology and the Reformation’s own understanding of scripture led to a reform movement whose goal was to reunite the Bible and the church—that is, to reorient the church toward the Bible. Judging by Luther’s body of work and publications, if he were teaching in a modern school of theology, he would most likely be a professor of 16.  Wallmann, Theologiebegriff, 18. Cf. Martin Luthers Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe (120 vols.; Weimar: Bohlaus, 1883–) 40:2; 328:17: “theologiae proprium subiectum est homo peccati reus ac perditus, et Deus iustificans ac salvator hominis peccatoris.” See also Martin Luthers Werke: Tischreden (Table Talk) 172:16, num. 153: “vera theologia est practica . . . speculativa igitur theologia, die gehort in die hell zum Teuffel” (Schwöbel, “Theo­ logie,” 262). 17. Cf. Ebeling, “Theologie,” 764.

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Hebrew Bible.18 Yet the historical and content-related otherness of the Bible hardly represented a problem worthy of reflection in Luther’s own day. Although the Reformers’ writings often demonstrate a sense of tension between biblical tradition and doctrine, the tension was not regarded as constitutive of theology.19 Rather, the ideal consisted of tying theology to biblical doctrine, an aim whose chances of success few people doubted. Consciousness of a fundamental historical divide between the biblical and the contemporary periods was quite faint, so readers were able to imagine the biblical authors as speaking personally to them. 2. “Theology” in Protestant Orthodoxy Protestant orthodoxy of the later sixteenth and seventeenth centuries returned to the systematizing forms of theology that were common prior to the Reformation. Melanchthon was hesitant to use the term “theology,” preferring to speak of doctrina christiana. With Bartholomäus Keckermann the term returned as a description for Christian teaching. In his work on the philosophy of science, Systema SS. Theologiae (Hannover: Antonius, 1602) inspired by Jacopo Zabarella, Keckermann listed theology alongside other academic disciplines. Following Johann Gerhard’s description of his Loci theologici (nine vols., Jena 1610–1622), Keckermann understands theology as an academic, comprehensive presentation of Christian doctrine.20 As a result, the convergence of Bible and doctrinal instruction became decisive in Protestant orthodoxy. The text was consulted in an eclectic fashion as a source of quotations to supply evidence for doctrinal positions. Of special importance was the identification of dicta probantia for the undergirding of doctrine. The best-known work of this kind was Sebastian Schmidt’s21 Collegium biblicum in quo dicta scripturae Veteris et Novi testamenti iuxta seriem locorum communium theologicorum disposita 18.  So H. Bornkamm’s characterization in Bornkamm, Luther und das Alte Testament (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1948) 1. 19.  Ebeling, Evangelische Evangelienauslegung: Eine Untersuchung zu Luthers Hermeneutik (Forschungen zur Geschichte und Lehre des Protestantismus X/1. Munich: Lempp 1942; 3rd ed.; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991); Bornkamm, Luther; O. Merk, Biblische Theologie des Neuen Testaments in ihrer Anfangszeit: Ihre methodischen Probleme bei Johann Philipp Gabler und Georg Lorenz Bauer und deren Nachwirkungen (Marburger theologische Studien 9; Marburg: Elwert, 1972) 8–13; B. Rothen, Die Klarheit der Schrift: Teil 1: Martin Luther: Die wiederentdeckten Grundlagen (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1990). 20. Cf. Wallmann, Theologiebegriff, 23; J. A. Steiger, Johann Gerhard (1582–1637): Studien zu Theologie und Frömmigkeit des Kirchenvaters der lutherischen Orthodoxie (Doctrina et Pietas I/1; Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog, 1997). 21.  Cf. J. W. Baier, Analysis et vindication illustrium scripturae dictorum sinceram fidei doctrinam asserentium (Altdorf: Kohles, 1716). The work concludes with two indexes that

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dilucide explicantur (Strassburg: Staedeius, 1671, 2nd edition: 1676, 3rd edition: 1689), which separately listed Old and New Testament quotations of theological loci but avoided explicit evaluation of them.22 The Bible and theology interacted with one another such that the former was the implicit groundwork and the latter the systematic explication. However, the emergence of historical-critical biblical scholarship brought about the rapid dissolution of this relationship.

III. From Biblical Theology to the Theology of the Old Testament 1. The Question of Biblical Theology as a Result of the Emancipation of Exegesis from Systematic Theology With the first steps toward historical-critical interpretation of the Bible in the seventeenth century,23 it at once became clear that the systematic theology of the Reformation was not simply biblical in that the Bible did not think in the way the reformers did. The biblical texts in fact said more, less, or even something different than systematics. The results were unavoidable: the unity between text and systematization, between exegesis and dogmatics, found in the premodern, and also still in the reformational period, became looser. The initial solution to this budding issue was the introduction of a mediating element—which could become ever more differentiated—between Bible and systematics. Biblical theology emerged as an independent theological inquiry in addition to systematic theology. It is noteworthy and important for reception history that this discipline includes the word “theology” as part of its title. Theology is understood in this context as an intellectual but unfinished endeavor that mediates between existing permanent entities in a rational and systematizing fashion. The date usually given for the beginning of this movement is that of Johann Philipp Gabler’s inaugural lecture in Altdorf from 1787, Oratio de justo discrimine theologiae biblicae et dogmaticae regundisque recte utriusque finibus.24 However, Gabler’s lecture was more a bundling of earlier summarize the passages in biblical order (pp. 425–27) and grouped doctrinally (pp. 428–34). See further Hayes and Prussner, Old Testament Theology, 5–8. 22.  Cf. H. G. v. Reventlow, “Theology (Biblical), History of ” ABD 6:483–505 (here 484). 23. K. Scholder, Ursprünge und Probleme der Bibelkritik im 17. Jahrhundert: Ein Beitrag zur Entstehung der historisch–kritischen Theologie (Munich: Kaiser, 1966). 24.  English translation in B. C. Ollenburger, Old Testament Theology: Flowering and Future (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2004) 497–506. German translation in Merk, Biblische Theologie, 273–82; or in G. Strecker, Das Problem der Theologie des Neuen Testaments (Wege der Forschung 367; Darmstadt: WBG, 1967) 32–44. Cf. R. Smend, Jr., “Johann

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efforts than a completely new starting point. The step in a direction toward a “biblical theology” that differentiated itself from systematics was already announced in Johann Georg Hofmann’s Oratio de Theologiae biblicae praestantia (Nürnberg: Bauer, 1770),25 in Jean Alphonse Turretini De Sacrae Scripturae interpretatione tractatus bipartitus (Frankfurt a.d.O.: Straus, 1776), in the works of Anton Friedrich Büsching—both his Dissertatio theologica inauguralis exhibens epitomen theologiae e solis sacris litteris concinnatae et ab omnibus rebus et verbis scholasticis purgatae (Göttingen: Luzac, 1756), as well as his Gedanken von der Beschaffenheit und dem Vorzug der biblisch-dogmatischen Theologie vor der alten und neuen scholastischen (Lemgo: Meyer, 1758); the latter of these brought him into conflict with the Göttingen school of theology26—as well as in Johannes Cocceius and Georg Calixt.27 The fact that Gabler has gone down as the founder of “biblical theology” in the memoirs of historical theology is justified in terms of the programmatic nature of his lecture.28 Gabler in no way lamented the breakup of the Bible and systematics; he instead attempted to determine an appropriate differentiation (discrimen) of the process. In his view, biblical and systematic theology should be kept separate. Biblical theology is an historical undertaking that reconstructs the theology of the biblical authors. Systematic theology, on the other hand, aims to formulate a contemporary theology, that by necessity must separate Philipp Gablers Begründung der biblischen Theologie,” EvT 22 (1962) 345–57; H.-J. Dohmeier, Die Grundzüge der Theologie Johann Philipp Gablers (PhD dissertation, University of Münster 1976); J. Sandys-Wunsch and L. Eldredge, “J. P. Gabler and the Distinction between Biblical and Dogmatic Theology: Translation, Commentary and Discussion of His Originality,” SJT 33 (1980) 133–58; M. Sæbø, “Johann Philipp Gablers Bedeutung für die biblische Theologie,” ZAW 99 (1987) 1–16; Hayes and Prussner, Old Testament Theology, 2–5; R. G. Kratz, “Auslegen und Erklären: Über die theologische Bedeutung der Bibelkritik nach Johann Philipp Gabler,” in Johann Philipp Gabler 1753–1826 zum 250. Geburtstag (ed. K.-W. Niebuhr and C. Böttrich; Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2003) 53–74 . 25. Cf. J. Sandys-Wunsch, What Have They Done to the Bible? A History of Modern Biblical Interpretation (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2005) 260 n. 77. 26.  Cf. W. Zimmerli, “Biblische Theologie I: Altes Testament” TRE 6:426–55 (here 427); Schwöbel, “Theologie,” 291. 27. Cf. Zimmerli, “Biblische Theologie,” 427; Wallmann, Theologiebegriff. 28. Cf. Merk, Theologie, 29–140. Daniel Georg Conrad von Cölln (Biblische Theologie, Leipzig: Barth, 1836) honors Gabler in the sense that he was the first to “have recognized the difference between biblical and dogmatic theology or rather systematic theology as such, and to have found the historical character of the former and the scientific [character] of the latter. Following this difference, the biblical component of dogmatics is marked by the discovery of universals in biblical teaching, with the help of philosophy, which are separated from the merely local, temporal, and individual, substantiated scientifically and linked. On the other hand, biblical theology only concerns itself with the actual discovery of religious concepts in the biblical texts, and must also take the local, temporal, and individual into consideration because these are characteristic for the religious perspectives of this epoch and of individual persons” (ibid., 24).

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itself from biblical theology, itself arising from a different, past epoch. In order for systematics to remain connected to biblical theology, Gabler introduced a further differentiation within biblical theology, between “true” and “pure” biblical theology. “True biblical theology” remains within the historical framework of the biblical world and its thought paradigm, “pure biblical theology” attempts to articulate universal, timeless perspectives behind this historically conditioned outlook of the Bible, thereby building a bridge to contemporary systematics.29 Biblical theology and systematics could be viewed in terms of division of labor according to Gabler. However, it will soon become clear that Gabler’s attempt did not really reconcile the Bible and systematics, but rather merely organized the differences into a stepped model, minimizing them only on the surface.30 Bible, true biblical theology, pure biblical theology, and systematics persisted next to one another, offering various degrees of systematization and applicability to the contemporary world, all of the same message. In a polemic manner, Gotthilf Traugott Zachariä conceived of the relationship between biblical and systematic theology somewhat differently in his Biblische Theologie oder Untersuchung des biblischen Grundes der vornehmsten theologischen Lehren (Tübingen: Schramm, 1780).31 Biblical criticism of systematics aims to “compare systematic and biblical ideas with one another and to investigate what of the accepted systematic ideas, which always have their sources in specific biblical expressions, are correct or incorrect.”32 In reality, however, Zachariä was in danger of replacing traditional dogmatism with the biblicism of which he also was consumed.33 29. One such “pure theology” that followed was C. F. v. Ammon, Entwurf einer reinen biblischen Theologie (Erlangen: Palm, 1792) (cf. idem, Entwurf einer Christologie des Alten Testaments: Ein Beitrag zur endlichen Beilegung der Streitigkeiten über messianische Weissagungen und zur biblischen Theologie des Verfassers [Erlangen: Palm, 1794]), but this was not accepted by Gabler (cf. Merk, Theologie, 82–90; J. Frey, “Zum Problem der Aufgabe und Durchführung einer Theologie des Neuen Testaments,” in Aufgabe und Durchführung einer Theologie des Neuen Testaments [ed. C. Breytenbach and J. Frey; WUNT 205; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007] 3–53 [here 24 n. 80]). 30.  Cf. also the attempt at a contemporary appropriation of Gabler’s distinctions in D.  Ritschl, Zur Logik der Theologie: Kurze Darstellung der Zusammenhänge theologischer Grundgedanken (2nd ed.; Munich: Kaiser, 1988). 31.  In a similar manner, there were the earlier works of C. Döderlein, Feyerliche Rede von den hohen Vorzügen der biblischen Theologie vor der scholastischen (Halle: Johann Christian Gunerten, 1758); C. F. Bahrdt, Versuch eines biblischen Systems der Dogmatik (Gotha: F. Heinsius, 1769/1770). On Zachariä, see Sandys-Wunsch, “G.P.C. Kaiser: La théologie biblique et l’histoire des Religions,” RHPR 59 (1979) 391–96; idem, “G.T. Zachariae’s Contribution to Biblical Theology,” ZAW 92 (1980) 1–23. 32.  Ibid., 8. 33.  On the importance of Zachariä, Sandys-Wunsch, Bible, 261, maintains: “This was one of the first attempts to face up to the fact that the Bible, too, has its history, and there is

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2. The Dissolution of Biblical Theology into Theology of the Old and New Testaments Gabler’s construction was not stable. Specifically, “pure biblical theology” was shown to be a Trojan horse that served the purpose of allowing for continued adherence to a transhistorical biblical truth, even if it was necessarily to be converted later into a particular temporal form by systematics. In terms of later reception history, it was not Gabler’s classification of biblical and systematic theology that was relevant, but rather the differentiations, which intensified further. Not only did historical-critical biblical perspectives increasingly distance themselves from traditional dogmatics (which also resulted in several nineteenth-century biblical scholars such as Julius Wellhausen withdrawing from the schools of theology),34 but also the unity of biblical theology was shown to be only of a provisional nature. The Old and New Testaments are, as became increasingly clear, distinct from one another in terms of their theological message. They do not even fit together in terms of a progressive linear sequence, as is often intended through the classification of promise and fulfillment or law and gospel. According to a growing consensus, from then on the theology of the Old Testament and the theology of the New Testament were portrayed separately. Georg Lorenz Bauer’s Theologie des A.T. oder Abriß der religiösen Begriffe der alten Hebräer: Von den ältesten Zeiten bis auf den Anfang der christlichen Epoche: Zum Gebrauch akademischer Vorlesungen (Leipzig: Weygand, 1796) is usually seen as the first stand-alone representative of the new subdiscipline.35 Subsequent theological, or rather religious-historical, treatments of the Bible generally consider the testaments separately. Those treating the Old Testament include Carl Peter Wilhelm Gramberg, Bruno Bauer, Heinrich Andreas Christoph Hävernick, Ferdinand Hitzig, August Kayser, and August Dillmann.36 Nonetheless, approaches taking the entire Bible into consideration— especially from a historical-developmental perspective—remained important. Especially worth noting are Wilhelm Martin Leberecht de Wette’s a yawning gulf between religion as it tended to be practiced in ancient Israel and what in that religion is of importance to us today.” 34.  Cf. R. Smend, Jr., Julius Wellhausen: Ein Bahnbrecher in drei Disziplinen (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2006). 35. Cf. Merk, Theology, 157–63; Frey, “Problem,” 24. 36. C. P. W. Gramberg, Kritische Geschichte der Religionsideen des Alten Testaments (Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 1829–1830); A. Dillmann, Handbuch der Alttestamentlichen Theologie (ed. R. Kittel; Leipzig: Hirzel, 1895). A detailed overview on the works of the period appears in W. Zimmerli, Grundriss der alttestamentlichen Theologie (Theologische Wissenschaft 3; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1972); for orientation to the history of scholarship, see also—in light of the current discussion—C. Helmer, “Biblical Theology: Bridge over Many Waters,” Currents in Biblical Research 3 (2005) 169–96; Frey, “Problem.”

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Biblische Dogmatik Alten und Neuen Testaments: Oder kritische Darstellung der Religionslehre des Hebraismus, des Judenthums und des Urchristenthums (Berlin: Realschulbuchhandlung, 1813, 3rd edition: 1831) and Wilhelm Vatke’s Die biblische Theologie wissenschaftlich dargestellt. I: Die Religion des A.T. (Berlin: Bethge, 1835). Arising especially from the subtitle of de Wette’s “dogmatics,” they attempt to bridge the distance between and within the testaments by means of historical-developmental interpretation.37 The breakup of biblical theology of the whole Bible into separate theologies of the Old and New Testaments is an extremely significant event in the context of the overall history of the concept of theology. It results in the conception of theology containing a plurality for the first time. The Bible does not have a single theology, but—one must say given current perspectives, at least—two theologies, one of the Old Testament and one of the New Testament. After establishing this distinction, no fundamental obstacles stood in the way of the further pluralization of theology that then unfolded over the course of the twentieth and the beginning of the twenty-first centuries.

IV. The Romantic Devaluation of the Concept of Theology 1.  The Differentiation between Religion and Theology and the Discovery of “Religious Consciousness” The historical importance of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries for the question of the adequacy of the application of the concept of theology to Hebrew Bible texts was also pivotal. During this period the 37.  H. G. A. Ewald (Die Lehre der Bibel von Gott, oder Theologie des alten und neuen Bundes [4 vols.; Leipzig: Vogel, 1871–1876]) presents an elaboration using this methodology of the doctrine of God; cf. the earlier work W. F. Hufnagel, Handbuch der Biblischen Theologie (Erlangen: Palm, 1785–1789). A programmatic statement of this approach appears in Cölln, Biblische Theologie, 3: “These foundational biblical ideas appear most clearly and fully in the original instructional speeches of Jesus and his immediate followers. So, beginning from this foundation one can recognize most clearly, establish most firmly, and portray in a scholarly context the deep coherence of the biblical concept of religion.” Further, “The name of biblical theology which one has attached to this discipline, has been understood in broadest terms to designate the treatment of the biblical writings as its object or to include the exegesis and evaluation of the Bible together with an explanation of the original content of its notion of religion, which then coincides with exegetical theology” (ibid., 5). “What, then, is arrived at in terms of the relationship of biblical theology with theological studies is that, as noted, in broad terms it coincides with exegetical theology. In the narrower terms in view here, however, it concerns the final and most important result of biblical studies. The final purpose of biblical-exegetical study must then be aimed in that direction: through exacting discovery of the original meaning of the biblical writings that contain the religious notions to be identified according to their contexts considering the entire culture and individuality of each teacher, the circumstances of the place, the time, and the entire constitution of the cultural life” (ibid., 6).

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distinction between religion and theology that was definitive for the subsequent period arose, and there was also the discovery of religion as the “individual province of the mind” (Friedrich Schleiermacher). Religion is not simply a matter of the spirit, the intellect, or feeling, but a unique phenomenon. As a result, it simply cannot be sufficiently evaluated by the traditional means coming from theology and philosophy.38 Religion is always more than what theology and philosophy are able to comprehend in it. In the eighteenth century, the basic distinction between religion and theology began to gain prominence. Then, especially in the movement of Neology—specifically with Johann Salomo Semler39—this separation became even more accentuated.40 Theology came to be understood as re38.  Cf. B. Gladigow, “Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768–1834),” in Klassiker der Religionswissenschaft: von Friedrich Schleiermacher bis Mircea Eliade (ed. A. Michaels; Munich: Beck, 1997) 17–27 (esp. 17). The situation prior to these developments is illustrated—naturally not exhaustively, but in exemplary fashion—in J. Ringmüller, Allgemeine Religions- und Staatsgeschichte von der Weltschöpfung an bis auf gegenwärtige Zeiten zum gemeinnützigen Gebrauche besonders der wirzburgischen Schulen (2 vols.; Würzburg: Stahel, 1772). Even his definition of religion binds theology together with ethics in the concept of religion, thereby forgoing any basic distinction between the two: “The knowledge of God and that which is acceptable to God and pleasing service is that which one calls religion” (ibid., 2). Keeping with this definition, Ringmüller can then separate the history of religion from a “theological” perspective into two parts. They divide into histories of the true and of the false religion. True religion is of a biblical nature, characterized either by belief in a deliverer to come (in ancient Israel) or one that has come (Christianity). False religion is represented by paganism, which, however, “. . . also produces many and considerable advantages: the most beautiful flowers grow from this infertile field” (ibid., 4*). 39.  Cf. E. Feil, Religio (Forschungen zur Kirchen- und Dogmengeschichte 91; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007) 4:427–58; H. E. Hess, Theologie und Religion bei Johann Salomo Semler: Ein Beitrag zur Theologiegeschichte des 18. Jahrhunderts (Augsburg o.J.: Blasaditsch, 1974); G. Hornig, Johann Salomo Semler: Studien zu Leben und Werk des Hallenser Aufklärungstheologen (Hallesche Beiträge zur Europäischen Aufklärung 2; Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1996). For Semler’s understanding of religion, see J. S. Semler, Ob der Geist des Widerchrists unser Zeitalter auszeichne? In freimütigen Briefen zur Erleichterung der Privatreligion der Christen beantwortet (Halle: Hemmerde, 1784) 60. He defined religion as “. . . an inner spiritual fulfillment, infinite religion, which continually grows in spiritual understanding of an infinite God and worships without silly submission to earlier humans and their religions, always better and more fulfilling.” 40. B. Ahlers, Die Unterscheidung von Theologie und Religion: ein Beitrag zur Vorgeschichte der Praktischen Theologie im 18. Jahrhundert (Gütersloh: Gerd Mohn, 1980); F.  Wagner, Was ist Religion? Studien zu ihrem Begriff und Thema in Geschichte und Gegenwart (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlaghaus, 1986) 42–54; on J. S. Semler in this context see also T.  Rendtorff, Kirche und Theologie: Die systematische Funktion des Kirchenbegriffs in der neueren Theologie (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlaghaus, 1966) 32–36, esp. 34: “Semler . . . accepted the distinction between theology and religion not in order to define theology, but in order to locate it within the cupboard of the church, to then tear away from theology the general nature and universality of Christian belief and thinking’s hegemony over it, so that theology was then able to unfold freely.” Also see T. Rendtorff, “Historische Bibelwissenschaft und Theologie: Über den Aufbau der Frage: Was ist christlich?” in Theo-

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flection on religion. This development resulted in the fundamental classifications of religion and theology, including the nature of the relationship between the two concepts in current discussion.41 This distinction was strongly supported first by Johann Gottfried Herder, and then especially by Friedrich Schleiermacher.42 Especially Schleiermacher’s formulation of the concept was influential for Old Testament studies. De Wette explicitly refers to Schleiermacher’s notion of religion and injected it into the exegetical disciplines.43 On the flip side, Old Testament studies developed an increasingly negative view of theology. Religion is experience, feeling, sensibility, and sensitivity for the eternal that theology cannot explain and define, but rather corrupts. Bernhard Duhm’s position provides one of many possible examples.44 He sees his primary task in his work on the Hebrew Bible as “examining religion in the stage before it had theology or at least was not fully dominated by it.”45 He points to this danger especially in the realm of prophecy. In his commentary on the book of Jeremiah, he writes concerning Jeremiah’s opponents: In reality, those first theologians known from the history of biblical religion unwillingly brought a deep antagonism to light, that which exists eternally between inspiration and scholarliness, between the forward-looking and living impulse of the creative spirits and the aspirations of epigones and imitative laypersons toward the achievements of an earlier age that treats the words of rie des Christentums: Historisch–theologische Studien zu seiner neuzeitlichen Verfassung (ed. T. Rendtorff; Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlaghaus, 1972) 41–60. 41.  Cf., for example, Wagner, Was ist Religion?, 49: “Theology is the academic engagement with religion, which is prior to this academic [reflection], and that means independent from theology, which has always already been lived out as religious consciousness.” 42.  Cf., for example, Wagner, Was ist Religion?, 49: “Religion and religious consciousness are not based primarily on the established predetermined depictions of the content determined by church tradition and authority; religion and Christianity instead owe their relationship with God and consciousness of God to religious consciousness, so the validity of religious content is dependent on their ability to be reconstructed as expressions of religious consciousness.” 43.  See W. M. L. de Wette, “Forward” in Biblische Dogmatik Alten und Neuen Testaments: Oder kritische Darstellung der Religionslehre des Hebraismus, des Judenthums und des Urchristenthums (Berlin: Realschulbuchhandlung, 1813; 3rd edition: 1831). On de Wette, see Merk, Theologie, 210–14. 44.  Cf. the note in Smend, “Theologie.” 45. B. Duhm, Das Geheimnis in der Religion (Freiburg i. Br.: Mohr [Siebeck], 1896) 7. Cf. also idem, Das Buch Jesaja: Übersetzt und erklärt (5th ed.; HKAT 3.1; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck, 1968) 67: “Religion humanizes the higher world, theology dehumanizes it again.” In his commentary on Isaiah an inconsistency appears with regard to the use of the terminology of theology. On one hand, Duhm notes that Isaiah misses “any theological streak” (Jesaja, 226). On the other hand (ibid., 221), he speaks of “Isaiah’s theology.”

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Chapter 2 a master as dead treasure, as an idol that cannot tolerate anything new or better. It is actually the tragedy of religion that the dead prophet kills the living one. The thought of the former prophets, such as Amos, Hosea, or Isaiah, is that which the Deuteronomistic theology is believed to have systematized, and for their sake that Jer[emiah] needed to become a martyr.46

On the book of Jonah he notes: It is unfortunate that the Old Testament canon was put together by theologians. Otherwise we would have had . . . more of this literary genre.47 Jonah is a touching narrative about the prophet and his God that does not pronounce a determinative message, but rather depicts a living relationship with God. Duhm treasured this book more than others in the biblical canon on account of this. The living religion of the Hebrew Bible which stands behind their theologically stamped and revised form must in each case first be dug up. Finally, this conviction was one of the most important drivers for the success of historical-critical biblical scholarship in the theological schools of the universities during the nineteenth century. Duhm, like many of his colleagues in Hebrew Bible studies, practiced historical criticism so intensively, with an almost unexplainable passion and intuitively accepted sense of necessity, because they were of the opinion that only by this means could they push through the—pejoratively viewed—theology of the biblical writings to true religion. Biblical criticism was a task whose necessity was self-evident. 2. The Idealistic Inheritance of the “History of Religion” and Its Historical-Critical Reception and Transformation In order to understand the history of scholarship of the boom with regard to the terminology of religion and the investigations of the history of religions in Old Testament studies during the nineteenth century, it is helpful to observe that the origins of the question of the history of religion for the nineteenth century received inspiration not only from Schleiermacher. It was also strongly marked by Hegelianism. Rudolf Smend, Sr., remarked poignantly and to the point in 1899: 46. B. Duhm, Das Buch Jeremia (KHC 11; Tübingen: Mohr [Siebeck], 1901) 90. 47. B. Duhm, Anmerkungen zu den Zwölf Propheten (Gießen: Töpelmann, 1911) 112.

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Old Testament history of religion was wrought by Wilhelm Vatke.48 Vatke’s magnum opus treats his subject, the history of religion, “both from historical-critical and dogmatic perspectives,”49 and for this reason can also bear the name “biblical theology,” though this is only presented in the first section.50 Vatke outlines the intention of the section as follows: Biblical theology presents the idea of religion in the form of the basic consciousness of the Hebrew people and the early Christian period, or, expressed differently, it portrays the religious and ethical views of the holy writings in their historical development and with their internal contexts. (ibid., 2) The concern for the religious history of ancient Israel—which on the basis of the source material available at the time could also be called biblical religious history—served considerably more than simple critical historiographic interest on the basis of its historical scholarly context. The history of ancient Israelite religion is set in a larger universal historical context: All pre-Christian religions, including that of the Old Testament, are prerequisites, preparations, anticipations of the one true religion. They first appear in their true light when viewed from the standpoint of the final [one true religion].51 In keeping with this conceptual formulation, biblical theology is set within the context of a broader theological method of operation: On the one hand, biblical theology assumes those theological disciplines that investigated the text as their immediate subject, such as canonical studies, hermeneutics, historical criticism, and 48. R. Smend, Sr., Lehrbuch der alttestamentlichen Religionsgeschichte (2nd ed.; Freiburg i. Br.: Mohr [Siebeck], 1899) 3. On Vatke’s conception of religion, cf. J. W. Rogerson, “What Is Religion? The Challenge of Wilhelm Vatke’s Biblische Theologie,” in Vergegenwärtigung des Alten Testaments: Beiträge zur biblischen Hermeneutik (ed. C. Bultmann; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002) 272–84. 49. W. Vatke, Die Religion des Alten Testaments nach den kanonischen Büchern entwickelt, vol. 1 of Die biblische Theologie wissenschaftlich dargestellt (Berlin: Bethge, 1835) vi. 50.  Ibid., 163–64: “According to the distinctions in conceptions of biblical religion, our discipline is separated into two main parts, the depiction of the religion of the Old and the religion of the New Testament. The particular stages of development of Old Testament religion, of which we will only be able to trace two in detail, the stages of bloom and of decay, constitute subordinate moments of the first section and relate to one another differently than to the religion of the New Testament.” 51.  Ibid., 18.

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Chapter 2 exegesis; and it brings together the results that are delivered by those [disciplines] from the strictly religious sphere. On the other hand, biblical theology also influences those disciplines in reverse to the degree that these borrow their principles from an overall view of the content in treating the religious content of the text. (ibid., 8)

In Vatke’s view, biblical theology is based on the normal analytical steps of historical criticism, but these steps are also dictated by their synthetic perspective. Remarkable when viewed from current scholarship is the recognition of the importance of the eighth century b.c.e. as a break in the source material: The sources for the older stories of Old Testament religion flowed from the later saga and are therefore fragmentary and unreliable. From the period of the Judges and even more so from the Davidic period, the tradition takes on historical character. Yet it can be followed with complete reliability first from the eighth century on the basis of the prophetic writings that begin at this time.52 In addition to Vatke, representatives of the idealist historical approach to Old Testament theology include Daniel von Cölln, Bruno Bauer, Ferdinand Hitzig,53 and August Dillmann.54 Heinrich Ewald still interpreted the intellectual history of Israel as the process of its religious development that increasingly perfected itself.55 However, toward the end of the nineteenth century, the orientation propounded by Abraham Kuenen,56 Julius Wellhausen,57 Berhnard Stade,58 and Karl Budde prevailed, which—under the contemporary influences of positivism and evolutionism—dictated a critical and historically oriented approach.59 Wellhausen was, of course, strongly influenced by Vatke and also needed to defend himself against the 52.  Ibid., 177–78. 53. F. Hitzig, Ferdinand Hitzigs Vorlesungen über biblische Theologie und messianische Weissagungen des Alten Testaments (ed. J. J. Kneucker; Karlsruhe: Reuther, 1880). 54.  Dillmann, Handbuch. 55. H. G. A. Ewald, Geschichte des Volkes Israel bis Christus (Göttingen: Dieterich, 1843) 1:9. 56. A. Kuenen, De Godsdienst van Israel tot den Ondergang von den joodschen Staat (Haarlem: Kruseman, 1869–1870). 57. J. Wellhausen, Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels (6th ed.; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2001); trans. as Prolegomena to the History of Ancient Israel (trans. J. S. Black and A. Menzies; Edinburgh, A. & C. Black, 1885). 58. B. Stade, “Über die Aufgabe der biblischen Theologie des Alten Testaments,” ZTK 3 (1893) 3–51; repr. in idem, Akademische Reden und Abhandlungen (Gießen: Töpelmann, 1907) 77–96. 59.  Cf. the discussion in Reventlow, Hauptprobleme der alttestamentlichen Theologie, 5f.

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allegation of Hegelianism,60 but the differences between his scholarly work and those of the Hegelian-influenced idealist-historical approach are quite clear. Wellhausen employed the historical standards of his time, though the progressive history of Israelite religion still played a decisive role: Israelite religion first lifted itself out of paganism; this itself is the content of its history.61 The emergence of Judaism, to which the history of Israelite religion pointed, was interpreted by Wellhausen as the process of intellectual history concerning the detachment from paganism. The history of religion was thus a meaningful process that leads from baser to more developed forms of reflection. 3.  Religion and Theology in F. Max Müller The late nineteenth century was the time of the development of an independent discipline of religious studies—a process that is also significant for the conception of theology, which was still unproblematic in early religious studies. One of the pioneers of this new field was F. Max Müller,62 whose primary contribution in terms of content was introducing the English-speaking world to Sanskrit literature. He conceived and began the series Sacred Books of the East, which was published between 1879–1910 by Oxford University Press. Its 50 volumes offer the most important texts from Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, Zoroastrianism, Jainism, and Islam translated into English (F. Max Müller himself took on the volumes on the Upanishads, Vedic hymns, Mahâyâna texts, and various others).63 It was originally to include the Old and New Testaments. However, Müller was forced to distance himself from this proposal on account of resistance from church circles, which recognized—correctly— that a basic relativization would occur if the Bible was set within a larger 60. Cf. the documentation and presentation of the history of scholarship in Perlitt, Vatke. 61. J. Wellhausen, Israelitische und jüdische Geschichte (3rd ed.; Berlin: Reimer, 1897) 34. 62.  Cf. L. P. v. d. Bosch, Friedrich Max Müller: A Life Devoted to Humanities (Leiden: Brill, 2002); H.-J. Klimkeit, “Friedrich Max Müller (1823–1900),” in Klassiker der Religionswissenschaft: von Friedrich Schleiermacher bis Mircea Eliade (ed. A. Michaels; Munich: Beck, 1997) 28–40, 362–64; Stolz, “Der Gott der Theologie und die Götter der Religionswissenschaft,” Religion und Rekonstruktion (ed. D. Pezzoli-Olgiati; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2004) 287–304 (here 289–90). 63.  F. M. Müller, The Upanishads (2 parts; Oxford: Clarendon, 1879 /1884); Vedic Hymns (vol. 1 of 2, Oxford: Clarendon, 1891). He also worked on E. B. Cowell, et al., Buddhist Mahâyâna Texts (part 1; The Sacred Books of the East 49; Oxford: Clarendon, 1894). Cf. also Klimkeit, Müller, 31. The volumes are available online at http://www.holybooks .com/the-sacred-books-of-the-east-all-50-volumes.

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assortment of holy texts from Asia.64 This collection constituted the foundation for Müller to carry out the comparative study of religion, of which he was the founder. In his determination of the nature of religion, he followed Schleiermacher closely. He conceived of religion as “that spiritual facility . . . which allows humans to engage the eternal under the most diverse names and various forms.”65 The following quotation shows clearly how he viewed religious studies on analogy with comparative linguistics and initially conceived of it in terms of historical philology. What would classically trained academics say to people who attempt to evaluate Homer’s religion without ever learning Greek; what would theologians say if one wagers to speak about Moses and the prophets without any knowledge of Hebrew!66 But Müller was not only interested in the concrete forms of religions’ appearances. He also assigned evaluative and theoretical tasks to religious studies: Because of the two meanings that we saw inherent to the word “religion,” religious studies divides into two parts. The first, which concerns itself with the historical appearances of religion, is called comparative theology; the second, which explains the conditions under which religion in its highest or basest forms is possible, is called theoretical theology.67 What is striking in this proposal of an inner distinction within the task of religious studies is Müller’s use of the concept of theology for both subdisciplines. This position assumes that reflection on the forms of appearance of religion could be called theology. Differently than in Vatke’s work, for example, is that Christianity does not receive a distinguished role a priori: I must admit that those who view comparative study of religion as a means to push down Christianity and raise up the other religions are just as unwelcome as partners as those who find it neces64. Cf. Klimkeit, Müller, 30. 65.  F. M. Müller, Einleitung in die vergleichende Religionswissenschaft: Vier Vorlesungen aus dem Jahr 1870 an der Royal Institution in London gehalten nebst zwei Essays “Über falsche Analogien” und “Über Philosophie der Mythologie” (Strassburg: Trübner, 1876) 17. 66.  Ibid., 33. 67.  Ibid., 19.

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sary to degrade all other religions in order to elevate Christianity. Academics does not need partisanship.68 Nonetheless, Müller accords Christianity de facto an exceptional position among the religions in that it is the only one employed to provide a foundation for “comparative theology.”69 Yet it is not the case that Christianity constitutes the consummate religion toward which all religious history runs and in which it culminates. In dependence on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Müller holds: The same [as with the languages] applies with the religions. Whoever knows [only] one, knows none.70 In taking this position he prepared an even-handed path for the study of the history of religion, yet one that has encountered considerable opposition, as Adolf von Harnack observed thirty years later in a reversal of Müller’s position, in an incisive response on the significance of Christianity: Whoever knows this religion, knows none, and whoever knows it together with its history, knows them all.71 68.  Ibid., 34. 69.  Klimkeit, Müller, 37. The representatives of the history-of-religions school push this perspective even further, as Vollenweider (“Streit zwischen Schwestern? Zum Verhältnis von Exegese und Religionsgeschichte,” ZTK 106 [2009] 20–40, here 24), appropriately observes: “The description proceeds in a normative direction. Christianity occupies the top position in the historical upward progression of the religions. Ernst Troeltsch, the ‘systematician and dogmatician’ among the history-of-religions school, discusses this in a detailed manner. Other authors supported this view. Wilhelm Bousset, for example, reports solemnly in his quite influential ‘Religionsgeschichtlichen Volksbüchern’: It ‘is, however, only the Christian belief in God that is the clearest occurrence of everything that the long history of religions has laboriously wrestled to present’ (W. Bousset, Unser Gottesglaube [Religionsgeschichtliche Volksbücher für die deutsche christliche Gegenwart 5–6; Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1908] 12; cf. idem, Das Wesen der Religion: dargestellt an ihrer Geschichte [4th ed.; Lebensfragen 28; Tübingen: Mohr (Siebeck), 1920] 173–76 and esp. 195: ‘in Christianity is not only the highest point of development achieved, but in it all previous lines flow together’). While the history-of-religions school distanced themselves from systematically normative theology, they placed emphasis on ‘revelation.’ In this way the history of religion crystallized the enigmatic that was announced in perceptions, emotions, and impressions. The figure of Jesus, as one of the preeminent prophetic leaders, marked the peak of belief in God, which dogmatic Christology would cast aside.” 70.  Müller, Einleitung, 14. 71.  A. von Harnack, “Die Aufgabe der theologischen Facultäten und die allgemeine Religionsgeschichte: Rede zur Gedächtnisfeier des Stifters der Berliner Universität König Friedrich Wilhelm II. in der Aula derselben am 3. August 1901,” in Reden und Aufsätze (Gießen: Ricker, 1905) 2:159–78; the quote is from 2:168; cf. C. Colpe, “Bemerkungen zu Adolf von Harnacks Einschätzung der Disziplin ‘Allgemeine Religionsgeschichte,’ ” Neue Zeitschrift für Systematische Theologie und Religionsgeschichte 6 (1964) 51–69.

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However, in time Müller’s position prevailed over that of von Harnack. Christianity is not the religion par excellence, but instead represents one historical embodiment among others. Following at least the direction developed within the phenomenology of religion, neither can these various forms of religion be easily unraveled into comparable individual elements. Each form exists in its own universe of meaning with specific accentuations.72 4.  The Virtual Disappearance of the Subdiscipline “Theology of the Old Testament” over the Course of Its Historicization at the Turn of the Twentieth Century Within Christian theology during the nineteenth century, Old Testament studies established an increasingly historical and descriptive approach with regard to the representations of processes and developments of the theology of the Old Testament. This was vigorously supported by the development of ancient Near Eastern studies as well as the rise of ethnography.73 The enthusiasm for religious-historical work did not take place without consequence for theology. In fact, the effects were decisive for Old Testament studies. As a result, Hermann Schultz, for example, opted for a purely historical approach to the subject in his Alttestamentlichen Theologie, which was reprinted multiple times: The task of biblical theology is, then, a purely historical presentation whose sources are the biblical books. . . . Biblical theology should present in purely historical manner the faith perspectives and customary conceptions on offer in the times of the emergence of Israelite and Christian religion . . . What biblical theology demonstrates to be the religious and ethical content from a particular time of its development should not at all for that reason be deemed the doctrine of Christian faith or practice.74 72. Cf. the discussion in the contributions in A. Michaels, D. Pezzoli-Olgiati, and F. Stolz, eds. Noch eine Chance für die Religionsphänomenologie? (Bern: Lang, 2001). 73.  See, once again, the concise statement by Vollenweider, “Streit,” 26: “The context of the humanities during the second half of the nineteenth century—the development of the philology of the East and the expansion of horizons—is of great importance for the rise of the history of religions. Worthy of mention is especially the interaction with classical philology, primed by Hermann Usener and his students (such as Albrecht Dieterich), then by scholars such as Richard Reitzenstein, Eduard Norden, and Paul Wendland.” 74. H. Schultz, Alttestamentliche Theologie: die Offenbarungsreligion auf ihrer vorchristlichen Entwicklungsstufe (5th ed.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1896) 2.5; cf. P.  Ulrich, Hermann Schultz’ “Alttestamentliche Theologie” im Zusammenhang seines Lebens und Werkes (Ph.D. diss., University of Göttingen, 1988). W. H. Schmidt (“‘Theologie des Alten Testments’ vor und nach Gerhard von Rad,” in Psalmen und Weisheit: Theologische

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Bernhard Stade pushes in a similar direction, but expresses it in far more radical terms: By biblical theology of the OT one understands the history of the religion under the old covenant.75 . . . It is therefore the task of OT biblical theology to expound the formation and the content of the religious belief of Judaism and its ideals, on which Jesus draws in his proclamation, and on which the NT writers draw in their report on [Jesus’ proclamation] and in interpreting his person, and which are therefore the historical preconditions to Christianity.76 Like Heinrich Schultz and Karl Marti, Ernst Kautzsch proceeded without introductory methodological reflections in his posthumously published Biblischen Theologie des Alten Testaments (Tübingen, 1911), which is laid out as a “history of Israelite religion” (p. 2). Just how comprehensively this approach became established is on display in the fact that also the somewhat more conservative theologies of the Old Testament appearing at the time conceived of their task in this manner: The theology of the Old Testament, the first main part of biblical theology, is an historical-genetic presentation of the religion contained in the canonical writings of the Old Testament.77 However, at the foundation of this historical description is a completely different concept of history, as for instance Johann Christian Konrad von Hofmann developed in his notion of salvation history. In the aftermath of von Hofmann, Gustav Friedrich Oehler stated:78 The theology of the Old Testament should follow the stages through which Old Testament revelation progressed on its way to the culmination of salvation in Christ. It should present the forms Anthropologie und Jeremia, Theologie des Alten Testaments, vol 2. of Vielfalt und Einheit alttestamentlichen Glaubens [ed. A. Graupner et al.; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1995] 155–79 [here 157]) writes in commentary: “This principle separates Old Testament studies from theology not only practically and methodologically, but also in principle and deliberately, at least to the degree that it discusses current issues.” This judgment will be discussed below. 75.  Stade, Theologie, 1. Cf. also Smend, Lehrbuch, 1 (and n. 93) 76.  Smend, Lehrbuch, 2. 77.  Oehler, Theologie, 7. 78.  Cf. the still informative study by K. G. Steck, Die Idee der Heilsgeschichte: Hofmann – Schlatter – Cullmann (Zollikon, Switzerland: Evangelischer Verlag, 1959).

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Chapter 2 that the communion between God and humans took shape under the old covenant. . . . its task, stated in short, is the presentation of the entire economy of revelation.79

The results of this conviction are on display in the choice of titles of Rudolf Smend and Karl Marti’s attempts at “theologies,” which receive the titles Textbook of Old Testament Religious History and History of Israelite Religion.80 Characteristic for this approach is the action taken by Karl Marti in 1897 for the revision of August Kayser’s Theologie des Alten Testaments in ihrer geschichtlichen Entwicklung dargestellt (Strassburg: Schmidt, 1886), in which Marti simply changed the title to Geschichte der israelitischen Religion (3rd ed., Strassburg, 1897).81 This was not difficult because Marti determined the aim of both approaches without any difference as follows: By History of Israelite Religion, as well as by Theology of the Old Testament is meant that discipline concerned with the presentation of the religious and ethical content of the Old Testament.82 As a result, theology of the Old Testament as a project and as a nominally identifiable discipline basically disappeared from the stage.83 This movement was naturally analogous to New Testament studies, prominently represented especially by William Wrede. His Über Aufgabe und Methode 79.  G. F. Oehler, Theologie des Alten Testaments (3rd ed.; Stuttgart: Steinkopf, 1891) 8. 80.  Smend, Lehrbuch, 1: “Biblical theology has come to designate the sum of the disciplines that have the Bible as their subject of investigation. However, it is commonly understood in a more limited fashion as the final product of all work related to the Bible, namely the portrayal of biblical religion. In both cases, the name was once historically accurate, but neither of them correspond to the present use in biblical studies. In any case, the presentation of Old Testament religion is far less concerned with theological beliefs and conceptions than with the history of religion. The name of the discipline is also in accordance with this [change in the subject of study].” Later he writes, “The presentation of Old Testament religion should not be systematic” (ibid., 7). 81.  Marti had the second edition of A. Kayser’s Die Theologie des Alten Testaments in ihrer geschichtlichen Entwicklung dargestellt (Strassburg: Bull, 1894) published under the original title. He justified the change in title for the third edition as follows: “The positive responses to the new form of the book found, however, that placing the old title on it was like a ship sailing under the wrong flag. This was the reason why I furnished the later editions with a new title. History of Israelite Religion, as it was called from then on, corresponds, incidentally, much better to the organization of the book as a whole. It expresses the recognition of the fact that it is impossible to derive a uniform theology from a book as variegated and diverse as the Old Testament. The content on offer by so-called ‘Old Testament theologies’ also exhibits the ‘history of Israelite religion,’ though in the appropriate and possible historical manner of presentation” (K. Marti, Geschichte der israelitischen Religion [3rd rev. ed., Strassburg, 1897] v). 82.  Kayser [Marti], Theologie, 1. 83. Cf. Schmidt, “Theologie,” 157.

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der sogenannten neutestamentlichen Theologie (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1897)84 was a decisive milestone in the history-of-religions approach to its subject: I must articulate right at the beginning that in my remarks I presuppose the strictly historical character of New Testament theology.85 It was clear for Wrede that only through the historical approach could the New Testament be appropriately elucidated. As long as one accorded the theology of the New Testament “a direct relationship to systematics,” “then various, e.g., serious contradictions, in the New Testament are simply not allowed to occur.”86 Martin Dibelius characterized Wrede’s program in the following way: In place of the “succession of doctrinal concepts,” the presentation of the living development of early Christian religion appeared, and as a result one was not able to maintain the boundaries of the canon.87 Hermann Gunkel formulated the radical change that took place around the turn of the century in Old and New Testament studies in a particularly clear manner: Without a doubt, the emergence of biblical theology as a specific discipline separated from systematics was a great advancement that can never be reversed. Now, however, after the almost 200 years that biblical theology has dominated, many voices in this generation are calling for the renewal of this discipline. It has become increasingly acknowledged that errors are preserved in both the word “theology” and in “biblical.” First “theology”: Ever since Schleiermacher one has distinguished with growing clarity between “religion” itself and the academic, i.e., the 84. Pages 7–80 are reprinted in Probleme der Theologie des Neuen Testaments (ed. G.  Strecker; Wege der Forschung 367; Darmstadt: WBG 1975) 81–154; trans. as “The Task and Methods of ‘New Testament Theology,’ ” in The Nature of New Testament Theology (ed. R. Morgan; SBT Second Series 25; London: SCM, 1973) 68–116. Wrede was married to Elisabeth Schultz, daughter of Hermann Schultz, author of a similarly historically oriented “Alttestamentlichen Theologie.” On the later developments, see R. von Bendemann, “‘Theologie des Neuen Testaments’ oder ‘Religionsgeschichte des Frühchristentums’?” VF 48 (2003) 3–28. 85.  Wrede, “Aufgabe,” 82 [cf. ET: “Task,” 69]. 86.  Wrede, “Aufgabe,” 82 [cf. ET: “Task,” 69]. 87. M. Dibelius, “Biblische Theologie und biblische Religionsgeschichte II. des NT,” RGG (2nd ed.) 1:1091–94 (here 1091).

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Chapter 2 cognitive treatment, namely “theology.” And especially for the O.T. it is clear that the living religion of the heart was quite prominent, while reflection on religion plays a comparatively minor role. Neither the nature of the Israelite people nor the period tended toward reflection. If one intends to treat the content of the O.T. appropriately, then the emphasis should be placed on religion. . . . At the same time, the fence implied in the word ‘biblical ’ continues to fall. The maturing and blossoming religion from the soil of the Israelite nation is an extraordinarily diverse picture, in which all its forms and orientations, higher and baser, should be recognized . . .”88 If one looks deeper and attempts to recognize the ultimate basis for the shortcomings of biblical theology, one notices that it is dominated by the early church doctrine of inspiration. As a result, it views the entire content of the Bible on the same plane and is able to organize systematically with uniform character the unity of thinking that it believes the Bible to possess. If this organization is now rejected, then this ultimately means that the spirit of historical scholarship has moved into this area of study. The appearance that our generation has experienced in the “history of Israelite religion” replacing biblical theology is therefore explained by the spirit of historical scholarship beginning to replace the doctrine of inspiration.”89

Gunkel postulates the necessity of replacing the consideration of biblical theology of the Old Testament with that of the history of Israelite religion on the basis of the disintegration of the foundational framework of theology. Historical thought rather than the doctrine of inspiration determined theology during his time. While this final statement is correct, the immediately following history of scholarship brought other developments than those that Gunkel expected with regard to biblical theology. They will be considered in §6. However, because of its coincidental character, the next section will treat the reception of the concept of “theology” in 19th-century Jewish scholarship. 88. H. Gunkel, “Biblische Theologie und biblische Religionsgeschichte I. des AT,” RGG (2nd ed.) 1:1089–91 (here 1089–90). 89.  Ibid. Especially noteworthy in this context is his statement in the foreword to his commentary on Genesis: “Whoever calls himself a theologian must study religion” (H. Gunkel, Genesis: Übersetzt und erklärt [HKAT I/1; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht 1901] n. p., emphasis in original; translated as Genesis: Translated and Interpreted by Hermann Gunkel [trans. M. E. Biddle; Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1997]).

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V. The Reception of the Concept of Theology in the “Academic Study of Judaism” and Its Application to Rabbinic Tradition The concept of “theology” has a comparatively short and controversial history in Judaism, essentially limited to the modern period.90 Though Josephus and Philo were aware of and used the term “theology” and its derivatives,”91 they remained non-specified applications, essentially within the horizon of the profane Greek fields of meaning.92 The concept of theology was first taken up in programmatic fashion in a prominent manner in the nineteenth-century movement grounded and driven by Leopold Zunz and other proponents of “Jewish studies.” In this 90.  Lists of the use of the concept of theology in the Jewish tradition appear in E. Ben Zvi, “Constructing the Past: The Recent History of Jewish Biblical Theology,” in Jewish Bible Theology: Perspectives and Case Studies (ed. I. Kalimi; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2012) 31–50 (here 42 n. 37); M. A. Sweeney, “Foundations for a Jewish Theology of the Hebrew Bible: Prophets in Dialogue,” in Jewish Bible Theology, 161–86 (here 161 n. 1). The concept of theologia prisca—the notion of an original truth extending beyond religions—was used in the Italian Renaissance also for the traditions of Jewish Kabbala. 91.  See above, §2.I.1. 92. S. Gesundheit (“Gibt es eine jüdische Theologie der Hebräischen Bibel?” in Theologie und Exegese des Alten Testaments / der Hebräischen Bibel: Zwischenbilanz und Zukunftsperspektiven [ed. B. Janowski; SBS 200; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 2005] 73–86 [here 77–78]) has pointed to various places in the Talmud that demonstrate clear systematizing impulses, such as bab. Makkot 23b–24a: “Rabbi Simlai when preaching said: 613 precepts were communicated to Moses, 365 negative precepts, corresponding to the number of days of the solar year, and 248 positive precepts, corresponding to the number of the members of the human body. . . . David came and reduced them to eleven [citation from Ps 15]. Yeshaʾayahu came and reduced them to six [citation from Isa 33:15–16]. Micah reduced them to three [citation from Mic 6:8]. Amos reduced them to one, as it is written: ‘Seek me and live.’ . . . To this Rab Nahman b. Isaac replied, ‘Might not Seek me be taken as observing the whole Torah (that is, all the commandments)? Rather, it is Habakkuk who came and reduced them to one, as it is written (Hab 2:4), ‘. . . but the righteous shall live by his fidelity.’” Gesundheit points to H. Graetz, Vom Untergang des Jüdischen Staates bis zum Abschluss des Talmud, vol. 4 of Geschichte der Juden von den ältesten Zeiten bis auf die Gegenwart (4th ed.; Leipzig: Leiner, 1908; repr. Berlin: Arani, 1996) 242: “This is the first attempt to trace all the laws of Judaism back to one principle.” In this context it is worth noting the rabbinical discussion mentioned in B. Sommer (“Psalm 1 and the Canonical Shaping of Jewish Scripture,” in Jewish Bible Theology: Perspectives and Case Studies [ed. I. Kalimi; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2012] 199–221 [here 200]), that it is permissible to convert a house of prayer into a house of instruction but not the reverse: “Rav Papi said in the name of Rava, ‘[It is] permissible [to convert] a house of prayer into a house of study, but [it is] forbidden [to convert] a house of study into a house of prayer.’ But Rav Papa taught the opposite in the name of Rava. Rav Aḥa held that the method of Rav Papi was more likely, since Rabbi Joshua ben Levi had earlier said, ‘It is lawful to convert a house of prayer into a house of study.’ ” One should be cautious, however, about designating such attempts at compromise as systematic theology. They are more reductive in their approach and remain aphoristic in terms of their form. At the same time, the attempt is noteworthy in that it investigates a complex existing tradition for their commonalities.

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context, a Wissenschaftliche Zeitschrift für jüdische Theologie was published beginning in 1835 by Abraham Geiger, and in 1854 a Jewish-theological seminary in Breslau was founded, which beginning in 1886 had a partner (and then from 1939 on a replacement) institution—the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in New York.93 Clearly visible in the background of these efforts is the aim to establish the written records, traditions, and history of Judaism as an object of academic investigation on analogy with Christianity. These initiatives were quite formative. The concept of theology was used for Jewish traditions in the latter nineteenth and twentieth centuries also in descriptions from the outside, though use of the concept often remained in relation to the concept of religion, just like its use in relation to Christianity.94 Ferdinand Wilhelm Weber, a Christian pastor, published a book about the Talmud with the title Jüdische Theologie auf Grund des Talmud und verwandter Schriften (Leipzig: Dörffling & Franke, 1897). Solomon Schechter treated Major Concepts of the Talmud (the subtitle) in his Aspects of Rabbinic Theology (London: Black, 1909, repr. New York: Schocken, 1961); Kaufmann Kohler published a Jewish Theology Systematically and Historically Considered (New York: Macmillan, 1918). A volume of writing by Arthur Marmorstein appeared with the title Studies in Jewish Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1950), treating subjects such as “The Background of the Haggadah,” “The Unity of God in Rabbinic Literature,” and “The Holy Spirit in the Rabbinic Legend,” among others. In Samuel S. Cohon’s Jewish Theology: A Historical and Systematic Interpretation of Judaism and Its Foundations (Assen: Van Gorcum, 1971), an understanding of theology is found that corresponds exactly in formal terms to that of Christianity, namely in the organization of religion: 93. M. Brann, Geschichte des Jüdisch-Theologischen Seminars (Fraenckel’sche Stiftung) in Breslau: Festschrift zum fünfzigjährigen Jubiläum der Anstalt (Breslau: Schatzky, 1904; repr. Hildesheim: Olms, 2009). On Jewish studies, also in the subsequent era, see K. Wilhelm, ed., Wissenschaft des Judentums im deutschen Sprachbereich. Ein Querschnitt (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1967); C. Wiese, Wissenschaft des Judentums und protestantische Theologie im wilhelminischen Deutschland: Ein Schrei ins Leere? (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999); M. Brenner and S. Rohrbacher, eds., Wissenschaft vom Judentum: Annäherungen nach dem Holocaust (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000). 94.  Nevertheless, the theology terminology was hardly based on the Bible alone. Cf. B. Sommer, “Dialogical Biblical Theology: A Jewish Approach to Reading Scripture Theologically,” in Biblical Theology: Introduction and Conversation (ed. L. G. Perdue et al.; Nashville: Abingdon, 2009) 1–53 (here 1): “Strictly speaking, there can be no such thing as Jewish biblical theology. While many definitions of the term ‘biblical theology’ exist, they all accord some privileged place to the Bible. All forms of Jewish theology, however, must base themselves on Judaism’s rich postbiblical tradition at least as much as on scripture, and hence a Jewish theology cannot be chiefly biblical.”

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Theology conceptualizes religious experience. It translates the life and faith of a religious community into ideas that are intelligible and communicable and give coherent answers to the spiritual questions which press upon the mind. The function of Jewish theology is to render the nature and goals of Judaism understandable and to show Judaism’s relevance for our times. 1: Religion, supplying the data of theological investigation, naturally precedes theology, even as flowers precede botany, or as health precedes hygiene or medicine.95 Theology is understood here completely in keeping with the Christian tradition as the form of reflection on faith.96 Nonetheless, the use of the concept of theology in Judaism remained marginal in the grand scheme of things.97 This can be explained by the nature of the content in postbiblical Jewish tradition. The Encyclopedia Judaica asserts in the framework of the article “Theology”: The Bible contains no systematic treatment of theological problems. . . . All this is largely due to the severely concrete, “organic” nature of ancient Hebraic thought which hardly bears any resemblances to the philosophical thinking that is the heritage of the Greeks and to which the Western world owes its theology. To a greater or lesser extent the same is true of rabbinic thought.98 95. Cohon, Jewish Theology, xv. 96. Cf. also, quite recently, J. Neusner, Rabbinic Judaism: The Theological System (Leiden: Brill, 2002). The classic presentation by Y. Kaufmann (Tōledōt hā-ʾemūnā hayyiśraʾēlīt mīmē qedem ʿad sōf bayit šēnī [4 vols.; Jerusalem: Bialik, 1937–56]; trans. and abridged as The Religion of Israel: From the Beginning to the Babylonian Exile [trans. and abridged by M. Greenberg; Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1960]) instead places the focus on faith, that is, religion. 97. Cf. T. Frymer-Kensky, “The Emergence of Jewish Biblical Theologies,” in Jews, Christians, and the Theology of the Hebrew Scriptures (ed. A. Ogden Bellis and J. S. Kaminsky; SBLSymS 8; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000) 109–21 (here 109): “Theology was narrowly understood as the study of God, and writing about God was not considered a Jewish activity.” 98. L. Jacobs, “Theology,” EncJud 15:1103–10 (here 1104). M. Sweeney (Tanak: A Theological and Critical Introduction to the Jewish Bible [Minneapolis: Fortress, 2012]), however, employs a similar conception of theology to Rendtorff, Theologie des Alten Testaments, for the Bible. On rabbinical interpretation, see D. W. Halivni, Peshat und Derash: Plain and Applied Meaning in Rabbinic Exegesis (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991); M. Fishbane, ed., The Midrashic Imagination: Jewish Exegesis, Thought and History (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1993); G. Stemberger, “Mishnah and Dead Sea Scrolls: Are There Meaningful Parallels and Continuities?,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages, and Cultures (ed. A. Lange et al.; 2 vols.; VTSup 140; Leiden: Brill, 2011) 2:619–29; for an overview, see idem, “Hermeneutik der Jüdischen Bibel,” in Hermeneutik der Jüdischen Bibel und des Alten

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There is also a further aspect. In correspondence with the authoritative Islamic tradition of the time,99 medieval Jewish reflections on the Bible and the rabbinic tradition were expressed in religious–philosophical rather than theological terms for determining the outline of the whole.100 Especially well known for this approach are the works of Saadia Gaon and Moses Maimonides. Saadia Gaon’s ʾemunot we-deʿot (“The Book of Beliefs and Opinions”) is considered one of the first philosophically grounded and systematically formulated presentations of Jewish doctrine. The book first appeared in 933 c.e. in Arabic with the title kitab al-amanat wal-l’tikadat, and was first translated into Hebrew in the twelfth century.101 Also arising during this time was Maimonides’ principle work, Dalālat alḥāʾirīn, which became known by its Hebrew title as moreh nevukim (“Teacher/ Guide of the Perplexed”).102 It attempts to comprehend philosophically such topoi as God, creation, mysticism, ethics, and eschatology.103 In keeping with these approaches, the terminology of both theology and philosophy was used for attempts at a synthetic view of the Hebrew Bible. One noteworthy example is David Neumark’s The Philosophy of the Bible (Cincinnati, 1918), which, despite its title, does not elucidate how his understanding of theology is distinct from that of philosophy; he instead attempts to give a “presentation of the history of thought in biblical Judaism.”104 A similar approach appears recently in Yoram Hazony, The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture: An Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), which has, however, encountered intense criticism.105 Testaments (ed. C. Dohmen and G. Stemberger; Kohlhammer Studienbücher Theologie 1,2; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1996) 22–132. 99. U. Rudolph, Islamische Philosophie: Von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart (Munich: Beck, 2004); on the relationship with theology see ibid., 21–24; and idem, “Islamische Theologie,” RGG (4th ed.) 4:259–62. 100. Y. Hazony (The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture: An Introduction [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012]), attempts to describe the intellectual endeavors of the Hebrew Bible in philosophical terms, but he omits the genre-oriented imprint of the biblical texts and overstretches the concept of “philosophy.” 101. J. Fürst, ʾEmunot we–Deʿot oder Glaubenslehren und Philosophie von Saʾadja Fajjumi: Aus dem Hebräischen mit theilweiser Benutzung des Arabischen übersetzt (Leipzig: Wiegand, 1845; repr. Hildesheim: Olms 1970). Cf. W. Bacher, Die Bibelexegese der jüdischen Religionsphilosophen des Mittelalters vor Maimuni (Budapest: Adold Alkalay, 1892); M.-R. Hayoun, L’exégèse philosophique dans le judaïsme médiéval (Texts and Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Judaism 7; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1992). 102. Cf. M. Ben Maimon, Führer der Unschlüssigen, übersetzt und kommentiert von Adolf Weiß (3rd. ed; Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1995). 103.  On Maimonides, see H. A. Davidson, Moses Maimonides: The Man and His Works (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010). 104.  Neumark, Philosophy of the Bible, iii. Thanks to Shimon Gesundheit (Jerusalem) for the reference to this work. 105.  J. D. Levenson, “Category Error,” Jewish Review of Books 11 (2012), n.p. http:// www.jewishreviewofbooks.com/publications/detail/category-error.

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VI. The Devaluation of the Concept of Religion in Dialectical Theology 1. New Theologies of the Old Testament from the 1930s Shortly after the virtual disappearance of theology as an independent concern from Christian Old Testament studies at the end of the nineteenth century, a countermovement—influenced by the experience of the First World War—set in. Rudolf Kittel,106 Wilhelm Staerk,107 Carl Steuernagel,108 and Otto Eissfeldt109 called, each in his own way, for an independent theology of the Old Testament distinct from the historyof-religions perspective. John J. Collins has in retrospect even called it a “neo-orthodox phase”110 in the history of the discipline of “theology of the Old Testament.” Otto Eisfeldt called most forcefully for the separation between the religious-historical and the theological approaches to the Hebrew Bible: The historical perspective on the one hand and the theological on the other hand belong to two different levels. They correspond to two different types of functions of our soul, that of cognition and of faith.111 Eissfeldt considered the intermixing of the two perspectives “destructive,” that is “dangerous.”112 This opinion is conspicuous in that it comes from the primarily historically oriented Eissfeldt, yet he clearly understood the 106. R. Kittel, “Die Zukunft der alttestamentlichen Wissenschaft,” ZAW 39 (1921) 84–99. 107. W. Staerk, “Religionsgeschichte und Religionsphilosophie in ihrer Bedeutung für die biblische Theologie des Alten Testaments,” ZTK new series 4 (1923) 289–300. 108. C. Steuernagel, “Alttestamentliche Theologie und alttestamentliche Religionsgeschichte,” in Vom Alten Testament (ed. K. Budde; BZAW 41; Gießen: Töpelmann, 1925) 266–73. 109. O. Eissfeldt (“Israelitisch–jüdische Religionsgeschichte und alttestamentliche Theologie,” ZAW 44 [1926] 1–12; repr. and cited according to Kleine Schriften [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1962] 1:105–14 [here 105]; trans. as “The History of Israelite-Jewish Religion and Old Testament Theology,” in Old Testament Theology: Flowering and Future [ed. and trans. by B. C. Ollenburger; Sources for Biblical and Theological Study 1; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2004]) articulates the task of theology in such a way that it does not concern the “past, but rather the current-universal.” 110.  J. J. Collins, Encounters with Biblical Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005) 13. 111.  Eissfeldt, “Religionsgeschichte,” 109. Cf. H.-J. Zobel, “Otto Eißfeldt als Theologe: Zum Verhältnis von ‘Israelitisch–jüdischer Religionsgeschichte’ und ‘Alttestamentlicher Theologie’ im Lebenswerk Otto Eißfeldts,” in Otto-Eissfeldt-Ehrung 1987 (ed. G. Wallis; Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg Wissenschaftliche Beiträge 1988/36 (A 108); Halle (Saale): University of Halle-Wittenberg, 1988) 19–44. 112.  Ibid., 109, 111.

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theological dimension of the Hebrew Bible to be qualitiatively separate from that of the historical. The historical consideration of the OT should never move beyond the relative and the immanent.113 However, theology calls for just this further perspective, and as a result it must go beyond the historical. With a similar impulse, Eduard König lamented at the beginning of his Theologie des Alten Testaments, published in 1921, and in its 3rd edition in 1923: Works concerning “biblical theology of the Old Testament” that have appeared recently offer merely a history of Israelite religion. They do not contain a systematic presentation of the elements and ideas that have been proven vital for the salvation history of the Old Testament.114 But the situation began to change in the following decades. In the 1930s two strongly systematic-oriented theologies of the Old Testament appeared, those of Walther Eichrodt and Ludwig Köhler.115 Rather than concentrating on historical reconstruction, these works instead offer a synthesis of the theologically relevant ideas of the Old Testament. Jörg Jeremias calls the departures of the 1930s the actual “hour of birth of the ‘theology of the OT’ as an independent discipline, . . . because for the first time since J. Ph. Gabler, exegetes . . . interacted confidently and free of fear with regard to the foreignness when interacting with the themes of systematic theology.”116 Both Eichrodt’s and also Köhler’s works show an unmistakable proximity to the concerns of systematic theology.117 Their theologies could almost be described as systematic theologies of the Old Testament, organized with similar structures to Christian systematic theologies. Yet their subject was not the Bible and the early church, or as the case may be the doctrinal cultivation stemming from Reformational 113.  Ibid., 109. 114.  König, Theologie, 3. 115. W. Eichrodt, Theologie des Alten Testaments. Teil 2+3: Gott und Welt – Gott und Mensch (5th ed.; Stuttgart: Klotz /Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1964; trans. J. A. Baker, Theology of the Old Testament, vol. 2; OTL; London: SCM, 1967); L. Köhler, Theologie des Alten Testaments (4th ed.; Neue theologische Grundrisse; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1966; first edition [1953] trans. A. S. Todd, Old Testament Theology; Philadelphia: Fortress / London: Lutterworth, 1957). 116. J. Jeremias, “Neuere Entwürfe zu einer ‘Theologie des Alten Testaments,’ ” in Theologie und Exegese des Alten Testaments / der Hebräischen Bibel. Zwischenbilanz und Zukunftsperspektiven (ed. B. Janowski; SBS 200; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2005) 125–58 (here 129). 117.  Cf. also Eichrodt, Theologie.

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developments; it was limited to the Hebrew Bible. One could term these projects—given their subject as the Hebrew Bible rather than the Bible as a whole—something like “provisional” systematic theologies. The reception of Eichrodt’s and Köhler’s projects were occasionally marked by striking differences.118 While Köhler chose a more systematic outline that distinguished between theology, anthropology, and soteriology,119 Eichrodt allowed the theme of the covenant, a principle found in the Hebrew Bible itself, to guide his organization. Nonetheless, a look at only the subtitles of Eichrodt’s three volumes shows that his structure was quite similar to Köhler’s:120 “God and World,” “God and the Nation,” “God and Human.”121 On the flip side, Köhler actually allowed the formulation of his theology to be guided by the terminology and intellectual world of the Hebrew Bible, which was less the case with Eichrodt.122 It is clear, however, that both Köhler’s and Eichrodt’s theologies are descriptive rather than normative in orientation.123 The renaissance of Old Testament theology in the 1930s, as will be shown below in §2.VI.2, cannot be understood without casting a glance at the marginally earlier emergence of Dialectical Theology, which resisted the history-of-religions and social-scientific monopolization of the Bible, favoring the rise of theological investigations of the Bible. It is striking, however, that Köhler, one of the authors of the central works of the period, was actually a representative of liberal theology.124 While Eichrodt, 118.  Cf. J. Barr, The Concept of Biblical Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1999) (here 28–31). On Eichrodt see also D. G. Spriggs, Two Old Testament Theologies: A Comparative Evaluation of the Contributions of Eichrodt and von Rad to our Understanding of the Nature of Old Testament Theology (London: SCM, 1974). 119.  Köhler, Theologie, v. The titles of the main sections are “Concerning God” (ibid., 1), “Concerning Humans” (ibid., 114), “Concerning Judgment and Salvation (ibid., 190). 120. Cf. Jeremias, “Neuere Entwürfe zu einer ‘Theologie des Alten Testaments,’ ” 130. 121.  The structure follows that of Die Theologie des Alten Testaments (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlaghaus, 1950) by Eichrodt’s teacher, Procksch, which actually appeared after (1950) that of Eichrodt (1936–39). Eichrodt likely became familiar with the content of Procksch’s theology through his lectures, however (cf. Zimmerli, “Biblische Theologie,” 440). 122. Cf. L. Köhler, Der hebräische Mensch: Eine Skizze: Mit einem Anhang: Die hebräische Rechtsgemeinde (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1953). See also idem, “Alttestamentliche Theologie.” 123.  Eichrodt professes in the “Introduction” of the fifth edition of his Theologie to “the rejection of all temptations that would allow it [Old Testament theology] to extend its reach to the realm of normative studies” (vi, cf. Zimmerli, “Biblische Theologie,” 441). 124. Cf. his autobiography (L. Köhler, Ein Schweizer wird Schweizer: Jugenderinnerungen [Schaffhausen: Protestantische Pfarrergemeinschaft, 1946]) as well as R. Smend, Jr., “Ludwig Köhler,” in Theologisches geschenkt (ed. C. Bizer et al.; Bovenden: Foedus, 1996) 185–95. Note also Köhler’s position in the dispute with E. Brunner concerning the doctrine of original sin; cf. K. Schmid, “Die Geschichte vom Sündenfall zwischen historischer Bibelkritik und Theologie: Die Kontroverse zwischen Ludwig Köhler, Emil Brunner

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following in the steps of his Erlangen teacher Otto Procksch,125 displayed considerable interest in confessionally bound and formed theology. Belonging to the wider circle of this approach was the Theologie des Alten Testaments in Grundzügen (ET: An Outline of Old Testament Theology) by Theodoor Christiaan Vriezen (German: Neukirchen, 1956; ET: Oxford, 1958). The progression of subheadings began with “Revelation” (ibid., 10), while “Theology” first appeared considerably later (ibid., 94): According to its method and its content, theology is a quite different form of study than the history of Israelite religion—with regard to the content, because it is not specifically the religion of Israel but rather the Old Testament that forms the subject of investigation; with regard to its method, because it investigates the preaching of the Old Testament, both on its own terms and in its relationship to the New Testament.126 Nonetheless, the approach taken by Eichrodt, Köhler, and Vriezen did not endure for the long term, despite its wide dissemination. Though they attempted to link the systematizations of their theology closely to the Bible, this proved to be a Procrustean bed. The witness of the Hebrew Bible proved to be too diverse to be categorized sufficiently. 2. Religion as “Unbelief” in the Work of Karl Barth One cannot adequately understand the resuscitation of the theology of the Old Testament in the 1930s without noting the fate of the concept of religion127 in Dialectical Theology, which appears at its most critical formulation in Karl Barth’s thesis that religion is “unbelief ”: Religion is unbelief. Religion is a concern, one can even say, the concern of godless people.128 Religion stands in opposition to revelation for Barth. Religion as such is the work of humans and should therefore be minimized: “Religion is never and nowhere true in and of itself.”129 Attempting to place Christiund Hugo Gressmann aus dem Jahr 1926,” in Biblische Theologie und historisches Denken: Wissenschaftsgeschichtliche Studien aus Anlass der 50. Wiederkehr der Basler Promotion von Rudolf Smend (ed. M. Kessler and M. Wallraff; Studien zur Geschichte der Wissenschaften in Basel New Series 5; Basel: Schwabe, 2008) 335–55. 125.  Cf. above, p. 35 n. 121. 126.  Ibid., 97, emphasis original. 127.  Wagner, Was ist Religion? 128.  KD I/2, 324–56, here 327. 129.  Ibid., 356.

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anity in connection with the concept of religion should only occur with great caution: The proclamation that Christianity is the true religion, if it is to be a meaningful proclamation, should only be ventured within the context of God’s revelation.130 With this harsh declaration against the notion of religion, Barth took a stand against the mainstream nineteenth-century position. Accompanying the gradual success of Dialectical Theology, whose influence shaped German-speaking Protestant theology after 1945, skepticism towards “religion” increased. On the flip side, the concept of theology, generally used in a pejorative manner in nineteenth-century biblical studies, bloomed once again. This development also led to a lack of clarity, however, in the conceptual distinction between religion and theology, especially in Old Testament studies. This is documented most clearly in Gerhard von Rad’s Theology of the Old Testament, which discusses religious, literary, and theological aspects of the Hebrew Bible all under this title (see more on von Rad below, §2.VII.1). While it was no longer a product of the 1920s and 1930s, it was still broadly within the theological tradition of Dialectical Theology. It is difficult to explain the brittle use of the concept of religion in this work otherwise (see below, §2.VII.1). The stigmatization of the concept of religion and the emphasis on divine revelation in Jesus Christ within the framework of Dialectical Theology also led to the programmatic conclusion by Emil Brunner and Raul Gyllenberg that a theology of the Old Testament is impossible.131 Because the Hebrew Bible is neither familiar with nor documents this revelation, there cannot be an independent theology of the Hebrew Bible. While these opinions came from outside Old Testament studies, they were also heard from within. Accordingly, there have been numerous later voices that have harshly critiqued Dialectical Theology’s influence on biblical studies: This theology [i.e., Dialectical Theology] certainly took hold of the unanswered task from the history-of-religions theology to 130.  Ibid., 357. 131. E. Brunner, Offenbarung und Vernunft: Die Lehre von der christlichen Glaubenserkenntnis (Zurich: Zwingli-Verlag, 1941) 287: “There is no ‘theology of the Old Testament’”; and before him R. Gyllenberg, “Die Unmöglichkeit einer Theologie des Alten Testaments,” in In piam memoriam Alexander von Bulmerincq, vol. 3 (ed. E. Plates; Abhandlungen der Herder-Gesellschaft und des Herder Instituts zu Riga 6; Riga: Plates, 1938) 64–68.

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Chapter 2 determine more precisely the special nature of Christianity and its God. But as a result it damaged especially Old Testament studies by renouncing a religious-historical approach, [which meant] the abandonment of an appropriate determination of the uniqueness of Israelite religion and the resuscitation of allegorical-typological interpretation of the OT.132

It is likely that certain personal resentment lay behind this declaration, and it is difficult to evaluate the history of the humanities and of academic developments in terms that are objective and meaningful when using the categories of “damaging” versus “useful.” However, this estimation points to an important deficit that can be observed in Old Testament studies during the middle of the twentieth century. 3. The “Biblical Theology Movement” as a Late Consequence of Gabler among Anglo-Saxon Scholars Dialectical Theology, which originated in German-speaking scholarship, quickly developed into a globally important movement, even if one with different accents and different spokespersons in various geographic regions. Particularly in Great Britain and in the U.S.A., there was considerable resonance with Dialectical Theology, leading both during and after the Second World War to the Biblical Theology Movement.133 This movement attempted, on the one hand, to highlight the importance of the Bible for theology. On the other hand, it attempted to link theology back to the Bible again. In terms of the interpretation of the biblical text, Krister Stendahl’s well-known article on “Biblical Theology” in the Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible insisted that biblical exegesis consider not only “what it meant,” but also “what it means.”134 Theological approaches to the Bible should, therefore, push beyond historical concerns in that they should consider the current significance of biblical texts. John J. Collins reformulates and adapts this position on the matter in the following manner: Biblical theology should not, however, be reduced to the “historical fact that such and such was thought and believed” but should clarify the meaning and truth-claims of what was thought and believed from a modern critical perspective.135 132. G. Fohrer, Geschichte der israelitischen Religion (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1969; trans. D. E. Green, History of Israelite Religion; Nashville: Abingdon, 1972) 6. 133.  Cf. the treatment in Reventlow, Hauptprobleme der alttestamentlichen Theologie, 1–10. 134. K. Stendahl, “Biblical Theology, Contemporary,” IDB 1:418–32 (here 419). 135.  Collins, Encounters, 18.

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John W. Rogerson, who belongs to the broader circles of this tradition, authored a short theology of the Old Testament that is dedicated almost exclusively to the latter question (“What it means”): A Theology of the Old Testament is a work which, to paraphrase Bultmann, will use the resources of historical criticism in the service of the interpretation of Old Testament texts, on the assumption that they have something to say to the present.136 Then, at the beginning of the 1970s, especially under the influence of the publications of Brevard S. Childs, the Biblical Theology Movement developed a strong working interest in the “canonical approach.”137 This approach emphasizes the final form of the biblical text and its supposed normativity. However, it then went on to follow its own agenda. The “Biblical Theology Movement” went far beyond the impulse it had received from Eichrodt. Eichrodt intended to revitalize the subdiscipline of “theology of the Old Testament” within Old Testament studies and to restore it to an independent stature. The “Biblical Theology Movement” was closer to Gabler’s demand for an independent discipline of biblical theology, which investigated the present relevance and normativity of the historical witness of the Bible. Behind this conviction is the theological perspective that biblical studies is not only responsible for the historical description of the biblical texts, but also for the application of the biblical texts to the present context. Whether dividing the disciplines of theology so that biblical studies receives this additional task makes sense must remain an open question at this point.138

VII. The Pluralization of the Theology of the Hebrew Bible/ Old Testament as a Result of Its Historicization 1.  The Salvation History Paradigm and the Virtual Identification of Theology and Literary History / History of Religion Gerhard von Rad wrote his epochal Theologie des Alten Testaments (1957/1960) in the context of the post-war German-speaking scholarly setting, and he viewed the retelling of the Hebrew Bible as the only 136.  J. W. Rogerson, A Theology of the Old Testament: Cultural Memory, Communication, and Being Human (London: SPCK, 2009) 12. 137.  Childs identified himself only with criticism of what he characterized as the dissolving Biblical Theology Movement; see B. S. Childs, Biblical Theology in Crisis (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1970). Cf. on Childs, S. Krauter, “Brevard S. Childs’ Programm einer Biblischen Theologie: Eine Untersuchung seiner systematisch–theologischen und methodologischen Fundamente,” ZTK 96 (1999) 22–48. 138.  See below, §4.II.

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legitimate option.139 This is a surprising choice when considered in light of, first, the works of his predecessors in the discipline, Eichrodt and Köhler, and second, the layout of the standard work of the neighboring discipline, Rudolf Bultmann’s Theology of the New Testament, which formulates theology in terms of anthropology. However, von Rad clearly did not allow the genre specifications for either a theology of his own discipline or the neighboring one to influence him. Decisive instead were those insights about the unique content of the Hebrew Bible that seemed to have been established at that time as especially characteristic of the Hebrew Bible. According to the information von Rad himself provides, the most important changes to be found in Old Testament studies following Köhler and Eichrodt are those in the wake of Gunkel’s form-critical scholarship. Here one “encounters quite ancient creedal formulas”—von Rad points to the results of his study on “The Form-Critical Problem of the Hexateuch” from 1938—which prove that the theme of story belongs to the historical nucleus of the Hebrew Bible. On the other hand—and here von Rad paid deference to his colleague Martin Noth—he asserts: [The] tradition-history instructs . . . in the three large works— Hexateuch, Deuteronomistic History, and Chronistic History— through the most diverse forms in their various layers to see anew the depiction of the story of God with Israel. Israel was at all times concerned with understanding its story in terms of certain divine interactions and how these divine interventions were portrayed differently in each time.140 Both changes led to emphasis on the theme of story in the theology of the Hebrew Bible and to the structural decision to formulate such a theology in the mode of retelling. Von Rad thereby separates theology clearly from a program of the history of religion of ancient Israel: The actual theological task for the Old Testament does not correspond with that of general religious studies. It is much more limited. The object that theology is concerned with is not the spiritual-religious world of Israel and the constitution of its soul, 139.  G. von Rad, Theologie, 1:126 [ET: 121]. Cf the preliminary methodological reflections in idem, “Grundprobleme einer biblischen Theologie des Alten Testaments,” TLZ 68 (1943) 225–34; idem, “Kritische Vorarbeiten zu einer Theologie des Alten Testaments,” in Theologie und Liturgie: Eine Gesamtschau der gegenwärtigen Forschung in Einzeldarstel­ lungen (ed. L. Hennig; Kassel: Stauda, 1952) 11–34. 140.  Ibid., 1:7 [ET: v].

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neither is it its world of belief. All of these are only accessible through inferences from its documents. But [the theological task is] rather only what Israel itself directly declared of Yahweh. [These declarations] limit themselves to Yahweh’s relationship to Israel and to the world, actually only to portray one perspective, namely continual divine action in history. What is meant by this is that the faith of Israel is fundamentally based on a theology of history.141 It cannot be said that von Rad really stuck to his own narrow understanding of “theology of the Old Testament” in his composition. In reality he treated the texts of the Hebrew Bible in such a way that recognized various forms of theology in them. Von Rad speaks of the “theological world of Jeremiah” (2:203 [ET: 193]), and the prophets go in “completely new theological directions” (2:198 [ET: 187]). Every time the task was given “to proclaim [the basic creed] in the theologically appropriate form” (1:304 [ET]).142 According to his program, the “theology” that was the object of investigation was not really the “theological world” of Jeremiah, but rather “what Israel directly proclaimed about Yahweh.” Von Rad constructed a differentiation that, as Friedrich Baumgärtel correctly notes, in my opinion, does not really exist: The problem that is treated in it [that is, the Theology] is according to v. R. the following: On one hand is the depiction formulated by historical-critical studies of the course of Israel’s history and its intellectual-religious world and its world of belief—a task that can also be carried out by non-theologians. This aspect remains stuck in the history of religion. Against this rationally constructed historical world is the depiction of Israel’s faith that has witnessed to the “continual divine action in history” (1:112 [ET: 106]), so that Israel’s faith “is fundamentally based on a theology of history” (ibid.). In this depiction one does not encounter historical facts established by historical-critical scholarship; it instead concerns facts “which [are] drawn up from the faith of Israel” (ibid. [ET: 107]). In this divergence v. R. sees the current heavy burden of biblical studies: it deals with “completely different intellectual activities.” One is [a] rational-historical method, the other is “confessional, personally involved in the events.” Israel speaks 141.  Ibid., 1:111–12 [ET: 105–6], cf. 117 [ET: 111]. 142.  Cf. F. Baumgärtel, “Gerhard von Rads ‘Theologie des Alten Testaments,’ ” TLZ 86 (1961) 801–16, 895–908.

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Chapter 2 only “with the passion of glory and regret about its history.” Historical scholarship “cannot explain the phenomenon of this faith” (1:113–14 [ET: 107–8]).143

Baumgärtel views this “divergence” between the historically reconstructible world of Israel’s faith and Israel’s confession of faith in God’s activity in history to be a false problem. To this can be said: there is nothing that diverges here, at least not for current critical biblical studies. The fact that the depiction constructed by Israel’s confessional faith of history often does not correspond to the actual historical sequences is a result of critical scholarship. This scholarship labors not only to ascertain the actual historical progression, but certainly also with regard to the portrayal of the perspective that Israel itself had of its history (salvation-history). . . . This perspective is certainly also a part of history . . . and it should be investigated and depicted with the tools of historical criticism.144 As a result of this quite unclear distinction between the world of faith and the confession of faith, von Rad’s program headed straight toward an identification of literary history with theology, as Zimmerli, for example, notes in an uncritical manner: What was earlier “literature,” perhaps “religious literature,” which began to grow stronger in light of Gunkel’s search for the Sitz im Leben and could be understood as animated or even artful sagas told around the campfire or also as piously reported sanctuary legends received the distinction of Israel’s confessional declarations that proclaim the faith and unmediated existence of the people of Yahweh.145 Carl A. Keller describes the problem in the most incisive manner:

143.  Ibid., 803–4. 144.  Ibid., 804. Cf. also ibid., 805: “Stated succinctly: the ‘confessional portrayal of history’ that comes from faith is a part of the religious history of Israel and as such can be investigated with the current historical-critical research methodology.” 145. W. Zimmerli, “Alttestamentliche Traditionsgeschichte und Theologie,” in Probleme biblischer Theologie (ed. H. W. Wolff; Munich: Kaiser, 1971) 632–47 (here 632). Zimmerli admired von Rad’s Theologie, but he inquired whether a theology of the Old Testament ought not be more systematizing (idem, “Review of Gerhard von Rad, Theologie des Alten Testaments,” VT 13 [1963] 105), as he has done in his own outline (Zimmerli, Grundriss).

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Von Rad’s book is basically not a theology, but rather an introduction.146 It is interesting to note that this judgment can actually be based on a selfdeclaration by von Rad in the foreword of the first volume of his Theology from 1957: Characteristic of the current situation in my opinion is the surprising convergence, even complementary overlap, between scholarly introductions and biblical theology that has taken place in the research of the past 20 to 30 years.147 One can in fact say that Gerhard von Rad’s Theology of the Old Testament is many things, but it is not true to its genre. With regard to the concept of theology, he relates it closely and in programmatic fashion to Israel’s direct confessions of the activity of God in history. He then extends it, without any methodological explanation, to the historically actualized forms of this confession. As a result the doors stand open to the use of the term “theology” in an historically descriptive manner to describe the particular content of religious texts. Von Rad certainly saw this pluralization of theologies, but he only mentions it outside his Theology of the Old Testament: This reality of the restless actualization of historical facts of salvation with the result that each generation saw itself set to march toward a new fulfillment is in the foreground of the Old Testament in such a way that a “theology of the Old Testament” must accommodate it. This of course takes place first in the sense of the deconstruction of various earlier notions of the unity of the Old Testament to the extent that the Old Testament contains not only one, but a number of theologies that diverge greatly both in their structure and in the nature of their argumentation.148

146.  C. A. Keller, “Review of G. von Rad, Theologie des Alten Testaments I,” TZ 14 (1958) 306–9 (here 308). 147. Von Rad, Theologie, 1:7 (ET: v). 148. Idem, “Offene Fragen im Umkreis einer Theologie des Alten Testaments,” in Gesammelte Studien zum Alten Testament II (TB 48; Munich: Kaiser, 1973) 289–312 (here 293–94), cf. the reflections on this citation in Spieckermann, “Theologie II/1.1. Altes Testament,” TRE 33:264–68; J. C. Gertz, Grundinformation Altes Testament: Eine Einführung in Literatur, Religion und Geschichte des Alten Testaments (3rd ed.; Uni-Taschenbücher 2745; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2009; trans. T & T Clark Handbook of the Old Testament: An Introduction to the Literature, Religion and History of the Old Testament [London: T. & T. Clark, 2012]) 598 n. 17.

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Von Rad’s unclear distinction between history of faith—thirty years before or after him one would have spoken of the history of religion—and confession of faith as well as the pluralization of theology had wide-reaching consequences. This approach brought about questions with regard to the legitimation of the discipline “theology of the Old Testament”—analogous to the developments at the close of the 19th century—as an independent investigation within Old Testament studies.149 2. The Proposal to Replace the Theology of the Old Testament with the History of Religion Only in the wake of von Rad’s Theology of the Old Testament does it become possible to understand how Rainer Albertz presents the view in his A History of Israelite Religion in the Old Testament Period in 1992 that “religious history” is “the more meaningful summary Old Testament discipline” than “theology.”150 He names the following advantages, among others: a “history of religion” corresponds better to the “historical structure of large parts of the Old Testament,” it takes “seriously . . . the perspective that religious declarations cannot be separated from the historical background from which they arise,” and it does not fall under the compulsion “to level to one theoretical abstract level” diverse religious declarations, nor is it compelled to present “absolute claims.”151 Nonetheless, in many ways Albertz’s own outline presents a mix of different approaches to the Hebrew Bible.152While Albertz also offers a history of religion, he refers first and foremost to the Hebrew Bible, from which both the themes and the structure are provided for his volumes. 149.  A later return to von Rad’s new definition of the concept of theology appears in G. Fischer, Theologien des Alten Testaments (Neuer Stuttgarter Kommentar: Altes Testament 31; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 2012) 13, 282, which identifies different biblical notions of God as “theologies.” 150. R. Albertz, Religionsgeschichte Israels in alttestamentlicher Zeit (GAT 8/1.2; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992; trans. J. Bowden, A History of Israelite Religion in the Old Testament Period [2 vols.; OTL; Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 1994]) 1:37. In this case he is taking up one of Gunkel’s postulates; cf. above n. 88. On the history of the investigation of the history of religion, see W. Zwickel, “Religionsgeschichte Israels: Einführung in den gegenwärtigen Forschungsstand in den deutschsprachigen Ländern,” in Religionsgeschichte Israels: Formale und materiale Aspekte (ed. B. Janowski and M. Köckert; Veröffentlichungen der Wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft für Theologie 15; Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlaghaus, 1999) 9–56 (here 9–15). 151.  Albertz, Religionsgeschichte 1:37–38. Albertz names further church and ecumenical aspects that do not deal with the question of the content under discussion. 152.  Cf. the comments in O. Keel, “Religionsgeschichte Israels oder Theologie des Alten Testaments?” in Wieviel Systematik erlaubt die Schrift? Auf der Suche nach einer gesamtbiblischen Theologie (ed. F.-L. Hossfeld; QD 185; Freiburg i. B.: Herder, 2001) 88–109 (here 100–1 and n. 13).

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This is the case even though he includes in prominent fashion the differentiations of private and official, local and family religion in his classification.153 How different a history of Israelite religion might appear when not based primarily on the biblical witnesses and themes is demonstrated in the contemporary volume by Othmar Keel and Christoph Uehlinger.154 For this reason Albertz’s book is basically just as much a literary history as it is a history of theology of the Hebrew Bible.155 In addition, however, Albertz clearly integrates elements of an “engaged” approach to his History of Israelite Religion. John W. Rogerson, for example, criticizes the headings in Albertz’s presentation such as “Yahweh, the God of Liberation,” “El and Yahweh as Anti-Imperial Symbols,” “The Prophetic Opposition Groups and the Jehu Revolution,” and “The Prophetic Total Opposition,” which clearly go beyond the bounds of a history-of-religions approach.156 Discussion since Albertz has shown that replacement is not an adequate model,157 but this in itself does not solve the search for the nature of the concept of theology in Hebrew Bible studies. 3. Contemporary Ambiguities The current questions and ambiguities surrounding theology in the Hebrew Bible and theology of the Old Testament cannot be understood without casting a glance at the state of the humanities in the Germanspeaking university environment as a whole. Theology was a leading branch of study for the humanities into the twentieth century. The essential questions and methods, and also the defining research paradigms of the humanities were determined by theology. One need only recall the interdisciplinary importance of hermeneutics from Friedrich Schleiermacher to Wilhelm Dilthey to Hans-Georg Gadamer.158 At the same time, 153.  Albertz, Religionsgeschichte, 1:38–43. 154. O. Keel and C. Uehlinger, Göttinnen, Götter und Gottessymbole: Neue Erkenntnisse zur Religionsgeschichte Kanaans und Israels aufgrund bislang unerschlossener ikonographischer Quellen (QD 134; Freiburg i. B.: Herder, 1992; 5th ed.: 2001; trans. T. H. Trapp, Gods, Goddesses, and Images of God in Ancient Israel [Minneapolis: Fortress, 1998]). 155. Cf. Keel, “Religionsgeschichte,” 100; Lemche, “Warum die Theologie,” 88 (“History of mentalities”). On the question of literary and theological history see Schmid, The Old Testament: A Literary History. 156. Cf. Rogerson, “What Is Religion?” 282. 157. Cf., for example, H.-J. Hermisson, Alttestamentliche Theologie und Religionsgeschichte Israels (Forum Theologische Literaturzeitung 3; Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2000), as well as the discussion in Jahrbuch für Biblische Theologie 10 (1995). 158. Cf. the overviews in J. Grondin, Einführung in die philosophische Hermeneutik (Darmstadt: WBG, 2001); U. H. J. Körtner, Einführung in die theologische Hermeneutik (Darmstadt: WBG, 2006).

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the humanities enjoyed a prominent position in view of the public perception of the university. Since the second half of the twentieth century, these leadership functions have diminished and in part even disappeared. Motivated especially by the rapid technological advancements in the 1950s and 1960s, which have fundamentally changed everyday life, the natural sciences have gained importance and begun to exercise considerable influence over the humanities. A good index of the meaning of these changes is the discussion surrounding Charles Percy Snow’s theory of the “two cultures” (1959) of the humanities and the natural sciences, which to a large degree exist in unmediated fashion next to one another.159 Two decades after this Habermas speaks of a “colonialization of the living world” by the exact sciences.160 A further indicator appears in the rise of empirically oriented social sciences that begin to separate themselves increasingly from the humanities in terms of their philosophical approach and organization. These developments are relevant for Hebrew Bible studies at least indirectly. The theology and the hermeneutics of the Hebrew Bible are not central questions in the current state of scholarship. Hebrew Bible studies is far more focused on clarifying religious history, literary history, and social history with regard to its object of study. All these investigations are, of course, interesting and the preoccupation with them has provided vital expansion of the state of knowledge of the Hebrew Bible in recent years. Nonetheless, the process sometimes described in terms of the “social scientification” and “cultural scientification” in the humanities has also served to distance Hebrew Bible studies from the questions of content that have traditionally belonged at its center, even if they have in the meantime reached levels of rhetorical excess. The current—in spite of all the thematic ambiguities—question regarding one or more “theologies” of the Hebrew Bible, which is still comparatively strongly anchored within the organization of the discipline, keeps Hebrew Bible studies focused on the content. Simultaneously, however, the need has emerged to maintain a degree of historical analysis when approaching “theological” questions.161 If this is the case, then there is no 159. Cf. C. P. Snow, “The Two Cultures,” Encounter 12 (1959) 17–25; see also H.  Kreuzer, Die zwei Kulturen: Literarische und naturwissenschaftliche Intelligenz: C. P. Snows These in der Diskussion (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1987). 160. J. Habermas, Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns (Suhrkamp-Taschenbuch Wissenschaft 1175; Frankfurt a. M.: Surkamp, 1995). 161.  Cf. especially J. J. Collins, “Is a Critical Biblical Theology Possible?” in The Hebrew Bible and Its Interpreters (ed. W. H. Propp et al.; Biblical and Judaic Studies 1; Winona

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way to avoid the pluralization of the “theology” of the Hebrew Bible; it is a direct result of its historicization. Hand in hand with the recognition that extrabiblical texts—note here as well the developments in terms of the history of this concept in the past two centuries—can contain “theologies” or be formed “theologically,” is the recognition that the discussion of “theological” questions cannot be limited to the texts that later became canonical. The decision in the last section to put “theology” or “theological” in quotes points to the important task of expounding this concept in its application to the corresponding qualities of the biblical texts. This task will be addressed in the following sections. Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1990) 1–17 (here 15); also T. Krüger, “Wahrheit der Schrift – Wahrheit der Auslegung: Zur Bedeutung der Bibel für die theologische Wahrheitsfindung,” Marburger Jahrbuch Theologie XXI: Wahrheit (ed. W. Härle and R. Preul; Marburger Theologische Studien 107; Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2009) 43–59.

Chapter 3 The Emergence of Theology in the Hebrew Bible and Ancient Jewish Tradition as a Religious-Historical Inquiry

I. Processes of Theologization in the Hebrew Bible and Ancient Jewish Tradition 1. The Way to Theology The previous journey through the history of scholarship on the various aspects of meaning of the concept of theology has demonstrated that there is no “theology” in the Hebrew Bible along the lines of the understanding of the concept by the Scholastics. Or, stated differently, it is anachronistic to speak of theology in the Hebrew Bible.1 Even if the situation with regard to New Testament literature is not fundamentally different, the beginnings of a change in perspectives can at least be observed there: “In threefold manner the NT is familiar with statements that are acquainted with how the nature of God appears: ‘God is spirit’ (John 4:24); ‘God is light’ (1 John 1:5); ‘God is love’ (1 John 4:8). The OT is not acquainted with any such statements.”2 Without attributing any kind of valuation to this observation, the New Testament literature appears to have developed new ways of speaking and genres that separate it from the Hebrew Bible literature in terms of what later became classified as “theology.” As ready at hand as it might seem to conclude from this that one should forgo the use of theological terminology in application to the Hebrew Bible texts, the alternative is also problematic. For while the Hebrew Bible does not contain theology, at the same time, what it contains is also not simply atheological. One can attempt to articulate this situation 1. G. Ebeling, Studium der Theologie: Eine enzyklopädische Einführung (UniTaschenbücher: Theologie 446; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1972) 32; cf. earlier von Rad, “Offene Fragen,” 294. 2.  Köhler, Theologie, 2.

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more precisely in various ways. Perhaps one of the most appropriate formulations comes from Christoph Levin, who spoke of “the way of the Old Testament to its theology.”3 While Rudolf Smend hesitated to use theological terminology for the Hebrew Bible in his epoch-making essay on “Theology in the Old Testament,” he still found it appropriate to speak of the Hebrew Bible texts as having “at least a strong convergence with theology.”4 Nobert Lohfink also demonstrates caution, summarizing the ambiguous results as follows: “The text type ‘theological treatise’ first emerged later and in a different cultural context. The Old Testament texts do not belong to it in terms of genre. ‘Theology’ appears in them only implicitly, indirectly, or reduced.”5 Nonetheless, this final sentence points to a perspective worthy of investigation. 2. Distinguishing between Implicit and Explicit Theology The distinction between implicit and explicit theology appears quite helpful with regard to the Hebrew Bible, even if one might retort that the expression “implicit theology” is an oxymoron.6 But this would really only be the case for a narrowly conceived conception of theology, one which could hardly be a majority view in contemporary discussion.7 The breadth of the concept of theology established in its reception history in fact allows for the paradoxical formulation that the Hebrew Bible neither contains theology nor contains no theology. In the context of its ancient Near Eastern environment, the Hebrew Bible is a unique corpus of tradition whose idiosyncrasy is observable in its very scribal exegetical character.8 The Hebrew Bible should, to a large degree, be viewed as reflective interpretation of preexisting religious texts. It thereby fulfills—at least with regard to those texts containing reflective interpretations—a basic requirement of “theology,” when understood as the reflective examination and interpretation of religious phenomena. At the same time, it is also important to note a fundamental difference from the phenomenon of “theology,” as a conceptually fixed field, which 3.  Levin, “Weg.” 4.  Smend, “Theologie,” 117. 5. N. Lohfink, “Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft als Theologie? 44 Thesen,” in Wieviel Systematik erlaubt die Schrift? Auf der Suche nach einer gesamtbiblischen Theologie (ed. F.-L. Hossfeld; QD 185; Freiburg i. Br.: Herder, 2001) 13–47(here 15). 6.  Duhm recognized something of a “primitive theology” in Hosea himself, “a real, what one might call, theology,” but he placed it instead first in the realm of those influenced by Hosea—in Deuteronomy and its literary-historical successors (B. Duhm, Über Ziel und Methode der theologischen Wissenschaft [Basel: Schwabe, 1889] 7). 7. Cf. Keel, “Religionsgeschichte,” 92–95. 8.  Cf. von Rad, “Offene Fragen,” 293.

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is the way it has developed in Christianity. “Theology” in Christianity is at its core philosophical, or at least bears the impression of an affinity for philosophy. It places itself in close proximity to philosophy and is formulated as something akin to the search for truth. As such, for the traditional project of a theology of the Hebrew Bible—where it is pursued—this two-part conception of theology should be differentiated. These two parts result from the double meaning of the genitive construction, as a subjective or objective genitive.9 The theology of the Hebrew Bible can either be taken as a subjective genitive meaning the theology that the Hebrew Bible itself contains. Or one can interpret it as an objective genitive, understanding it to mean the theology that results from the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. The former can, following Lohfink, only be described as implicit theology, but it remains advisable to continue to use the concept of theology to describe these phenomena,10 as long as one views the reflexive character to be a constitutive mark of theology. Such forms of implicit theology can also include various degrees of the beginnings of explicit theology. Theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament in the sense of an objective genitive, however, can only exist as an endeavor imported from outside the Hebrew Bible, which does not at all render it an illegitimate project. A grammar of the Hebrew language likewise does not arise from within, but it is developed from outside. Nonetheless, it is of course a legitimate scholarly endeavor. Within such an approach from outside, however, the necessity arises to specify which perspective is called for with regard to a theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. In the context of this present study, such a path will not be followed any further. The concern here is essentially for the “implicit theology” of the Hebrew Bible itself in its different varieties. The term “implicit” theology is not a neologism. It draws on a noble tradition, at least within the twentieth century. It appears as early as in Bultmann—here with reference to the New Testament: The study of New Testament theology has the task of presenting the theology of the NT, that is, the theological thoughts of the New Testament texts, namely both those explicitly developed (e.g., 9.  The classical essay on this differentiation is G. Ebeling, “Was heißt ‘Biblische Theologie’?,” in Wort und Glaube (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1960) 69–89. 10. Cf. Smend, “Theologie”; Fishbane, Interpretation; Kratz, “Noch einmal”; K. Schmid, “Innerbiblische Schriftauslegung: Aspekte der Forschungsgeschichte,” in Schriftauslegung in der Schrift (ed. R. G. Kratz, T. Krüger, and K. Schmid; BZAW 300; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000) 1–22.

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Paul’s teaching on the law), as well as those that are implicitly at work in narrative or exhortation, in polemic or encouragement.11 A formulation that illustrates this differentiation even better occurs in the following context: “Theological propositions . . . can never be the object of faith: but only the explication of the understanding inherent in it.”12 According to Bultmann, implicit theology with regard to the Bible designates the understanding inherent in its texts, which assumes a corresponding potential for reflection in them. This does not, however, allow for them to be seen as basically atheological. The reason Bultmann does not simply attempt to keep the concept of theology at a remove from the Bible lies in the conscious decision in favor of an understanding of theology that is not solely intellectual. It also bears an existentialist stamp, which can be traced back to the Reformation. Bultmann therefore declares in his Theology: The presentation given in this book of New Tetament theology stands, on the one hand, in the tradition of historical-critical and history-of-religions scholarship, and attempts on the other hand to limit their error, which consists in pulling apart thought and life acts and thereby misrecognizes the intent of the theological propositions.13 For this reason Bultmann demands that biblical studies strive not only for “reconstruction,” but also for “interpretation.”14 What is valid for him is: “There is freely not just the one or the other, and both always remain in reciprocal relationship.”15 The terminology of “implicit theology,” which Bultmann did not, however, use in programmatic fashion, did not establish itself as traditional terminology. It appears that later usage of the concept does not refer specifically to Bultmann, but rather presents independent impressions. For example, Jan Assmann uses the distinction between “implicit” and “explicit” theology with regard to the extrabiblical, in his case Egyptian, texts.16 In 11.  Bultmann, Theologie, 585 [ET: 2:237] (emphasis original). 12.  Ibid., 586 [ET: 2: 237–38]. 13.  Ibid., 599–600 [ET: 2:250–51]. 14.  Ibid., 600 [ET: 2:251]. 15.  Ibid., 600 [ET: 2:251]. Cf., with regard to the current situation, also the reflections in K. Schmid, “Sind die Historisch–Kritischen kritischer geworden? Überlegungen zu Stellung und Potential der Bibelwissenschaften,” Jahrbuch für Biblische Theologie 25 (2011) 63–78. 16.  Assmann, Ägypten, 21–23, 192f. Cf. the reception, e.g., in Keel, “Religionsgeschichte,” 93; T. Sundermeier, “Religionswissenschaft versus Theologie? Zur

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“implicit” theology he finds an opportune term for the Egyptian texts. Assmann naturally does not think of polar opposites with this distinction, but he reckons with different degrees of theological explication. However, he views the most simple form of implicit theology as present in every religion; they relate to one another like grammar and language.17 It is possible that this determiniation is, however, formulated somewhat too universally. In light of the actual facts, it is more advisable to employ the category of “implicit axioms” suggested by Dietrich Ritschl.18 Assmann does not directly reference Bultmann’s terminology. In reality, the prominent usage by Assmann, anchored in the title of the book itself, is more likely to have been inspired by von Rad, whose decision to present the theology of the Hebrew Bible in terms of a narrative opened the way for the use of the concept in relation to other ancient texts.19 The terminology of “implicit theology” is also found, for example, in Günter Stemberger’s work with regard to Sifre Deuteronomy, though Stemberger references neither Bultmann nor Assmann.20 The cultivation of this concept appears to recommend itself with regard to various ancient textual phenomena, and has, therefore, been formed and appropriated commensurately with this variety. In the English-speaking realm, the differentiation between “implicit” and “explicit” with regard to “theology” appears less prevalent.21 Instead it could be that the adjective “theological” and the noun “theology” are distinguished from one another in similar fashion. In his interaction with Hans Hübner concerning the question of theology in the Bible, James Barr proposes qualifying the Bible as “theological,” while its texts themselves should not be spoken of as “theology.”22 Verhältnisbestimmung von Theologie und Religionswissenschaft aus religionswissenschaftlicher Sicht,” Jahrbuch für Biblische Theologie 10 (1995) 189–206, esp. 198–99; K. Seybold, Die Poetik der erzählenden Literatur im Alten Testament (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2006) 290 (in dependence on Ritschl, Logik); C. Markschies, Kaiserzeitliche christliche Theologie und ihre Institutionen: Prolegomena zu einer Geschichte der antiken christlichen Theologie (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007) 14. 17. J. Assmann, Politische Theologie zwischen Ägypten und Israel (Carl Friedrich von Siemens Stiftung Themen 52; Munich: Carl-Friedrich-von-Siemens-Stiftung, 1992) 25. 18.  Ritschl, Logik. 19.  See, e.g., H. v. Stietencron and J. Assmann, Theologen und Theologien; Berlejung, “Theologie.” Cf. also the investigation of a “theology of religions,” in R. Bernhardt, “Literaturbericht ‘Theologie der Religionen’ (I),” TRu 72 (2007) 1–35; idem, “Literaturbericht ‘Theologie der Religionen’ (II),” TRu 72 (2007) 127–49. 20. G. Stemberger, Judaica Minora, Geschichte und Literatur des rabbinischen Judentums (part 2; TSAJ 138; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010) 497. 21.  Though see D. O. Via, What Is New Testament Theology? (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2002) 46. 22.  Barr, Concept, 498. Quite similarly, Keel, “Religionsgeschichte,” 93 n. 5, distinguishes between “theological” and “theology”: “The most rudimentary form of exegesis

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In the following, “implicit theology” is defined, in contrast to Assmann, as something more specific that the reconstructable “grammar” of religious-historical statements. Theologizing processes, even when they at first only concern the development of “implicit theology,” are marked by a certain reflexive perspective with regard to the preexisting texts and points of view. Within the context of innerbiblical scribal expansion, no new genre of exegetical literature is generally created. The form and content of the theologizing text is instead oriented towards the passage that it expands. Even when new texts are generated in the throes of theological reflection, for the most part these new texts follow the preexisting generic conventions (see, for example, the Priestly Document or Chronicles). An increased degree of explication is recognizable in the aftermath of each in their respective areas of influence—both in text-internal and text-external exegesis. The boundaries of the canon do not appear to play a qualitatively decisive role in this matter. 3. New Literary Works as Indicators of Intensified Theological Reflection While not fundamentally pushing beyond the category of implicit theology, a special phenomenon that indicates a higher degree of theological explication in comparison with implicit theology in biblical texts occurring in the literary and theological history of the Hebrew Bible should be mentioned at this point. As long as biblical literature is expanded through commentary, by definition the formation of secondary literature cannot take place—an important formal stipulation of theology as a form of reflection. As expansion, the commentary passages are added to the primary text and cannot be distinguished from them on a textual basis. They therefore remain—at least in terms of form—primary literature. Within the framework of Hebrew Bible literature itself there are, however, several early forms of a type of written reflection that can be recognized. In the process of transmitting tradition, these forms do not merely expand on the given textual content, but they instead develop new literary entities. This situation itself suggests that the canonical boundary not be understood as a decisive qualitative distinction between the biblical and post-biblical texts.23 These new textual formations can generally be observed in a number of places within the Hebrew Bible traditions—every time a new book emerges. However, with several texts it would have been expected on is the bringing together of parallel statements. . . . But with this, the process of connection already begins. While this is a theological activity, it is not yet theology.” 23.  Cf. H. Najman, “The Vitality of Scripture Within and Beyond the ‘Canon,’ ” JSJ 43 (2012) 497–518.

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account of their content that they would instead have developed as expansions (Fortschreibungen) because they refer intensively to a preexisting tradition. Nonetheless, they appear to have emerged as originally independent literary works. Worth naming in this regard are Deuteronomy, the Priestly Document, the Second Isaiah tradition, and also Chronicles (though the literary independence of the Priestly Document and the traditions of Second Isaiah are based on reconstructions). One could also add texts such as the books of Job and Qoheleth. With regard to their content, however, it is immediately clear where the definitive distinctions from later post-canonical theological commentary lie. The forms of the canonical texts essentially remain related to those of the preexisting literature—the texts remain “primary literature.” Nonetheless, their theological emphasis clearly requires that they be set apart from the stream of tradition and appear as separate entities. With regard to Deuteronomy, this writing appears, even if the position remains debated, to have originally emerged as an independent text.24 At the same time, it is quite clear that Deuteronomy receives and reformulates the preexisting Covenant Code, especially under the auspices of cult centralization. In the background is also the tradition of the Neo-Assyrian vassal treaties, which Deuteronomy takes up and then applies to the relationship between God and the people. The relationship of legal consequence between Deuteronomy and the Covenant Code can be seen in the application of royal succession. Just as Assurbanipal follows Esarhaddon, Deuteronomy also follows the Covenant Code.25 A second new beginning appears, historically speaking, in the context of Pentateuchal tradition—when following the traditional determination of the Priestly Document as a source26—in the Priestly Document. Within the accumulation of traditions in the Pentateuch, it presents an anomaly because it probably did not develop as the expansion of preexisting textual material. It was instead composed as a literarily and conceptually independent entity. This still remains the case if one follows Blum in seeing the 24. Cf., e.g, R. G. Kratz, “Der literarische Ort des Deuteronomium,” in Liebe und Gebot: Studien zum Deuteronomium (ed. R. G. Kratz and H. Spieckermann; FRLANT 190; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000) 101–20. 25.  Cf. B. Levinson and J. Stackert, “Between the Covenant Code and Esarhaddon’s Succession Treaty: Deuteronomy 13 and the Composition of Deuteronomy,” Journal of Ancient Judaism 4 (2012) 122–40. 26.  Cf., e.g., K. Koch, “P – kein Redaktor! Erinnerung an zwei Eckdaten der Quellenscheidung,” VT 37 (1987) 446–67. Cf. more recently however the complete, or as the case may be, partial challenges to this conclusion from C. Berner, Die Exoduserzählung: Das literarische Werden einer Ursprungslegende Israels (FAT 73; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2010) and J. Wöhrle, Fremdlinge im eigenen Land: Zur Entstehung und Intention der priesterlichen Passagen der Vätergeschichte (FRLANT 246; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2012).

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alternatives of source and redaction as inappropriate. He understands the Priestly Document as a literary entity that was conceived of as separate but then immediately combined with the non-Priestly Pentateuch.27 Why, then, might it have been necessary to conceive of the Priestly Document as an independent text separate from the preexisting tradition? Two circumstances may have been decisive. First, while the demand for cult centralization received from Deuteronomy was in force for the Priestly Document, it was not applied to the Mosaic period in the preexisting material. This was especially clear in the non-Priestly Genesis, which brings the ancestral figures into active and legitimating association with sanctuaries outside of Jerusalem (Bethel, Shechem, Mamre, etc.). This does not appear to have been acceptable for the Priestly Document. In addition, the Priestly Document pursued its own conception of covenant theology, which was difficult to reconcile with the preexisting tradition. Not qualifying the Sinai lawgiving as a covenant and also pushing forward the authoritative commitments of God into the earlier period of Noah and Abraham called for a new literary beginning. With the scope of prophetic tradition, the Second Isaiah tradition is especially important in terms of its conception as a literary independent text. The determination of the literary beginnings of the prophecy transmitted in Isa 40–55 and commonly known under the artificial name “Second Isaiah” (or Deutero-Isaiah) are indeed debated. They were integrated into the Isaiah tradition at a certain juncture, and some scholars conclude that it emerged within this context.28 Others reckon with an original development within the context of the Jeremiah tradition.29 Yet even if one reckons with these kinds of literary contexts for the development of the Second Isaiah tradition, it remains probable that it was composed with a certain degree of independence on the basis of the presence of a prologue 27.  Within the framework of the modification of his own position, Blum now limits his “Kd” to Exod–Num/Deut (E. Blum, “Die literarische Verbindung von Erzvätern und Exodus: Ein Gespräch mit neueren Endredaktionshypothesen,” in Abschied vom Jahwisten: Die Komposition des Hexateuch in der jüngsten Diskussion [ed. J. Gertz et al.; BZAW 315; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2002] 119–56), which is possible, but difficult to imagine: “Kp” does not simply follow the outline of “Kd,” but supplies “Kd” with an elaborate pre-story in the form of a Proto-Genesis. 28. Cf. R. E. Clements, “Beyond Tradition-History: Deutero-Isaianic Development of First Isaiah’s Themes,” JSOT 31 (1985) 95–113; repr. in Old Testament Prophecy: From Oracles to Canon (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1996) 78–92; R. Albertz, “Das Deuterojesaja-Buch als Fortschreibung der Jesaja–Prophetie,” in Die Hebräische Bibel und ihre zweifache Nachgeschichte (ed. E. Blum et al.; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1990) 241–56. 29.  R. G. Kratz, “Der Anfang des Zweiten Jesaja in Jes 40,1f. und das Jeremiabuch,” ZAW 106 (1994) 243–61; repr. in Prophetenstudien: Kleine Schriften II (FAT 74; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011) 216–32.

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(40:1–5) and an epilogue (52:7–10), which frame the alleged original text in Isa 40–48*. In any case, the proclamations from Isa 40ff. were not inserted as expansions into the text of Isa 1–32*, but were formed into a separate—self-sufficient or semi-self-sufficient—writing. The necessity for this is again recognizable in terms of the content. The election traditions from monarchic Israel and Judah had been annulled theologically as a result of the demise of the Northern and Southern Kingdoms. This made a new scheme necessary, which would not have made sense as an expansion of existing textual matter. One further example—more would be possible—concerns Chronicles. Its date is controversial with proposals fluctuating from the Persian into the Maccabean periods,30 though through redaction-historical distinctions it is likely to cover this whole spectrum.31 It is the first and only canonical representative of the genre of rewritten bible, otherwise well attested in the literature of the second century b.c.e. (esp. the book of Jubilees).32 It is also easy to explain the logic behind the formation of a new literary work in the case of Chronicles. Its basic theological outlook was not achievable within the context of a revision or expansion of Genesis–2 Kings. This outlook concerns the select limitation of the true Israel to Judah (in which the allIsraelite focus was maintained in the sense of the twelve-tribe ideal: the former northern tribes are invited to join Judah and the cult in Jerusalem). Furthermore, the theocratic orientation for the Jerusalem cultic community could not be equated with the political orientation of the Deuteronomistic land theology in the preexisting text of the Former Prophets.

II. The Formation of Implicit Theology in Prophetic Literature While the ongoing formation of implicit theology in the Hebrew Bible does not coincide with the religious-historical progression of ancient Is30.  For a late date in the Maccabean period, cf. G. Steins, Die Chronik als kanonisches Abschlußphänomen (BBB 93; Weinheim: Beltz Athenäum, 1995); for an overview, see S. Japhet, 1 Chronik (HThKAT; Freiburg i. Br.: Herder, 2002) 52–56. 31.  Cf. R. G. Kratz, Die Komposition der erzählenden Bücher des Alten Testaments (UniTaschenbücher 2137; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000; trans. J. S. Bowden, The Composition of the Narrative Books of the Old Testament [London: T. & T. Clark, 2005]) 97–98. 32.  Cf. M. Segal, The Book of Jubilees: Rewritten Bible, Redaction, Ideology, and Theology (VTSup 117; Leiden: Brill, 2007); A. Laato and J. van Ruiten, eds., Rewritten Bible Reconsidered: Proceedings of the Conference in Karkku, Finland, August 24–26, 2006 (Studies in Rewritten Bible 1; Turku: Åbo Akademi University, 2008); M. Zahn, Rethinking Rewritten Scripture: Composition and Exegesis in the 4QReworked Pentateuch Manuscripts (STDJ 95; Leiden: Brill, 2011); M. Segal, “Qumran Research in Israel: Rewritten Bible and Biblical Interpretation,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls in Scholarly Perspective: A History of Research (ed. D. Dimant; STDJ 99; Leiden: Brill, 2012) 313–33.

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rael, the formation of implicit theology is a special part of the religious history. For this reason one can also understand, describe, and observe the journey of the Hebrew Bible to its theology as a religious-historical challenge. This journey does not end with the close of the Hebrew Bible, however, but rather continues further into the literature of ancient Judaism and Christianity. Where are the beginnings of this journey to be located? A simple and unequivocal answer is impossible for two reasons. The first is that there is no agreement among historical evaluations of the beginnings of Hebrew Bible literary history. This situation will remain the case due to the lack of possible empirical documentation.33 One must rely on reconstructions that move between various levels of probability. The second is that it cannot be expected that the rise of implicit theology is a traceable literary process that might allow its path to be observed or reconstructed from one particular literary context into another. It is more likely that implicit theology be recognizable in various streams of tradition, which does not preclude the fact that certain forms of theologization have prevailed over others. At the same time, it is sensible to highlight at the forefront two particular literary contexts that appear to have played paradigmatic roles in this process. The prophetic and legal traditions, which developed with a certain amount of reciprocal influence on one another. The prophetic literature with its capacity—in part in its beginnings and in part redactionally fashioned—as the normative word of God quickly took over legal terminology and redactional forms. These did not leave the legal literature untouched from influence in the reverse direction. The reasons for the particular importance of these bodies of literature are not difficult to identify. First for prophecy: even the simple collection, but also the further transmission of prophetic oracles that arose from a particular historical circumstance over a longer historical period of time naturally required the development of theological reflection, rules for adaptation and actualization of preexisting tradition, and the compilation of an historically differentiated whole.34 Within the context of secondary passages in the prophetic corpus, which attempted to bring together tradition and contemporary relevance in redactional formulations, lies a basis for the development of implicit theology in the Hebrew Bible. A comparable analysis applies for the Hebrew Bible legal literature, which quite early on in ancient Israel—from the Neo-Assyrian period— 33.  Cf. for example, C. Levin, Das Alte Testament (Munich: Beck, 2001) 27–48. 34.  Cf. the overview in O. H. Steck, Die Prophetenbücher und ihr theologisches Zeugnis: Wege der Nachfrage und Fährten zur Antwort (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1996); idem, Gott in der Zeit entdecken: Die Prophetenbücher des Alten Testaments als Vorbild für Theologie und Kirche (Biblisch-theologische Studien 42; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 2001).

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was interpreted as divine law and accordingly had to be adjusted to changing historical circumstances through the mode of adaptation and actualizing expansion. In view of the contemporary and parallel developments in the prophetic tradition, the well-known redactional techniques from ancient Near Eastern legal traditions offered promise for application to the exegetical procedures within prophetic literature.35 Caution is recommended with regard to identifying the period when these theologizing processes first become observable. At the same time, it can be said that the end of the eighth and especially the seventh century  b.c.e., which marks both the time of the demise of the Northern Kingdom of Israel (722 b.c.e.) as well as the reception of Neo-Assyrian imperial ideology and also the traditions of the Northern Kingdom into Judah,36 is accorded particular importance as the initial phase of the origination of theology in the Hebrew Bible.37 It is nonetheless difficult to weigh the importance of these beginnings in comparison to the reflective efforts surrounding the loss of the First Temple, beginning in 587  b.c.e. While the experience of the destruction of the Jerusalem temple led to the considerable intellectualization and spiritualization of the religion of ancient Judah,38 at the same time, it was not—viewed in isolation—predestined to trigger such theologizing processes. The opposite would have been expected, but the previous experience of the theological-historical development in the wake of the demise of the Northern Kingdom brought about the circumstance in which Judah’s catastrophe led not to the abandonment, but rather to the intensification of theological thought. After these beginnings come the subsequent exegetical efforts at reconciliation in the Persian period, which concern the orientation of the content 35.  Cf., e.g., E. Otto, “Techniken der Rechtssatzredaktion israelitischer Rechtsbücher in der Redaktion des Prophetenbuches Micha,” SJOT 2 (1991) 119–50. 36.  Cf. D. E. Fleming, The Legacy of Israel in Judah’s Bible: History, Politics, and the Reinscribing of Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012). 37.  This determination should not be confused with the position represented in some parts of the Anglo-Saxon context that the most important parts of Hebrew Bible literature in general originated in the eighth and seventh centuries b.c.e. (cf. I. Finkelstein and N. A. Silberman, The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Sacred Texts [New York: Simon and Schuster, 2001]; W. M. Schniedewind, How the Bible Became a Book: The Textualization of Ancient Israel [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004]). It clearly remains the case from the transparent and thorough imprint in the Hebrew Bible in terms of monotheism, covenant, and law that decisive phases of literary formation must also be placed in the Babylonian, Persian, and Hellenistic—therefore the post-monarchic—period, even if the literature builds on older material. Cf. the overview in Levin, Altes Testament [ET: Old Testament]; Kratz, Komposition [ET: Composition]; Schmid, Literaturgeschichte [ET: The Old Testament: A Literary History]. 38.  Cf. K. Schmid, “The Canon and the Cult: The Emergence of Book Religion in Ancient Israel and the Gradual Sublimation of the Temple Cult,” JBL 131 (2012) 291–307.

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in non-Torah texts to the Torah or some of the inner-prophetic interpretive processes. With the rise of Judaism in the exilic and postexilic periods, various exegetical techniques developed that take into account and reflect both the traditions as well as the contemporary application of the texts.39 In sum, the intellectual process of the development of “implicit theology” began already within the Hebrew Bible itself in late preexilic prophecy and legal literature. However, the most important “implicit theological” texts—containing various degrees of “explication”—of the Hebrew Bible arose later, in the Babylonian, Persian, and Hellenistic periods, in the time of ancient Judaism. What appeared to the romantically influenced nineteenth century as the disadvantage of exilic and postexilic Judaism—its rationalizing and reflective approach to the preexisting religious traditions—turns out to be the underlying necessary condition for the possibility of the survival of those very traditions. They survive not in uninterpreted but in interpreted forms. It can hardly be expected that the words of the historical Amos or Isaiah might have been recommendable without the theological reworking that took place in the centuries-long transmission process. It was only through the theological reworking in later periods that the Hebrew Bible texts took on those qualities that rendered them interesting beyond their own period in time.40 1. Expansion of Prophecy as Theologization Only since the most recent innovations in scholarship on the prophets,41 observable for about the last forty years,42 has scholarly attention been directed especially toward the prophetic tradition as an important 39. Cf. Fishbane, Interpretation; K. Schmid, Schriftgelehrte Traditionsliteratur: Fallstudien zur innerbiblischen Schriftauslegung im Alten Testament (FAT 77; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011). 40. Cf. in more detail, K. Schmid, “Ausgelegte Schrift als Schrift: Innerbiblische Schriftauslegung und die Frage nach der theologischen Qualität biblischer Texte,” in Die Kunst des Auslegens: Zur Hermeneutik des Christentums in der Kultur der Gegenwart (ed. R Anselm, S. Schleissing, and K. Tanner; Frankfurt a. M.: Peter Lang, 1999) 115–29. 41. Cf. U. Becker, “Die Wiederentdeckung des Prophetenbuches: Tendenzen und Aufgaben der gegenwärtigen Prophetenforschung,” BTZ 21 (2004) 30–60; K. Schmid, “Klassische und nachklassische Deutungen der alttestamentlichen Prophetie,” Zeitschrift für Neuere Theologiegeschichte 3 (1996) 225–50; R. G. Kratz, Die Propheten Israels (Munich: Beck, 2003); cf. for the methodological perspective idem, “Redaktionsgeschichte I. Altes Testament,” TRE 28:367–78. A prominent forerunner for this kind of investigation was W. Zimmerli, Ezechiel (BK XIII/1.2; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1969; trans. Ezekiel: A Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel [2 vols.; vol. 1 trans. R. E. Clements, vol. 2 trans. J. D. Martin; Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979/1983). 42.  An especially exemplary contribution is H. Barth (Die Jesaja-Worte in der Josiazeit: Israel und Assur als Thema einer produktiven Neuinterpretation der Jesajaüberlieferung [WMANT 48; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1977]), because in this book Barth

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inaugurator of theological reflection within Hebrew Bible traditions. Only at this point did those texts in the prophetic books usually viewed as “spurious,” which in reality are to be characterized more than anything as later interpretations, receive necessary attention. It became increasingly clear that these texts consist not merely of glosses and textual errors, and they should be understood as meaningful interpretations of preexisting textual material.43 The most recent prophets scholarship no longer concentrates on the supposed isolated geniuses behind the prophetic books, but instead consciously views these books as scribal prophecy. Formerly oral prophecy is only transmitted in the Hebrew Bible in meaningful written contexts. Not all prophecy was originally oral. Considerable sections of the prophetic books never existed except in written form (for example, Isa 56–66; Jer 30–33). For individual prophetic books, such as Nahum, Jonah, or Malachi, it can even be debated whether or not they arose completely from scribal activity. There was likely no prophetic figure behind them, whose proclamation was written and formed the basis for the further redaction-history of the book. It appears much more likely that these books were completely the products of scribal prophecy.44 The scribal character—that is, marked by the writing down and further interpretation—of the prophetic literature of ancient Israel and Judah surely constitutes its most important characteristic within the framework of comparative events in the ancient Near East.45 Prophecy is also attested outside of Israel, known especially from the Mari texts (eighteenth century b.c.e.) and the Library of Ashurbanipal (seventh century b.c.e.).46 In Mari especially the letter form of written prophecy is attested, while NeoAssyrian prophecy is found on collected tablets of individual oracles. These were ordered according to certain recognizable principles and also in entries, showing that prophetic words were read in supra-temporal fashion as also being authoritative for later epochs. In this way, Ashurbanipal appears to have collected and edited prophetic words that originally served to leconsciously presents a monograph on secondary prophetic texts in a methodologically reflective manner—a direction unknown before this time. 43. Cf. Steck, Prophetenbücher. 44.  Cf. K. Schmid, “Hintere Propheten,” in Grundinformation Altes Testament: Eine Einführung in Literatur, Religion und Geschichte des Alten Testaments (4th ed.; ed. J. C. Gertz; Uni-Taschenbücher 2745; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2010) 313–412; 3rd edition trans. as “The Latter Prophets” in T & T Clark Handbook of the Old Testament: An Introduction to the Literature, Religion and History of the Old Testament (London: T. & T. Clark, 2012) 383–522. 45.  Cf. J. Jeremias, “Das Proprium der alttestamentlichen Prophetie,” TLZ 119 (1994) 483–94. 46.  Cf. the comparative presentation by J. Stökl, Prophecy in the Ancient Near East: A Philological and Sociological Comparison (Leiden: Brill, 2012).

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gitimate his father, Esarhaddon, but in this new context should implicitly serve the same purpose for his son. Neither Esarhaddon nor Ashurbanipal was the firstborn son. Each therefore had a specific need for legitimation.47 However, such marked forms of redactional reinterpretations of earlier prophetic tradition as is known in the domain of ancient Israel are not attested in these traditions. The scribal, interpretive, and theologizing work on the Hebrew Bible prophetic traditions were carried out in very different ways. The start of this theological exegetical work is basically recognizable in the first transcription of oral oracles,48 which is an act of interpretation because the oral word has been taken out of its original spoken situation. The work continues in the compilation of these individual texts. Compilation generally follows certain meaningful criteria, but needs not take any form of the insertions of new redactional formulations. The ordering of texts can itself result in the production of various theological meanings,49 and this was also the case for the collected tablets of Neo-Assyrian prophecy.50 The absence of subtitles in Hos 4–14 signals that the texts collected here were not intended to be read separately, but rather in their literary context.51 To the degree that these processes occur, one can say that the start of theological work on the prophetic oracles simultaneously implies the loss of their authenticity: “true” prophetic oracles as such are not present anywhere (anymore) in the Hebrew Bible because the first transcription of formerly oral words, their selection, and the placing together of various “smaller units” are already acts of interpretation, behind which it is difficult to gain access.52 This situation should not be lamented. The tradents clearly held the view that the meaningful collection of prophetic words was more important than their atomized transmission. In reality, the meaningful compilation of individual prophetic texts played an important role in 47. Cf. S. Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies (SAA 9; Helsinki: Helsinki University Press, 1997) lxix. 48.  Cf. M. Nissinen, “How Prophecy Became Literature,” SJOT 19 (2005) 153–72. 49.  Cf. the studies collected in J. Jeremias, Hosea und Amos: Studien zu den Anfängen des Dodekapropheton (FAT 13; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1995). 50. Cf. Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies; M. Nissinen, “Spoken, Written, Quoted, and Invented: Orality and Writtenness in Ancient Near Eastern Prophecy,” in Writings and Speech in Israelite and Ancient Near Eastern Prophecy (ed. E. Ben Zvi and M. H. Floyd; SBLSymS 10; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000) 235–71; idem, “How Prophecy.” 51. Cf. Jeremias, Prophet Hosea (ATD 24,1; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1983); idem, Prophet Amos (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1995; trans. D. W. Scott, The Book of Amos: A Commentary [OTL; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1998]). 52.  Cf. R. G. Kratz, “Die Redaktion der Prophetenbücher,” in Rezeption und Auslegung im Alten Testament und in seinem Umfeld (ed. R. G. Kratz and T. Krüger; OBO 153; Fribourg: Academic Press / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997) 9–27.

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the development of the conviction that these texts were able and worthy of becoming tradition. Easier to grasp are the theological interpretive endeavors found in the processes of expansion and editing of preexisting texts and text compilations. The easiest form consists of small-scale expansions, which are only connected to the immediate context. In the book of Jeremiah such additions are found especially in the domain of Jer 4–10, which expand the preexisting declarations of judgment and lament surrounding accusations. These are generally addressed, in the 2nd feminine singular, to a person who can be identified from the context as the personified presentation of the city of Jerusalem.53 Both from the content and the form one can assume that these in the 2nd-feminine-singular texts are later insertions and are dependent on their literary context. That is, they are not source material but were instead written for their context. These additions show clearly with regard to the preexising material that the impending judgment is not simply bad luck, but divine punishment for guilt. This guilt consists—metaphorically speaking—of Jerusalem’s “adultery,” which stands for its wrongheaded politics of seeking alliances.54 Jerusalem seeks other “lovers,” instead of trusting in God. Jer 4:13–15: Look! He comes up like clouds (i.e., the storm [4:11–12]), his chariots like the whirlwind; his horses are swifter than eagles—woe to us, for we are ruined! O Jerusalem, wash your heart clean of wickedness so that you may be saved. How long shall your evil schemes lodge within you? For a voice declares from Dan and proclaims disaster from Mount Ephraim. Jer 4:29–30: At the noise of horseman and archer every town takes to flight; they enter thickets; they climb among rocks; all the towns are forsaken, and no one lives in them. And you, O desolate one, what do you mean that you dress in crimson, that you deck yourself with ornaments of gold, that you enlarge your eyes with paint? In vain you beautify yourself. Your lovers despise you; they seek your life. 53.  Recognized and described especially by C. Levin, Die Verheißung des neuen Bundes in ihrem theologiegeschichtlichen Zusammenhang ausgelegt (FRLANT 137; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1985), and M. E. Biddle, A Redaction History of Jer 2:1–4:2 (ATANT 77; Zurich: TVZ, 1990). 54.  Cf. the still classic presentation by A. Fitzgerald, “The Mythological Background for the Presentation of Jerusalem as a Queen and False Worship as Adultery in the OT,” CBQ 34 (1972) 403–16.

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One can recognize in these expansions that theologizations are inserted into the text in two ways. In the first, the destruction is reconceived as punishment for guilt (here “wickedness”), and in the second God implicitly becomes the subject of the punishment. Scholars like Christoph Levin, Robert P. Carroll, William McKane,55 and also as early as Bernhard Duhm56 were of the opinion that scribal exegesis in the prophetic books took place primarily or even exclusively in small isolated additions, and there were few or no comprehensive redactional layers that could be detected. The literary growth of the prophetic books was then comparable to an “unattended forest”57 or an ever-growing avalanche. Contrary to these conclusions, it should be emphasized that expansionary texts can be detected in the prophetic books that redact certain portions of books or even entire books (perhaps even series of books) and thereby provide larger text complexes with new theological meaning. The redactional activity formulates comprehensive theological perspectives that in such cases apply not only to the immediate context, but rather to broader contexts like entire books or even series of books. For even redactional networks reaching beyond the individual books can be discovered, which evidently serve to fashion the theological form of a corpus propheticum (Isaiah–Malachi) that is internally coherent or even the creation of the canonical section the Neviʾim (see the inclusio Josh 1:7/ Mal 3:22–24). Those such as Erich Bosshard and Odil Hannes Steck have detected corresponding redactional perspectives in Isaiah and the Book of the Twelve.58 From this perspective doublets such as Isa 2:2–5/Mic 4:1–5 or Jer 49:7–22/Obed might also be investigated.59 All these activities are accessible as processes of interpretive exegesis and a differentiated systematization. They demonstrate the attempt to “theologize” preexisting tradition. A special impulse must have been generated by the claim that prophecy is God’s word, even if in some prophetic books this claim first emerged or became explicit over the course 55. Cf. Levin, Verheißung; R. P. Carroll, Jeremiah: A Commentary (OTL; London: SCM, 1986); W. A. McKane, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Jeremiah (2 vols.; ICC; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1986/1996). 56.  Duhm, Jeremia. 57.  Duhm, Jeremia, xx. 58. E. Bosshard-Nepustil, Rezeptionen von Jesaja 1–39 im Zwölfprophetenbuch: Untersuchungen zur literarischen Verbindung von Prophetenbüchern in babylonischer und persischer Zeit (OBO 154; Fribourg: Academic Press / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997); O. H. Steck, Der Abschluß der Prophetie im Alten Testament: Ein Versuch zur Vorgeschichte des Kanons (Biblisch-theologische Studien 17; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1991). 59.  Jeremias, “Neuere Entwürfe.”

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of transmission.60 As the word of God, prophecy could not simply be changed or rescinded, so it had to be furnished with a complex process of expansion and actualization to formulate various ways of appropriately presenting the interpretive possibilities. As already suggested, comparable processes in this sense are found in the legal literature. 2. The Juxtaposition of “Old” and “New” in Second Isaiah Assuming that prophecy as a whole plays an important role in the development of theology in the Hebrew Bible tradition, the text complex in Isa 40–5561 should especially be highlighted in this regard. While this text complex arises later than the period of classical prophecy—it presupposes and assimilates classical prophecy—this temporal progression itself created the possibility for the texts in Isa 40–55 to relate in reflective and transformational manners to the preexisting tradition. In the wake of Johannes Begrich, Gerhard von Rad, and Siegfried Herrmann, in 1968 Odil Hannes Steck especially wrestled with the description of “Deutero-Isaiah as theological thinker,”62 emphasizing the importance of the observation of specific theological argumentation within prophetic literature with this special example. Prophecy described as the reception of a supernatural word by exceptional, inspired figures is not sufficient. And the prophetic books are not apprehended appropriately if one reads them simply as text compilations or florilegia without describing the recognizable theological perspectives and references presented by their 60.  Cf. on Jeremiah: Levin, Verheißung, 156–59; idem, “Das Wort Jahwes an Jeremia: Zur ältesten Redaktion der jeremianischen Sammlung,” ZTK 101 (2004) 257–80; K.-F. Pohlmann, Die Ferne Gottes: Studien zum Jeremiabuch: Beiträge zu den “Konfessionen” im Jeremiabuch und ein Versuch zur Frage nach den Anfängen der Jeremiatradition (BZAW 179; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1989); K. Schmid, Buchgestalten des Jeremiabuches: Untersuchungen zur Redaktions- und Rezeptionsgeschichte von Jer 30–33 im Kontext des Buches (WMANT 72; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1996) 140–43; on Ezekiel: K.-F. Pohlmann, “Zur Frage nach ältesten Texten im Ezechielbuch: Erwägungen zu Ez 17,19 und 31,” in Prophet und Prophetenbuch (ed. V. Fritz; BZAW 185; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1989) 150–72. Whether these processes that can be reconstructed for the books of Jeremiah and Ezekiel are also applicable for the book of Amos is questionable: cf. R. G. Kratz, “Die Worte des Amos von Tekoa,” in Propheten in Mari, Assyrien und Israel (ed. M. Köckert and M. Nissinen; FRLANT 201; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2003) 54–89, and the response in A. Scherer, “Vom Sinn prophetischer Gerichtsverkündigung bei Amos und Hosea,” Bib 86 (2005) 1–19. 61.  On the literary and theological-historical questions of the section boundaries, cf. Schmid, “Hintere Propheten,” 338–46. The new commentary by S. Paul, Isaiah 40–66: Translation and Commentary (Eerdmans Critical Commentary; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012), acknowledges the content and formation-historical difference between Deutero- and Trito-Isaiah, but overlooks the different profiles of the content of the various texts. 62.  Cf. the references to Begrich, von Rad, and Hermann found in O. H. Steck, “Deuterojesaja als theologischer Denker,” in idem, Wahrnehmungen Gottes im Alten Testament: Gesammelte Studien (TB 70; Munich: Kaiser, 1982) 204–20 (here 207 n. 2).

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literary figures. The assignment of the activity of specific literary figures to concrete authors remains notoriously difficult within the prophetic books, as in biblical literature as a whole. Yet with regard to Deutero-Isaiah, the possibility might be considered that a collective rather than an individual stands behind the respective texts.63 But this is only of minor importance for the current discussion. Decisive instead is that the Deutero-Isaiah tradition in its historical location—near the end of the Babylonian exile and at the begin of the Persian period64—evidently led to reflective efforts, or rather was compelled to reflection, such that the topic of the development of theology took on great importance. Steck describes this fittingly in the earlier mentioned contribution from 1968: Theological questions in the narrowest sense of the word are those that are produced here. The question of whether Yahweh would again turn to deliver his people at all, the question of whether the word of Yahweh coming through Deutero-Isaiah was at all reliable and could become reality, the question of whether Yahweh was even able to bring about this kind of worldwide deliverance that directed the nations and the powerful, especially the other deities, especially those of the Babylonian conquerors, who in the unfolding of history now appeared to have the upper hand. These questions led to the kind of religious problem that one could not avoid—this was the precipice of a theological crisis of belief in Yahweh that the message of deliverance of Deutero-Isaiah comes up against; this theological crisis calls the prophet back to the basic task as theological thinker.65 It is without question that prophet and theology still coincide in Steck’s statement—Deutero-Isaiah himself is a theologian. This is an historical possibility, but it need not be the case. Nonetheless, Steck correctly sees the theological dimensions present in the content treated in Isa 40–55. Ulrich Berges also recognizes an intellectual undertaking in Isa 40–55 that is definitively concerned with theological questions: In summary it can be said that independent of the preferred terminology (disputation/discussion/contest), no other prophetic 63.  Cf. U. Berges, Jesaja 40–48 (HThKAT; Freiburg i. Br.: Herder, 2008) 36–46. 64.  Cf. the exemplary observations in R. G. Kratz, Kyros im Deuterojesaja-Buch: Redaktionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zu Entstehung und Theologie von Jes 40–55 (FAT 1; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1991) 19–33 for Isa 45:1–7. 65.  Steck, “Deuterojesaja,” 209.

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Berges does not use the concept of “theology” as prominently as Steck does in application to Isa 40–55, but his choice of words still indicates the “theological discussion”: the “intellectual dispute” shows how central this aspect is for the assessment of Isa 40–55. In reality the Deutero-Isaiah tradition allows for continual observation of theologically innovative achievements. The following discussion singles out only one example in which this is especially clear, namely the theme of the “new”67 in Isa 43:16–21:68 16 Thus says Yhwh, who makes a way in the sea, a path in the mighty waters, 17 who brings out chariot and horse, army and warrior; they lie down, they cannot rise, they are extinguished, quenched like a wick: 18 Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old. 19 I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness 66.  Berges, Jesaja, 54. 67.  Cf. on the broader horizon of innovation in Hebrew Bible prophecy, R. G. Kratz, “Das Neue in der Prophetie des Alten Testaments,” in Prophetie in Israel: Beiträge des Symposiums “Das Alte Testament und die Kultur der Moderne” anlässlich des 100. Geburtstags Gerhard von Rads (1901–1971), Heidelberg, 18.–21. Oktober 2001 (ed. I. Fischer et al.; Altes Testament und Moderne 11; Münster: LIT, 2003) 1–22; repr. in Prophetenstudien: Kleine Schriften II (FAT 74; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011) 49–70. 68.  Cf. on the following argument, K. Schmid, “Neue Schöpfung als Überbietung des neuen Exodus: Die tritojesajanische Aktualisierung der deuterojesajanischen Theologie und der Tora,” in K. Schmid, Schriftgelehrte Traditionsliteratur: Fallstudien zur innerbiblischen Schriftauslegung im Alten Testament (FAT 77; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011) 185–205; trans. as “New Creation Instead of New Exodus: The Innerbiblical Exegesis and Theological Transformations of Isaiah 65:17–25,” in Continuity and Discontinuity (ed. L.-S. Tiemeyer and H. Barstad; FRLANT 255; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014) 190–98.

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and rivers69 in the desert. 20 The wild animals will honor me, the jackals and the ostriches; for I give water in the wilderness, rivers in the desert, to give drink to my chosen people, 21 the people whom I formed for myself so that they might declare my praise. (nrsv) This passage can be divided into three parts. The first section (43:16– 17) praises Yhwh through the form of a participial hymn and evocative pictures from the exodus from Egypt and the deliverance of Israel at the Sea of Reeds. The second section (43:18–19) follows, speaking of how the past is not worth remembering. In fact, God is now doing something new. Finally, the third section (43:20–21) carries out this new thing and describes it in the hues of a new exodus through the desert, during which there will be no shortage of water. The text and its outline show clearly that the old exodus is juxtaposed with the new: the old should no longer be considered; it will be replaced by the new. The nature of this content is disputed by some interpreters, most likely because of its heterodoxical impression.70 However, the structure, especially of the middle piece of 43:18–19,71 leaves no doubt that Isa 43:16–21 really does separate the old exodus from the new one in a foundational way, as the antithetical orientation of the two verses clearly demonstrates: 69. 1QIsaa reads “paths.” 70.  Cf. C. Westermann, Das Buch Jesaja Kap. 40–66 (ATD 19; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1966) 104–5; K. Elliger, Deuterojesaja. 1: Jesaja 40,1–45,7 (BK XI/1; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1989) 353; K. Kiesow, Exodustexte im Jesajabuch: Literarkritische und motivgeschichtliche Analysen (OBO 24; Fribourg: Éditions Universitaires / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1979) 71–73; J.-D. Macchi, “ ‘Ne ressassez plus les choses d’autrefois’: Esaïe 43,16–21, un surprenant regard deutéro-ésaïen sur le passé,” ZAW 121 (2009) 225–41(here 234 and n. 28); Kratz, Kyros, 68 with n. 240; T. Krüger, Dekonstruktion und Rekonstruktion prophetischer Eschatologie im Qohelet-Buch,” in “Jedes Ding hat seine Zeit . . .”: Studien zur israelitischen und altorientalischen Weisheit. Diethelm Michel zum 65. Geburtstag (ed. A. A. Diesel et al.; BZAW 241; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1996) 107–29; repr. in Kritische Weisheit: Studien zur weisheitlichen Traditionskritik im Alten Testament (Zurich: TVZ, 1997) 151–72 (here 155 with n. 22); H. Barstad, A Way in the Wilderness: The “Second Exodus” in the Message of Second Isaiah (JSS Monograph 12; Manchester: University of Manchester, 1989) 107–12; L.-S. Tiemeyer, For the Comfort of Zion: The Geographical and Theological Location of Isaiah 40–55 (VTSup 139; Leiden: Brill, 2011) 156–68. Already von Rad (Theologie 2:257) correctly noticed that these words “especially for the pious must have contained something blasphemous.” 71.  On this see Berges, Jesaja, 300.

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Chapter 3 v.18aα: “Remember not” – v.19aα: “See, I am doing” v.18aβ: “Former things” – v.19aβ: “New” v.18bα: “Past things” – v.19bα: “Now it sprouts forth” v.18bβ: “Do not consider” – v.19bβ: “Do you not perceive it?”

The old exodus had lost its salvific quality; God creates something new; and this new will not at all be analogically comparable with the old. But how is this rejection of the traditional exodus tradition to be explained? The historical context of Deutero-Isaiah, situated after the demise of Judah and Jerusalem, provided the confirmation that the leading of Israel out of Egypt was accorded no relevance for deliverance in the current era according to the perspective in Isa 40–55. The former exodus from Egypt had manifestly brought a history of perdition with it that resulted in the loss of their own land. Therefore, that exodus should no longer be considered. Isa 43:16–21 sets up as a contrast a new exodus, now from Babylon, that will surpass the old one by far. First Yhwh himself will go out of Babylon, and the people will then follow him. It is noteworthy that the new exodus will also have a “water miracle”—but not one that destroys the enemy like in Exodus 14. Instead, Yhwh will provide water in the desert so that his people can drink. Isa 43:16–21 is naturally, like the entire Deutero-Isaiah tradition, presented in kerygmatic language. And the arguments are neither partially nor continually elevated to the status of a reflective meta-level. The reflection concerning the replacement of the “old” by the “new” remains within the same kind of language as the traditional presentation of the “old,” but the “new” is introduced and made plausible in an implicit, though reconstructible, thought process as a substitute for the “old.” The implicit theology of the old exodus tradition had been broken on account of the historical circumstances of the time. As a result, a new formulation was needed that promulgated a new theology. The election of Israel by Yhwh remained in existence, however, it was not founded on the exodus from Egypt, but on the return home from Babylon. What is observable here as elsewhere in the Deutero-Isaiah tradition, following Steck and Berges, can in reality be seen as theological considerations. These modify preexisting conceptions in light of a new historical reality and formulate alternatives for it. The position of the Deutero-Isaiah tradition is radically new in this endeavor: instead of adding its statements as expansions to the preexisting text in various places, a new literary composition had to be produced.

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3. Universal Theology of History in the Book of Jeremiah An especially remarkable example of implicit theology is found in a particular interpretive perspective in the book of Jeremiah. One can recognize how the mediation of an older, literarily frozen prophetic word and an actual historical experience generate the notion of a universal judgment for the first time in the Hebrew Bible in these texts. The stories of various royal dynasties from different nations that traditionally had no need to be reconciled with one another—each existed autonomously—are intertwined.72 In terms of compositional history, this new interpretation likely presupposes the Deutero-Isaiah tradition and belongs to the middle of the Persian period. It is, therefore, set after the preceding section. This perspective can be identified by the conspicuous prophecy in Jer 36:30, which the literary context places in the fourth and fifth years of King Jehoiakim—in terms of absolute chronology in the year 605/4  b.c.e.— (36:1; cf. 36:9). In contrast to all historical witnesses, this passage presents King Jehoiakim as the final representative of the Davidic dynasty: Therefore thus says Yhwh concerning King Jehoiakim of Judah: He shall have no one to sit upon the throne of David, and his dead body shall be cast out to the heat by day and the frost by night. (nrsv) This proclamation was not fulfilled. Further Davidides followed Jehoiakim on the Judahite royal throne for almost two decades until the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 b.c.e. 1 Chr 3:17–21 even reports of further descendants for Jehoiachin, Davidides, into the Persian period. Contrary to some suggestions, the fact that Jer 36:30 was not fulfilled is not evidence for the composition of the text during the reign of Jehoiakim, whose historical error would then be explained by lack of knowledge about what later actually took place. The specific perspective of Jer 36:30 instead arose from inner-biblical exegesis. The announcement of Jer 36:30 combines two earlier prophetic words from Jer 22:18–19 and 22:30. These announce a 72.  For more detail, cf. K. Schmid, “Nebukadnezars Antritt der Weltherrschaft und der Abbruch der Davidsdynastie: Innerbiblische Schriftauslegung und universalgeschichtliche Konstruktion im Jeremiabuch,” in Die Textualisierung der Religion im antiken Juda (ed. J. Schaper; FAT 62; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009) 150–66; repr. in K. Schmid, Schriftgelehrte Traditionsliteratur: Fallstudien zur innerbiblischen Schriftauslegung im Alten Testament (FAT 77; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 2011) 223–41.

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shameful burial for Jehoiakim and deny any descendants for Jehoiachin. Jer 36:30 applies them both to Jehoiakim and places the end of the Davidic dynasty already in the fourth or, as the case may be, the fifth year of Jehoiakim for theological rather than historical reasons. As we know not least from the book of Jeremiah itself (Jer 25:1), this point in time also marks the accession to world domination of the Babylonian crown prince and later king Nebuchadnezzar. In this very year, he attained hegemony over the Near East as a result of his victory in the battle of Carchemish (605 b.c.e.). Setting the end of the Davidic dynasty in the same year by means of Jer 36:30 also draws on a formulation of universal history that only allows for one kingdom of God’s favor. This was initially the Davidic dynasty, of course. Through the failure of the Judahite kings, this still “Davidic” kingdom could then transfer to foreign powers as well. With the rejection of Jehoiakim, according to the prophetic word in the year 605 b.c.e., this kingdom passes to Nebuchadnezzar, whom the book of Jeremiah arguably for this reason calls “Yhwh’s servant” (Jer 25:9; 27:6; 43:10). In the events of world history, this process is expressed in an observable manner by Nebuchadnezzar emerging victorious from the battle of Carchemish. As a result, he was able to secure authority over the then-known world. The reader of the Bible knows, however, that this order would prove to be of only limited duration. World domination then passed quickly, as known by the Deutero-Isaiah tradition, which covers the early Persian period, to Cyrus—the “Messiah” of Yhwh (Isa 45:1)—who then inherited the Davidic dynasty after Nebuchadnezzar. This conception of a translatio imperii—from the Davidides to the Babylonians and to the Persians—was not prepared by the tradition, nor was it the immediately obvious step. One rather cannot avoid concluding that it presents nothing other than intense theological reflection that searched for an explanation for how, on the one hand, the eternal dynasty of the Davidides could demonstrably break off, and on the other, that the theocratic direction of world events by God alone could be retained. The closest explanation would be this theological conception of a backwards projection of the highly innovative theological thought of the election of the Persian king Cyrus by Yhwh in Isa 45:1 as his “messiah.” This almost in itself leads to the conclusion that between the last Davidide and Cyrus there must have been a connecting link in a kingdom elected by God. Historically, this conception of the translatio imperii presupposes the experience of three great imperial powers displacing one another within a century. This chain of events was without analogy to that point, so it was

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unlikely that it can be placed earlier than the final political establishment of Persian dominion at the time of Darius. This perspective can be described as theological—in the sense that it draws reflectively on preexisting experience and tradition—because it attempts to recognize an overarching meaning behind the preexisting prophetic oracles such as Jer 22:18–19 and 22:30. It remains implicit in that it follows the narrative logic of the text of Jer 36 and is not worked out on the surface of the text. 4. The Promotion of Isaiah to Prophet of World History The material extension of the process just described is also apparent in the development of the conception in the book of Isaiah. The prophet Isaiah, from the historical watchtower accorded him within the book, surveys the entire history of the world—from the Assyrian to the Babylonian and Persian periods as far as the new creation of heaven and earth. The historical Isaiah also certainly spoke about the future, but this temporal horizon likely stretched only a couple of years or, in the best case, a couple of decades.73 But with the literary unification of the Proto- and Deutero-Isaiah traditions—that is, Isa 1–39 + Isa 40–55—the dimensions of the historical projection changed fundamentally in this newly formed prophetic book. If it is the case that through the insertion of the bridge chapter of Isa 35 a greater book of Isaiah combining the Proto- and Deutero-Isaiah traditions was developed,74 then this development entails not only a massive quantitative change to the book of Isaiah, but also a qualitative transformation. By subordinating the prophecy from Isa 40–55 under the authority of Isaiah, Isaiah conversely became the prophet not only of the Assyrian, but also of the Persian period. And with the further expansion of the Isaiah text, especially in Isa 65–66, this horizon then stretched to the Eschaton. With this development in view, which can also be traced analogically in the Book of the Twelve Prophets as a redactional unity,75 Duhm can be judged correct that the Hebrew Bible canon was put together by theologians.76 The book of Isaiah in this prophetic dimension is at least implicitly a theological book. This results, on the one hand, from the conviction that the Proto- and Deutero-Isaiah traditions could be connected. 73. For more detail, cf. K. Schmid, Jesaja 1–23 (ZBK 19/1; Zurich: TVZ, 2011) 13–44. 74.  Cf. O. H. Steck, Bereitete Heimkehr: Jesaja 35 als redaktionelle Brücke zwischen dem Ersten und dem Zweiten Jesaja (SBS 121; Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1985). 75. Cf. Bosshard-Nepustil, Rezeptionen; Steck, Abschluß. 76.  Cf. above, pp. 17–18.

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This marked a tremendous transformation in the biblical construction of prophecy. On the other hand, though, it is a theological book because of the further theological interpretive and expansionist processes that constituted the impression of the content of the book. 5. The Systematization of Various Promises Both the presence of different prophetic traditions that arose from different historical prophetic figures, as well as the manifold expansions that were added to them, led to a variegated appearance of prophetic literature in terms of language and content. In light of the theological imprint of this literature, it is quite conspicuous that this diversity did not simply become more and more diverse, but rather specific rational strategies of reconciliation appear to have mediated between the perspectives. This can be recognized, for example, in the book of Jeremiah, where Jer 33:14–16 takes up Jer 23:5–6 (see table on p. 73) and also refers back to “the good word” from Jer 29:10. As in the section above, a text takes up the preexisting promises and systematizes the content.77 Jer 33:14–26 has a special place within the book of Jeremiah: at 185 words, it is the longest plus that appears in the Hebrew but not the Greek version of the book. This feature can hardly be evaluated in any way except that Jer 33:14–26 was not present in the Hebrew Vorlage used by the Greek translation. The text with great probability belongs to the end of the productive literary transmission history of the book of Jeremiah. Now the opening section in Jer 33:14–16 indicates clearly that it is related to preexisting texts that it evidently takes up and reinterprets. On the one hand, it recalls the messianic prophecy of Jer 23:5–6, and on the other, the “good words” in Jer 29:10, which view the return of the Babylonian exiles to Jerusalem. Jer 33:14–16 apparently intends to combine these two themes and obtain an explanation for why the restitution of the Davidic dynasty promised in Jer 23:5f. still had not taken place at the time of its composition—likely in the third century b.c.e. First the Diaspora must return home, and only then will the Davidic dynasty be restored. On the basis of the special situation that this text is only witnessed in the Hebrew, one can assume with some confidence that Jer 33:14–16 77. Cf. Schmid, Buchgestalten, 56–66, 323–27; idem, “Die Verheißung eines kommenden Davididen und die Heimkehr der Diaspora: Die innerbiblische Aktualisierung von Jer 23,5f in Jer 33,14–26,” in K. Schmid, Schriftgelehrte Traditionsliteratur: Fallstudien zur innerbiblischen Schriftauslegung im Alten Testament (FAT 77; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 2011) 207–21.

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33:14  The days are surely coming, 23:5  The days are surely coming, says Yhwh, says Yhwh, when I will fulfill when I will the promise [good word; cf. 29:10] I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. 33:15  In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David;

and he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. 33:16  In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will live in safety. And this is the name by which it will be called: ‘Yhwh is our righteousness.’

raise up for David a righteous Branch,

and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will live in safety. And this is the name by which he will be called: ‘Yhwh is our righteousness.’

only arises as a Hellenistic text. It is arguably later than the translation of the book of Jeremiah into Greek, otherwise it would appear there as well. It evidently arose through a contemporary reading of older texts such as Jer 23:5–6 after the Persian period, at which point the question became increasingly pressing with regard to the meaning of these promises of dominion that have gone unfulfilled for centuries since “Jeremiah.” Jer 33:14–16 answers this question by affirming the promise from Jer 23:5–6 on the one hand, but on the other, by coupling it with the one from 29:10, this makes fulfillment contingent upon the conditions of 29:10. Only when the Diaspora have returned to the land will the promise of dominion from Jer 23:5–6 be fulfilled. This new interpretation of Jer 23:5–6 in Jer 33:14–16 results from the theological synthesis of traditional material. On the flip side, it is only recognizable as the result of a theologically informed reading of the book of Jeremiah. One can then note, on the one hand, how the content of the book of Jeremiah becomes more theological over the course of its history of expansions and, on the other, it requires an increasing amount of theological cultivation from its readers.

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6. The Interaction of the Prophetic Books with the Torah A comparable phenomenon to the one just described, but with a broader literary horizon, is found in the mediation of the prophetic texts with the Torah.78 Here as well it is a case of attempts at reconciliation, but they are no longer within the prophetic literature itself. They are instead related to the prophetic corpus’s recourse to the Torah. These cross-references between Torah and prophets were always known by premodern and modern biblical exegetes. They were originally interpreted according to the familiar biblical presentation. The prophets come after Moses and interpret the law. First with Wellhausen was this relationship reversed, which is historically accurate: lex post prophetas. The older passages of the prophetic books are not familiar with the Mosaic law. What Wellhausen means by Mosaic law is essentially the priestly cultic ordinances. The enthusiasm surrounding this discovery made it impossible for biblical studies to see the relativity of this conclusion clearly for quite some time. What was accurate for the older portions in the prophets was not necessarily the case for the later portions as well. In reality, a number of expansionary texts in the prophetic books that originate from the Babylonian, Persian, and Hellenistic periods show conspicuous proximity to the Torah texts. However, these overlaps can be either concordant or of a critical-distancing kind. So, for example, the promise of a new heaven and a new earth in Isa 65:17–25 is formed markedly by the reception of Genesis 1–3. The new creation of heaven and earth is meant to replace the current order of the old creation.79 Isa 65:17–25 appears to have found a model for this juxtaposition in Isa 43:16–21, where the old and new exodus are contrasted. The replacement of the old by the new exodus is surpassed in Isa 65:17–25 in terms of a universally reaching antithesis of old and new creation. Furthermore, it can even be recognized that Isa 65:17–25 borrows not only from Genesis 1–3. It also makes reference to the end of the Torah—namely Deut 28:30—and thereby substitutes a functionally equivalent perspective of salvation in place of the ordering of life of the old creation. Qohelet 1 78.  Cf. E. Otto, “Jeremia und die Tora: Ein nachexilischer Diskurs,” in idem, Die Tora: Studien zum Pentateuch: Gesammelte Schriften (BZABR 9; Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2009) 515–60; cf. also C. Maier, Jeremia als Lehrer der Tora: Soziale Gebote des Deuteronomiums in Fortschreibungen des Jeremiabuches (FRLANT 196; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002). D. Rom-Shiloni (“Actualization of Penateuchal Legal Traditions in Jeremiah: More on the Riddle of Authorship,” ZAR 15 [2009] 254–81) dates the Torah quite early and for the most part only sees dependencies on the side of the Jeremiah tradition, which to a large degree goes back to Jeremiah himself. 79.  Cf. O. H. Steck, “Der neue Himmel und die neue Erde: Beobachtungen zur Rezeption von Gen 1–3 in Jes 65,16b–25,” in Studies in the Book of Isaiah (ed. J. van Ruiten and M. Vervenne; BETL 132; Leuven: Peeters, 1997) 349–65.

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then argues polemically against this position (“There is nothing new under the sun”).80 A similar process of critical reference to the Torah is shown in the promise of the new covenant in Jer 31:31–34. It evidently follows the content of the formulation of the Shemaʿ Israel in Deut 6:4–9, but reverses the conditions of the Deuteronomy text for the ensuing time of salvation. The law will be placed upon Israel’s heart, and no one will instruct another any more.81 The debate in the prophetic literature with the Torah provides an obvious witness of the intense discussions between the various groups preserving the traditions of this literature, who by no means needed to be separated from one another by great distances. Intellectual distance and spatial proximity are not mutually exclusive. Remarkable, however, is the will to distinguish each position from the others, to place these in relation with one another, and then to mark the contours of each and to justify them. Little speaks in favor of attempts to avoid the terminology of “theological” efforts.

III. The Theologization of the Law Law was never at any time or in any society simply a static entity, despite the proverbial law of the Medes and Persians (Dan 6:13), which is not historical reality, but rather a literary fiction within the framework of the Daniel narratives. Interpretation always accompanies law. In the context of ancient Israel, this also included the fundamental process of its theologization. In order to understand the activities of legal interpretation adequately, it is necessary to recall the fundamental significance of ancient Near Eastern legal collections. A number of indicators suggest that law did not exclusively have binding status. It was instead interpreted along the lines of paradigmatic examples for discerning justice. As a result, the well-known legal treatises do not even come close to covering every conceivable offense. They instead seem to deal with complicated exceptions more than with everyday difficulties. A comparison of the penalties in the legal treatises with extant legal judgments shows that there was considerable latitude of judgment. Finally, it remains clear that in the ancient Near Eastern context, final legislative authority was not granted to a text, but the king. The king’s subordination under the law was an innovation first made by the Torah (Deuteronomy 17). 80. Cf. Krüger, “Dekonstruktion.” 81. Cf. Schmid, Buchgestalten, 66–85.

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1. The Transfer of Legal Categories onto Israel’s Relationship with God It is a well-known fact that the legal traditions of the Hebrew Bible distinguish themselves in a fundamental manner from those of the ancient Near East in that they are formulated as divine law rather than as royal law.82 Where the king is brought into explicit connection with Hebrew Bible law, he functions—as already mentioned (Deuteronomy 17)—as the object, not as the subject of the law. Nonetheless, the so-called Covenant Code— the oldest legal collection in the Hebrew Bible—still allows for the clear recognition that its formulation as divine law emerged as a secondary reinterpretation.83 The formation of the legal ordinances of the Hebrew Bible as divine law was not the case for the oldest collections—worth mentioning here is especially the basic content of the so-called Mishpatim (“legal ordinances”) from Exodus 21–23. In the past several decades, the insight has gained acceptance that this new interpretation as divine law owes its success essentially to a critical reception of Neo-Assyrian vassal treaty ideology, in which Israel is set in an analogously dependent relationship to its God as Assyrian vassals were to the Assyrian emperor.84 From this new interpretation arose a conception that appears to be of fundamental importance for the further development of theology in the Hebrew Bible. The relationship of God to his followers came to be conceived in legal terms. This process is of fundamental importance for the investigation of theology in the Hebrew Bible, because through this process God could be thought of in basically rational categories—those of international treaty law. How God relates to Israel is dependent on the content of the treaty existing between the two covenant partners and the fulfillment of these stipulations. While God was naturally not completely confined to this treaty relationship, his actions toward Israel were definitely interpreted through legal categories.85 82. E. Otto, “Recht/Rechtstheologie/Rechtsphilosophie I,” TRE 28:197–209; idem, “Recht und Ethos in der ost- und westmediterranen Antike,” in idem, Altorientalische und biblische Rechtsgeschichte: Gesammelte Studien (BZABR 8; Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 2008) 619–36; idem, “Exkarnation ins Recht und Kanonsbildung in der Hebräischen Bibel: Zu einem Vorschlag von Jan Assmann,” in Altorientalische und biblische Rechtsgeschichte, 507–18. 83.  Cf. R. Albertz, “Die Theologisierung des Rechts im Alten Israel,” in Geschichte und Theologie: Studien zur Exegese des Alten Testaments und zur Religionsgeschichte Israels (ed. I. Kottsieper and J. Wöhrle; BZAW 326; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2003) 187–207; summarized briefly by E. Otto, “Bundesbuch,” vol. 1 of RGG (4th ed.) 1:1875–76. 84. Cf. E. Otto, Das Deuteronomium: Politische Theologie und Rechtsreform in Juda und Assyrien (BZAW 284; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1999); more differentiated and taking it a step further is C. Koch, Vertrag, Treueid und Bund: Studien zur Rezeption des altorientalischen Vertragrechts im Deuteronomium und zur Ausbildung der Bundestheologie im Alten Testament (BZAW 383; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2008). 85.  An especially incisive example of the legally formulated interpretation of the relationship between God and humanity is found in the Decalogue (cf. M. Köckert, Die Zehn

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It should be emphasized, however, that this legally formulated relationship between God and his people was not a totally new innovation on the part of Judahite theologians during the Neo-Assyrian period. It follows a traditional conception of order found throughout the ancient Near East that symbolizes the concept of justice in the various languages. Also traditional is the notion that the world is inhabited by a “just” structure.86 New, however, is that this notion could be furnished with positive legal ordinances for the sphere of God and his people. With regard to the investigation of the legal traditions in the Hebrew Bible, the step of the formulation as divine law was of definitive importance. As soon as the law was understood as divine law, then modification could, because of its high authoritative status, only take place through the process of interpretation. Replacement was no longer conceivable. As time progressed, this became ever more inevitable. Conversely, the decision to canonize both the legal base text and also its interpretation led to an extraordinarily fruitful legal hermeneutic. As a result, the dynamic of interpretation was accorded the same normativity as the legal positions presented, which need to be accounted for in complementary balance. 2. Divine Law and Inner-biblical Exegesis These processes of exegesis can be observed in a multitude of ways between the Covenant Code and Deuteronomy. An especially clear example is offered in the reworking of Exod 21:2–11 in Deut 15:12–18:87 Gebote [Munich: Beck, 2007]). As a result of religious-historical indicators, it can be dated with comparative precision to the beginning of the sixth century b.c.e. On the one hand, the demand for intolerant Yhwh monolatry does not assume the clearly monotheistic conceptions of the Priestly Document or the Deutero-Isaiah tradition, but on the other, this demand is clearly inspired by Deuteronomy. The central focus on the Sabbath law (so, esp. in Deuteronomy’s Decalogue, which—when one observes the links between the individual commandments with “and”—should rather be called Pentalogue) with its innovative identification of the seventh day as the traditional day of rest with what in the period of the monarchy was still the New Moon Festival called “Sabbath.” The economic restrictions also appear to date to a time after 587 b.c.e. (cf. A. Grund, Die Entstehung des Sabbats: Seine Bedeutung für Israels Zeitkonzept und Erinnerungskultur [FAT 75; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011]). The Decalogue is therefore of special importance because it regulates humans’ social and divine relationships comprehensively in terms of law. For this reason, it is a theological rather than a judicial text. 86. Cf. H. H. Schmid, Gerechtigkeit als Weltordnung: Hintergrund und Geschichte des alttestamentlichen Gerechtigkeitsbegriffes (BHT 40; Tübingen: Mohr [Siebeck], 1968); J. Assmann, Maʾat: Gerechtigkeit und Unsterblichkeit im alten Ägypten (2nd. ed.; Munich: Beck, 2006). 87.  Cf. B. M. Levinson, “The Manumission of Hermeneutics: The Slave Laws of the Pentateuch as a Challenge to Contemporary Pentateuch Theory,” in Congress Volume Leiden 2004 (ed. A. Lemaire; VTSup 109; Leiden: Brill, 2006) 281–324.

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Exod 21:2: When you buy a male Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, but in the seventh he shall go out a free person, without debt. (3) If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. (4) If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master’s and he shall go out alone. (5) But if the slave declares, “I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out a free person,” (6) then his master shall bring him before God. He shall be brought to the door or the doorpost; and his master shall pierce his ear with an awl; and he shall serve him for life. (7) When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. (8) If she does not please her master, who designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed; he shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people, since he has dealt unfairly with her. (9) If he designates her for his son, he shall deal with her as with a daughter. (10) If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish the food, clothing, or marital rights of the first wife. (11) And if he does not do these three things for her, she shall go out without debt, without payment of money.

Deut 15:12: If a member of your community, whether a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you and works for you six years, in the seventh year you shall set that person free. (13) And when you send a male slave out from you a free person, you shall not send him out empty-handed. (14) Provide liberally out of your flock, your threshing floor, and your wine press, thus giving to him some of the bounty with which the Lord your God has blessed you. (15) Remember that you were [also] a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God redeemed you; for this reason I lay this command upon you today. (16) But if he says to you, “I will not go out from you,” because he loves you and your household, since he is well off with you, (17) then you shall take an awl and thrust it through his earlobe into the door, and he shall be your slave forever. You shall do the same with regard to your female slave. (18) Do not consider it a hardship when you send them out from you free persons, because for six years they have given you services worth the wages of hired laborers; and the Lord your God will bless you in all that you do.

It is readily apparent that Exod 21:2–11 is taken up and reinterpreted in Deut 15:12–18. Both texts deal with the release of slaves after six years,

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which is the statute in both (Exod 21:2 and Deut 15:12). But the ordinance in the Covenant Code is transformed from various perspectives in Deuteronomy. To begin with, it is conspicuous that the freed slave in Exodus 21 goes out empty-handed, while Deuteronomy 15 stipulates that he must be furnished with certain provisions. Why? Evidently in order that the freed slave did not immediately fall back into debt slavery, he needed an amount of seed money from which to build up his own livelihood. This aspect also determines the different formulation of the way one becomes a slave in Exod 21:2 and Deut 15:12. While in Exod 21:2–11 the “purchase” of a slave appears to take place following a typical process, the form of expression in Deut 15:12–18 (“When your brother . . . sells himself to you”) clearly indicates that the situation of debt slavery describes a state of emergency. Slavery is not a permanent institution. It is rather a necessary, but limited and temporary evil. According to Deut 15:12–18, slaves are viewed as potentially free people, while for Exod 21:2–11 they are members of one class of people among others. The explicit theologization of the manumission of slaves is then formulated in Deut 15:15. Slave manumission was not based solely on a social imperative, but also on a theological imperative. Also, the now-free Israelites were once slaves and were freed from slavery. A second theologization is formulated in Deut 15:18. Adherence to the law of slave manumission no longer simply means respecting a legal principle, but it brings God’s blessing with it. In terms of the history of institutions, the time of composition of this theologization perhaps occured when there was no longer an executive authority that could carry out the implementation of these laws, but it was up to the discretion of those addressed. A further element of the theologizing of law in Deut 15:12–18 appears in the ritual that seals the event of a former slave choosing to remain with his master. In Exod 21:6 the idea seems to be assumed that one could appear “before God” on the property of the master. Deuteronomy cannot agree with this notion because of its theological program of the centralization of the cult in Jerusalem. As a result, the ritual becomes profane and no longer takes place “before God.” Remarkably, in this comparison the Exodus slave manumission text refers to God in relation to a slave remaining with his master. In Deuteronomy it is the release that receives a theological coloring. The inner-biblical exegetical history of Exod 21:2–11 does not, however, end in Deut 15:12–18. Within the context of the so-called Holiness Code, Lev 25:39–46 takes up the slave laws from Exod 21:2–11 and Deut 15:12–18 and once again provides a new interpretation: there may no

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longer be Israelite slaves. The designation “slave”—reserved for people who have to sell themselves—is avoided; they are classified as day laborers and resident aliens. Lev 25:39: If any who are dependent on you become so impoverished that they sell themselves to you, you shall not make them serve as slaves. (40) They shall remain with you as hired or bound laborers. They shall serve with you until the year of the jubilee. (41) Then they and their children with them shall be free from your authority; they shall go back to their own family and return to their ancestral property. The designation “slave” is only applicable to the Israelites in a theological context. All Israelites are slaves of God, and it can be said that they were freed from Egypt. For this reason they cannot be sold. Worth noting in Lev 25:39–46 is that the memory of the exodus is not applied to the masters, but rather to the slaves: (42) For they are my servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves are sold. (43) You shall not rule over them with harshness, but shall fear your God. The expression “with harshness rule over them” alludes to a manner of speaking about the oppression of the Israelites by the Egyptians from Exod 1:13–14 (“The Egyptians forced the Israelites harshly to the work”— “and they made their life bitter with . . . all the work, which they imposed harshly upon them”). If Israelites enslave their compatriots, then they are no different than the Egyptians in their relationship to Israel, according to Exodus 1. While there should not be any Israelite slaves, Lev 25:39–46 does not reject the institution of slavery as such: (44) As for the male and female slaves whom you may have, it is from the nations around you that you may acquire male and female slaves. (45) You may also acquire them from among the aliens residing with you, and from their families that are with you, who have been born in your land; and they may be your property. (46) You may keep them as a possession for your children after you, for them to inherit as property. These you may treat as slaves, but as for your fellow Israelites, no one shall rule over the other with harshness. The movement of inner-biblical exegesis running from Exod 21:2–11 through Deut 15:12–18 to Lev 25:39–46 places the dispensation of justice in an ever-wider-reaching theological context and becomes increas-

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ingly critical of the enslavement of Israelites. For Exod 21:2–11, slavery is an unquestioned reality that should, however, be subjected to specific regulations. For Deut 15:12–18, the enslavement of Israelites is a necessary, temporary, and limited evil. For theological reasons it should be worked against so that it occurs as seldom as possible. While for Lev 25:39–46 the theological perspective is given such strong priority that the enslavement of compatriots is banned on theological grounds. How these three slave laws are to be read together is an open question. Rabbinical exegesis understood them as three separate ordinances that are all accorded the same applicability. If one follows the narrative location of each slave law, then Exod 21:2–11 and Lev 25:39–46 are anchored in the Sinai giving of the law, while Deut 15:12–18 takes place within the context of the lawgiving in the Transjordan and therefore possesses lower authoritative status. The insertion of Lev 25:39–46 into the framework of the Sinai pericope likely arises in response to this line of reasoning: its theological weight provided the reason to place this final modification of the slave laws in the book of Leviticus.

IV. The Theologization of Political History The emerging conception of God as lawgiver and Israel’s duty in response to the law promulgated by him was accompanied by the transfer of this relationship to the interpretation of the history of Israel and Judah. The annalistic presentation of their own royal history is based in ancient Near Eastern tradition. The synchronistic synopsis of Israel and Judah represents a first, substantial interpretive effort.88 But especially noteworthy is the structure of theological evaluations in the books of Kings, whose historical setting, however, remains debated.89 English-speaking scholarship largely places it at approximately the same time as the Assyrian-period core of Deuteronomy, while German-speaking scholarship often argues for a date several decades later, after the downfall of Judah and Jerusalem. Both views agree that this structure is to be seen in close literary and thematic connection with Deuteronomy—each with its literary-historical differentiations in multiple layers and reciprocal dependencies.90 The following 88.  Cf. C. Levin, “Das synchronistische Exzerpt aus den Annalen der Könige von Israel und Juda,” VT 61 (2011) 616–28. 89.  Cf. F. Blanco-Wißmann, “Er tat das Rechte . . .”: Beurteilungskriterien und Deuteronomismus in 1Kön 12–2Kön 25 (ATANT 93; Zurich: TVZ, 2008); T. Römer, The So-Called Deuteronomistic History: A Sociological, Historical, and Literary Introduction (London: T. & T. Clark, 2007). 90. Cf. Kratz, Komposition; K. Schmid, “Das Deuteronomium innerhalb der ‘deuteronomistischen Geschichtswerke’ in Gen–2Kön,” in Das Deuteronomium zwischen Pentateuch und deuteronomistischem Geschichtswerk (ed. E. Otto and R. Achenbach; FRLANT 206;

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simplified perspective makes it possible to consider the problem: when viewing the judgments of kings, then the issue of cult centralization (cf. Deut 12) seems to have been front and central.91 The judgment criterion for the kings of the Northern Kingdom was the retention of the sins of Jeroboam,92 and for the kings of the Southern Kingdom a multiplicity of cult sanctuaries93 was brought forward as the decisive criterion. In a subsequent step, the allegation to have transgressed the principle of the single cult location was expanded into an allegation of idolatry, which would mean transgression against the first (and—depending on how one counts—the second) commandment of the Decalogue.94 Interesting here is the observation that now the cultic worship at the high places, which was earlier admissible—but was in the wrong place insofar as it was not centralized worship—was not subsumed under idolatry and interpreted as such (cf. esp. 2 Kgs 17:9–12 and 1 Kgs 14:22–24): The Judahite kings who “did right in the eyes of Yhwh,” but only did not destroy the high places, could receive an overall positive evaluation (cf. 2 Kgs 18:22). Finally, one can conceptually add one further step, for which “everything that Moses, the servant of Yhwh had commanded” (2 Kgs 18:12 is the evaluative measuring stick), so not transgression against one or another specific principle of law, but rather transgression against the commands of the Torah in general.95 By measuring history by the theology of Deuteronomy—or, as the case may be in later layers, by the theology of the Torah as a whole—this Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2004) 193–211; trans. as “Deuteronomy within the ‘Deuteronomistic Histories’ in Genesis–2 Kings,” in Deuteronomy in the Pentateuch, Hexateuch, and the Deuteronomistic History (ed. K. Schmid and R. F. Person, Jr.; FAT/2 56; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012) 8–30; idem, “The Deuteronomistic Image of History as Interpretive Device in the Second Temple Period: Towards a Long-Term Interpretation of ‘Deuteronomism,’” in Congress Volume Helsinki 2010 (ed. M. Nissinen; VTSup 148; Leiden: Brill, 2012) 369–88. 91.  Cf. E. Aurelius, “Der Ursprung des Ersten Gebots,” ZTK 100 (2003) 1–21 (here 4). 92.  Cf. 1 Kgs 12:25–30 (Jeroboam I); 15:25–26 (Nadab); 15:33–34 (Baasha); 16:18– 19 (Zimri); 16:25–26 (Omri); 16:29–33* (Ahab); 22:52–53 (Ahaziah); 2 Kgs 3:1–3 (Joram); 10:29 (Jehu); 13:1–2 (Jehoahaz); 13:10–11 (Joash); 14:23–24 (Jeroboam II); 15:8–9 (Zechariah); 15:17–18 (Menahem); 15:23–24 (Pekahiah); 15:27–28 (Pekah); 17:1–2 (Hoshea). 93.  1 Kgs 3:2–3 (Solomon); 14:22 (LXX: Rehoboam; MT: Judah); 15:1–3 (Abijah); 15:11–15* (Asa); 22:41–45 (Jehoshaphat); 2 Kgs 8:16–19 (Jehoram); 8:25–27 (Ahaziah); 12:1–4 (Joash); 14:1–4 (Amaziah); 15:1–4 (Azariah); 15:32–35 (Jotham); 16:1–4 (Ahaz); 18:2–7* (Hezekiah); 21:1–2 (Manasseh); 21:19–22* (Amon); 22:1–2 (Josiah); 23:31–32 (Jehoahaz); 23:36–37 (Jehoiakim); 24:8–9 (Jehoiachin); 24:17–20 (Zedekiah). 94.  Cf. Exod 20:2–6; 23:13, 23–24; Josh 23:6–7, 16; 1 Sam 7:3–4; 8:8; 12:10; 26:19; 1 Kgs 9:6, 8f.; 11:1f., 9–10; 14:7–9; 16:30–33; 18:17–18; 21:25–26; 22:54; 2 Kgs 10:18; 17:15–17, 35, 38–39; 21:3, 21; 22:17. 95.  Cf. Josh 1:7–8; 8:30–35; 22:5; 23:6–7; 1 Kgs 2:1–3; 6:11–13; 2 Kgs 10:31; 14:6; 18:6, 12; 21:7–8; 22:8, 10–11; 23:1–3, 25.

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history is no longer perceived as a progression characterized by occasional “charismatic” divine interventions. Instead it was interpreted as a theologically determined continuum, the quality of which was determined by human action and divine reaction within the framework of the basic reciprocal obligation found in Deuteronomy and the Torah.96 The theological achievement of this juxtaposition with Deuteronomy is that God is conceived of not only in terms of vassal-treaty categories, but the course of history is also to be correlated with these categories. As a result, history becomes readable as a text; it becomes a narrative whose meaning can be sought out.97 The theologization of the literary presentation of the political history of Israel is therefore also a result of the theologization of Israel’s relationship with God according to legal tradition. Within the framework of the search for theology in the Hebrew Bible, this process is therefore especially meaningful because it demonstrates that processes of theologization possessed—naturally—an expansive character.

V. Theology in the Pentateuch at Large As a result of the fact that the legal traditions of the Hebrew Bible were transmitted within the frame of the Pentateuch, the search for theology with regard to one of the basic parts of the Pentateuch has already been addressed in the previous section. However, one of the fundamental characteristics of the Pentateuch is that it contains not only legal, but also narrative material. Which processes of theologization are recognizable in this second block, or, as the case may be, in its connection with the first part? 1. The Promise Theology of the Ancestral Narratives The text block of Gen 12–50 is strongly marked by promise texts that combine the various individual episodes and narrative cycles with one another. Since the works of Rainer Kessler, Rolf Rendtorff, and Erhard Blum,98 the insight that these promise texts do not belong to the original 96.  Cf. J. Assmann, Das kulturelle Gedächtnis: Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identität in frühen Hochkulturen (Munich: Beck, 1992) 248–49. 97.  Cf. in more detail, K. Schmid, “Zeit und Geschichte als Determinanten biblischer Theologie: Überlegungen zum Wandel des Geschichtsverständnisses im Alten Testament,” in K. Schmid, Schriftgelehrte Traditionsliteratur: Fallstudien zur innerbiblischen Schriftauslegung im Alten Testament (FAT 77; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011) 299–322. 98.  Cf. R. Kessler, Die Querverweise im Pentateuch: Überlieferungsgeschichtliche Untersuchung der expliziten Querverbindungen innerhalb des vorpriesterlichen Pentateuchs (Ph.D. diss., University of Heidelberg, 1972); R. Rendtorff, Das überlieferungsgeschichtliche Problem des Pentateuch (BZAW 147; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1976; trans. J. J. Scullion, The Problem of the Process of Transmission in the Pentateuch [JSOTSup 89; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press,

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layer of the tradition has gained acceptance. They instead arise on account of their theological interpretation and the redactional cross-linking of the previously independent narratives and narrative strands. The promise theme contains, however, at least one point of contact with the preexisting tradition, which is in Gen 18. The narrative of the visit of the three men to Abraham contains the promise of a son who should be born to the host within a year—for form-critical reasons this element should be seen as integral to the original narrative. Comparable narrative reports of divine visits contain the element of a gift for the host, which in this case is the promise of a son. It cannot be ruled out that this element was already part of the oral pre-history, and as such accompanied the tradition complex of the Abraham narrative and then the further ancestral history over an extended period. The theme of the promise then grew to enormous importance especially through its use as the frame establishing a comprehensive ancestor narrative. An especially primary role is played by the promises in Gen 12:1–3 and 28:13–15, the historical location of which are debated, but they likely presuppose the demise of the Northern Kingdom in 720 b.c.e. and perhaps also that of the Southern Kingdom in 587 b.c.e.99 It is obvious that the literary process of the combination of the individual narrative cycles of the ancestral history into an overarching complex of Gen 12–50 is of considerable importance for the question of theologizing processes in Hebrew Bible tradition. The redactional connection was fashioned out of explicitly “theological” texts—that is, as the statements of God himself. Therefore, it is unquestionable that this combining activity is interlaced with theological meaning. What does it consist of? First, the most striking moment in the configuration of the divine speeches should be mentioned. When the preexisting individual traditions and narrative cycles present divine interactions with people, these events can be recognized as being portrayed in a far more reserved manner. This is perhaps most clearly seen in Gen 28:10–22. Regardless of whether one views Gen 28:13aα as belonging to Jacob’s original dream in Bethel or not, the numinous nature of the place described in Gen 28:11–12*, 16–19*—which would not yet have contained the promise in 28:13– 15,100—suggests that the original narrative did not include a palpable di1990]); Blum, Komposition; idem, Studien. See also D. M. Carr, Reading the Fractures of Genesis: Historical and Literary Approaches (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1996). 99. Cf. Kratz, Komposition; Schmid, Literary History, 84–86, 122–25. 100.  This is recognizable as an addition, first because of its conception of a deity that is not locally bound, and second, it forecloses on the subsequent oath formulation in vv. 20–22. Differently, however, E. Blum, “Noch einmal: Jakobs Traum in Bethel – Genesis 28,10–22,”

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vine verbal revelation. It is first the redactional integration of this narrative in the larger context of the ancestor story (or rather into the Jacob cycle) that brings with it the insertion of an explicit divine speech into the text. One could describe this theological interpretation as a rationalization and as a universalization. God does not appear in the promise texts as a diffuse numinous entity, but rather as a bearer of revelation with a distinct content. He can appear wherever necessary, whether in Mesopotamian Haran or in Israelite Bethel. He is not bound to a particular sanctuary or a particular ethnicity. Noteworthy in this is that in Gen 28:13 God is provided with a self introduction: “I am Yhwh.” The promises in Gen 12:1, 7; 13:14 do not include this element. While the readers of Gen 12–50 know from the beginning that this revelatory deity is “Yhwh,” the actors only recognize this bit by bit (cf. Gen 15:7; 28:13). In terms of the transmission history, this conception of God can be characterized as integrative monotheism.101 Even though the God of the Fathers hypothesis of Albrecht Alt has succumbed to criticism, especially by Matthias Köckert,102 behind the traditional materials of the ancestral story various pre- and extra-Yahwistic conceptions of the deity remain recognizable. They were evidently integrated into a conception of the one “Yhwh” over the course of transmission. One of the tradition-historical roots of the promise texts in Genesis can be conjectured to lie in Gen 18.103 However, it is by all means likely that the configurative features of the redactional synthesis of the ancestor story with regard to divine speech did not take place without influence from the prophetic literature of the Hebrew Bible that was taking shape simultaneously. Scholarship has traditionally avoided this question because the promises to the ancestors were classified as considerably older than the beginnings of written prophecy. However, with the upheavals in more recent Pentateuch scholarship, this perspective should be reappraised. In keeping with the insights concerning the nature of literary enterprise in ancient Israel, one should not expect the relationships to render clearly recognizable and identifiable citations in every case. It is more likely that these were mediated through memorization. in Rethinking the Foundations: Historiography in the Ancient World and in the Bible: Essays in Honour of John Van Seters (ed. T. Römer et al.; BZAW 294; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000) 33–54. 101. Cf. C. Levin, “Integrativer Monotheismus im Alten Testament,” ZTK 109 (2012) 153–75. 102.  Cf. M. Köckert, Vätergott und Väterverheissungen: Eine Auseinandersetzung mit Albrecht Alt und seinen Erben (FRLANT 142; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1988). 103.  Schmid, Literary History, 84–87, 122–25.

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The promise texts of Genesis “propheticize” the preexisting tradition. They place the reported events into the horizon of the wider reaching future plans of God, of which the actors in the narrative are informed. These plans also remain unfulfilled for the audience. God is construed in these texts as an entity whose power cannot simply be read or defined as linear in relation to the powers of the political, economic, and demographic realities of the present. His power instead transcends these realities. In view of the search for implicit theology in the Hebrew Bible, the cluster of promise texts in Genesis offers a parade example because they present redactional supplements from a literary perspective, and especially this “supplementarity” reflects the preexisting tradition, which it synthesizes and orients toward a new objective. An interesting empirical example of how a promise is supplementarily inserted into an existent text appears in the Qumran text 4Q158 (lines 1–2, 7–10), which takes the biblical text from Gen 32:27 (“and he blessed him there”) and adds a promise (“and he said to him: May yh[wh] make you fruitful [and multi]ply you . . . insight and understanding, and may he deliver you from all violence and . . . until this day and as far as the eternal generations . . . And he went further along his way, after he had blessed him there.”104 2. The Priestly Document as Theological Text In addition to the ancestor narratives of Genesis, one particular literary entity must be named when discussing the theology of the Pentateuch, without which the perspective of the Pentateuch cannot be sufficiently understood in terms of literary origins or content—the so-called Priestly Document. The marking off of the Priestly Document from the Pentateuch as an—alleged—originally independent source document,105 even if it is only a hypothesis, is among the most widely accepted conclusions of biblical criticism. The reason for the success of the hypothesis of the Priestly Document rests on well-known observations whose stature has not diminished and whose need of explanation has remained prominent ever since the beginnings of historical-critical biblical scholarship. These include the doublets of material—they can either be placed one after another as in Genesis 1–3 or worked into one another as in Genesis 6–9. Another is the striking Elohim terminology in the narrative presentation from Genesis 1–Exodus 6 that separates itself from the designation of God as “Yhwh” in many non-priestly portions of text. Furthermore, there is the distinct formal104. Cf. Zahn, Rethinking, 27–28. 105.  Cf. the discussion in Wöhrle, Fremdlinge, 12–22.

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ized speech and the impression of a particular conception of theology that solidify the identification of an originally separate Priestly Document.106 To what degree is the Priestly Document important for the investigation of theology in the Hebrew Bible? A number of answers can be given to this question. For one, it seems that it—at least in essential parts—is responsible for the opening Primeval History of the Pentateuch. This is relevant from two perspectives for the theological imprint of the Pentateuch. The first is that the national religious tradition of Israel and Judah becomes contextualized as universal—and this takes place both in terms of the temporal and spatial perspectives. This broadening is quite obviously linked with the attempt to set their own particular tradition in relation with an overarching perspective, which is essentially a process driven by intellectual demands. Historically, it would be understandable to place the location of the composition of the Priestly Document in the Babylonian exile. The universal contextualization of a particular tradition is, in any case, self-evident within the context of an exilic location. Another is the presentation of the Primeval History in the Priestly Document, which is directly connected to and strongly marked by Babylonian scholarship. The Priestly Document quite manifestly attempted to maneuver within and engage the state of knowledge at the time in its presentation of creation.107 The mediation between religious tradition and scientific knowledge—even if this distinction remains artificial for the ancient Near East—is an essential component of theological work. In addition to the aspects conditioned by the cultural contact with especially Babylon, there are further endogenous elements of the Priestly 106.  As far as the extent of P, its original end would have been located in the Sinai pericope, though exact determinations vary (cf. most recently the discussion in J.-L. Ska (“Le recit sacerdotal: Une ‘histoire sans fin’?,” in The Books of Leviticus and Numbers (ed. T. Römer; BETL 215; Leuven: Peeters, 2008] 631–54), who himself opts for an ending in Num 27). Support is found on the one hand in the weight of the content that is ascribed to the giving of the cultic law on Sinai, and on the other hand by the conspicuous literary inclusio to be observed between creation and Sinai. This inclusio constructs a parallel between the creation of the world and the creation of the sanctuary and therefore points in the same direction. The traditional boundary of the Priestly Document to the scope of the Pentateuch fails especially because of the inner analysis of Deut 34 (L. Perlitt, “Priesterschrift im Deuteronomium?,” ZAW 100 Supp. [1988] 65–87; differently again C. Frevel, Mit Blick auf das Land die Schöpfung erinnern: Zum Ende der Priestergrundschrift [HBS 23; Freiburg i. Br: Herder, 2000]). This conclusion was also driven in the traditional source model to a significant degree by the conviction that the formation of the Pentateuch must have been according to a preexisting source and could not simply be redactional. 107.  Cf. J. C. Gertz, “Antibabylonische Polemik im priesterlichen Schöpfungsbericht?” ZTK 106 (2009) 137–55; see also M. Bauks, Die Welt am Anfang: Zum Verhältnis von Vorwelt und Weltenstehung in Gen 1 und der altorientalischen Literatur (WMANT 74; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1997).

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Document that should be named, as they are related more than anything else to the theological systematization of preexisting elements of tradition. First off, its characteristic as the “basic document” of the Pentateuch should be mentioned. If the commonly accepted limits are correct even only in their approach and if more recent scholarship is correct in its view that the Priestly Document presents not only the literary but also the conceptual foundation for the Pentateuch, then the Priestly Document must be viewed as the actual originator of a proto-Pentateuch.108 In this case, what is found here—in contrast to the various contextcontingent expansions in the prophetic literature and also in the older parts of the Pentateuch—is a theological design that from the very beginning can be recognized as a new approach—as its own text that exists next to the extant tradition. If it is correct that the ancestor story and the Moses–Exodus narrative were first combined by the Priestly Document, then it marks one of the most important literary-historical syntheses of the Hebrew Bible. This very innovation in terms of content is likely the reason why it did not arise as expansion of the existing text material, but first as its own source.109 The conception of theology in the Priestly Document can be understood over wide stretches as a new interpretation of the religious traditions of Israel and Judah in light of the historical situation surrounding their early Persian-period composition. This situation is marked by the experience of the fact that the destruction and deportation evidently do not mean the end of the history of Israel and Judah. And, on the other hand, the new Persian dominion could be grasped as a possible, even divinely ordained form of political existence for Israel in the land and in the Diaspora. This basic outlook is reflected foremost in the covenant theology of the Priestly Document, which also determines its overall literary structure. Contra the opinion of Wellhausen, P is not to be classified as a 108.  Cf. esp. A. de Pury, “PG as the Absolute Beginning,” in Les dernières rédactions du Pentateuque, de l’Hexateuque et de l’Ennéateuque (ed. T. Römer and K. Schmid; BETL 203; Leuven: Peeters, 2007) 99–128. 109. This has been seen especially clearly by C. Levin, Der Jahwist (FRLANT 157; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1993) 437 n. 6, who lays value primarily on the Priestly aspect of cult centralization, which in contrast to the preexisting tradition demands a “literary-historical break.” The new study by Wöhrle (Fremdlinge) presents the Priestly Document—in reliance on J. C. Gertz (Tradition und Redaktion in der Exoduserzählung: Untersuchungen zur Endredaktion des Pentateuch [FRLANT 186; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000])—in Genesis 12–50 in terms of a redactional model, without generalizing this result for the entire Priestly Document, as was done overly hastily—given the inadequate textual basis and the incomplete discussion of contrary conclusions—by Berner (Exoduserzählung).

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liber quatteor foederum (‘book of four covenants’), for which he gave it the designation Q. The Priestly Document speaks explicitly of only two covenant ceremonies, with Noah (Gen 9) and with Abraham (Gen 17). These formulate God’s basic order for the world and for the Abrahamic peoples—especially Israel (Isaac/Jacob), but also the Arabs (Ishmael) and the Edomites (Esau). The Priestly Document can accordingly be broken down primarily into two large sections. One can correspondingly be called the “sphere of the world” and the “sphere of Abraham.” In Gen 9 God places the unstrung military bow in the clouds and guarantees an enduring existence to creation. God thereby rejects all kinds of violence, after having destroyed “all flesh” except Noah and his clan in the previously narrated flood: Gen 6:13: And God said to Noah, ‘The end (qṣ) of all flesh has come, for the earth is filled with violence because of them; now I am going to destroy them along with the earth.’ This severe announcement of the “end,” that “has come,” is not only striking within the Priestly Document, but it is also dictated by a particular inner-biblical theological discussion. The Priestly Document enters into conversation with the prophecy of judgment that predated it, in which the following was already asserted: Amos 8:2: He said, ‘Amos, what do you see?’ And I said, ‘A basket of summer fruit.’ Then Yhwh said to me, ‘The end (qṣ) has come upon my people Israel; I will never again pass them by. Ezek 7:2–3: You, O mortal, thus says the Lord Yhwh to the land of Israel: ‘An end (qṣ) is coming! The end (qṣ) has come upon the four corners of the land. Now the end (qṣ) is coming upon you, I will let loose my anger upon you; I will judge you according to your ways, I will punish you for all your abominations.’ The Priestly Document therefore recalls a prominent element of judgment prophecy, but collapses it into the Primeval History. While Amos 8 and Ezekiel 7 proclaim the “end,” the Priestly Document reports how this “end” was really determined. However, in the hoary Primeval period God himself modified it. The Priestly Document does not falsify the prophets with this modification, but it corrects them decisively. Similar to its approach to the world as a whole, the Priestly Document conceives of Israel in a theologically analogous manner. Just as the covenant with Noah guarantees an enduring existence for the world, the

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covenant with Abraham ensures continual proximity to God for Israel—in both cases these take place without conditions!110 As especially Zimmerli points out,111 the disqualification of the Sinai events as a covenant and the sole concentration on the covenant made with Abraham for the sphere of Abrahamic peoples does not result from chance or carelessness. It instead aligns with the theological intentions of the Priestly Document. The divine assurances of blessing (increase, land, God’s proximity) are not conditional upon Israel’s adherence to the Law in the way that is stipulated in the Deuteronomistic formulation of the Sinai pericope. Rather, “covenant” for the Priestly Document is a onesided assurance of blessing from God. While individuals could perhaps fall out of the covenant (if they, for example, did not proceed with circumcision), the collective entity of the Abrahamic peoples as a whole could not. This is shown in detail by the representative adaptation of the so-called covenant formula in Gen 17:7: “That I will be God for you and your descendants after you.” The second half of the formula which is at home in Deuteronomistic theology (“and you will be my people” and other similar formulations) is missing here because regardless of what Abraham and his descendants do or do not do, it will not change the unconditionally assured proximity to God. The overall structure of the Priestly Document, however, is not twopart, which one might expect given its covenantal theology. It is actually three-part, as indicated by its doctrine of God. In addition to the two already described concentrically related spheres of the world and of Abraham, there is also a third inner sphere, the Israel sphere. Although the Priestly Document pursues an “ecumenical” theology within the Abrahamic sphere, which combines the Israelites, the Arabs, and the Edomites,112 it is still undoubtedly clear that Israel alone is granted complete knowledge of God. Israel alone possesses a medium (in the gift of the sacrificial cult) that contains the possibility of partially restoring the “very good” creation order. The three spheres correspond to three revelatory modes for God: for the entire world God is in force as “Elohim.” The Priestly Document uses the Hebrew generic term for “God” in an undetermined 110.  On circumcision see H.-J. Stipp, “ ‘Meinen Bund hat er gebrochen’ (Gen 17,14): Die Individualisierung des Bundesbruchs in der Priesterschrift,” MTZ 56 (2005) 290–304. 111. W. Zimmerli, “Sinaibund und Abrahambund: Ein Beitrag zum Verständnis der Priesterschrift,” TZ 16 (1960) 268–80; repr. in Gottes Offenbarung: Gesammelte Aufsätze zum Alten Testament (TB 19; Munich: Kaiser, 1963) 205–17. 112.  Cf. A. de Pury, “Abraham: The Priestly Writer’s ‘Ecumenical’ Ancestor,” in Rethinking the Foundations: Historiography in the Ancient World and in the Bible (ed. S. L. McKenzie et al.; BZAW 294; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000) 163–81.

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manner in Gen 1-Exod 6 as a proper name,113 identifying the genre “god” with its only member and thereby propagating an inclusive monotheism. In contrast, he presents himself to the ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as “El Shaddai.” Then, first to Moses’ generation does he disclose his actual name, “Yhwh,” which is intended for use in the cult. This tiered approach to revelation is most easily grasped in the Priestly presentation of the call of Moses in Exod 6:2–3: Exod 6:2–3: God also spoke to Moses and said to him: “I am Yhwh. I appeared to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as ‘El Shaddai,’ but by my name ‘Yhwh’ I did not make myself known to them. As a whole, the Priestly Document maintains a completely non-eschatological and pacifist (and in this sense also thoroughly political) position. This view provides a glance at both the Persian-period time of composition as well as the divinely intended goal of history. The one God (“Elohim,” who can by all means be worshiped under different names, such as “El Shaddai” in the Abrahamite ecumenical sphere and as “Yhwh” in Israel) rules over the entire world that he created. In it the nations, each in its place, with its language and its cult, can live together in lasting peace. Only Egypt is depicted as hostile in the Priestly Document, which can be recognized both in the plague cycle and in the note in Exod 12:12. This probably mirrors the place of Egypt at the time of the Priestly Document’s composition, which was still before the incorporation of Egypt into the Persian Empire under Cambyses in 525 b.c.e. The Priestly Document, with its pacifistic and pro-Persian perspective is therefore the antithetical conception par excellence of the Deuteronomistic stream of tradition.114 That tradition appraised the Persian period as fundamentally deficient in terms of deliverance. As long as Israel was not unified under a king of its own in its land in national sovereignty, then God has still not brought the goal of history with his people to completion. For this reason, the present age remains one of judgment and means that Israel is still guilty, because judgment is the Deuteronomistic punishment for guilt. 113.  Cf. idem, “Gottesname, Gottesbezeichnung und Gottesbegriff: ʾElohim als Indiz zur Entstehungsgeschichte des Pentateuch,” in Abschied vom Jahwisten: Die Komposition des Hexateuch in der jüngsten Diskussion (ed. J. C. Gertz et al.; BZAW 315; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2002) 25–47; differently E. Blum, “Der vermeintliche Gottesname “Elohim,” in Gott nennen: Gottes Namen und Gott als Name (ed. I. Dalferth and P. Stoellger; Religion in Philosophy and Theology 35; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008) 97–119. 114.  Steck, Abschluß, 17–18 n. 19; Schmid, Erzväter, 256 n. 476.

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With the juxtaposition of the Priestly Document and Deuteronomism, an elementary antagonism comes into view that, following Plöger, one can characterize as the conflict between “theocracy and eschatology.”115 The blanket comparison between “theocracy and eschatology” has often been criticized, but one should not misunderstand these terms as complementary categories into which Persian-period literature can be divided without remainder. They instead address two basic approaches by which individual texts or writings are to be located with greater or lesser proximity. In the sense of a heuristic identification of views, which must be differentiated, the distinction between theocratic and eschatological approaches can still be maintained without dichotomist aims. 3. The Theology of the Pentateuchal Redaction The formation of the Penateuch as Torah is a procedure that is without question relevant in terms of the theology in the Hebrew Bible. For with the formation of the Torah comes the intellectual problem of combining disparate contents to form an actual whole, and this was only possible through theological mediation. With the Torah, the core of the later Hebrew Bible canon arose. What led to the building of the core remains debated in scholarship. One should possibly reckon with the interpretation of the Torah as the result of a process within the framework of Persian imperial politics. The ancient Persian empire had no overarching imperial law, but rather appeared more often to authorize various local laws. The Torah could, as especially Ezra 7 indirectly indicates, have arisen from just such an authorization process. It presents a body of laws that were produced by the Jews and authorized by the Persians. Such a “Persian imperial authorization” of the Torah can neither be proved nor disproved, but it would explain why such divergent material was combined. The Torah is a compromise document that reproduces different positions of Persian-period Judaism, whose development came about through a certain amount of external pressure.116 Presumably already the first important Persian-period stages of the formation of the Pentateuch—namely the unification of the Priestly and non-priestly text portions—should be interpreted within the horizon of the Persian imperial policy. But especially important is the close of the 115. Cf. O. Plöger, Theokratie und Eschatologie (3rd ed.; WMANT 2; NeukirchenVluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1968); cf. the discussion of the history of scholarship in E. M. Dörrfuss, Mose in den Chronikbüchern: Garant theokratischer Zukunftserwartung (BZAW 219; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1994). 116.  Cf. the discussion in J. W. Watts, ed., Persia and Torah: The Theory of Imperial Authorization of the Pentateuch (SBLSymS 17; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2001); Schmid, “Abschluss.”

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Torah, which should be set in the late Persian period, after which only small additions were possible within this text complex. The date of the close of the Torah at the end of the fourth century b.c.e. is suggested by various considerations. First, clear literary reflexes of the demise of the Persian Empire are missing in the Pentateuch in the way they are found as striking judgments of the world in the prophetic corpus (cf. Isa 34:2–4; Jer 25:27–31; 45:4f.; Joel 4:12–16; Mic 7:12f.; Zeph 3:8).117 Accordingly, the substance of the Pentateuch is likely pre-Hellenistic. In addition are the “Torah” references in 1–2 Chr, Ezra–Neh, which assume a pre-Hellenistic written form of it as well. Finally, the composition of the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Torah, should be mentioned, which is placed in the middle of the 3rd century b.c.e. and marks the terminus ante quem. The closing of the Torah appears to have arisen literarily from a specific Pentateuch redaction that inserted a distinct theological perspective into the Pentateuch.118 The criteria for the identification of such texts are found primarily in that they reflect a Pentateuch-wide horizon and show redactional interest in the configuration of the Pentateuch as Torah. In reality such textual elements are found in the Pentateuch. They comprise the oath-formulated promises of land to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that pervade the Pentateuch, but are no longer extant from Joshua on. Second is the interest in Deut 34:10–12, which evidently serves to set apart the Torah as the “arch-prophecy” of Moses from the subsequent “prophetic books” from Joshua to Malachi. And finally, the motif of the death of Moses at the age of 120 according to Deut 34:7, which points back to the determination of Gen 6:3 and simultaneously formulates a reconciliation between Deuteronomistic and Priestly theologies of guilt in the form of a third way. Moses dies neither for the collective responsibility of the people of Israel (cf. Deut 1:34–37; 3:25–27) nor for his own guilt (cf. Num 20:1–13), but rather because of destiny, in that his lifetime of 120 years has run out before the entrance into the promised land. The promises of land as oaths to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—without their explicit modifier as “ancestors”—appears in the Pentateuch in Gen 50:24; Exod 32:13; 33:1; Num 32:11; Deut 34:4.119 If one adds Lev 26:42, which has similar content, then this is the only theological statement that 117. Cf. Schmid, Buchgestalten, 305–9. 118.  Cf. for the following in more detail, Schmid, “Abschluss.” 119.  Cf. Schmid, Erzväter, 296–99, based on D. J. A. Clines, The Theme of the Pentateuch (JSOTSup 10; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997); T. Römer, Israels Väter: Untersuchungen zur Väterthematik im Deuteronomium und in der deuteronomistischen Tradition (OBO 99; Fribourg: Universitätsverlag / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1990) 554–68.

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carries through all five books of the Pentateuch. And—what is especially striking in this context—it is not found afterwards, in Josh–2 Kgs. From these general observations it is clear that with these texts one should think of components of a Pentateuch redaction. This suggestion is supported by the last of these texts, Deut 34:4, which points back to the network of promises from Gen 12f. through a clear inclusio (cf. esp. Gen 12:2 and 13:15), so to the beginning of Israel and the Pentateuch. This first motif of the oath-formulated promises of the land to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob theologically accentuates the diaspora character of the Torah, which in any case results in the fact that the narrative of the Torah ends before Israel’s entrance into the promised land. The Torah is the founding charter of “exilic” Israel, a people whose story begins outside its land, and a considerable part of the reading experience of the Torah also takes place outside this land. The Torah thereby receives an eminent “prophetic” tenor. Deut 34 has the impression of the Pentateuch redaction on the basis of v. 4, but also of v. 10:120 Moses is here categorically separate from the prophets and presented as arch-prophet, whom no later prophet can match. Deut 34:10 intends to separate Moses from the subsequent prophets. This separation between “Moses” and the “prophets” is a type of argument that can most simply be explained in terms of the formation of the canon. Moses must be set off from the “Prophets” if the Torah is to be qualitatively superior to the “Prophets” (that is, the prophetic books of Joshua–Malachi, namely the canon section of the “Prophets”). The content of this perspective is also inserted into the subsequent statement in v. 10–12: Never since has there arisen a prophet in Israel like Moses, whom [Yhwh] knew face to face. He was unequaled for all the signs and wonders (cf. Deut 6:22; 28:6; among others) that Yhwh sent him to perform in the land of Egypt, against Pharaoh and all his servants and his entire land, and for all the mighty deeds and all the terrifying displays of power (see Deut 4:34; 26:8; Jer 32:21) that Moses performed in the sight of all Israel. Striking in this passage is the audacious manner in which the acts of God are transferred to Moses. The “signs and wonders,” and “the mighty 120. Cf., e.g., J. Blenkinsopp, Prophecy and Canon: A Contribution to the Study of Jewish Origins (University of Notre Dame Center for the Study of Judaism and Christianity in Antiquity 3; Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1977) 80–95; A. H. J. Gunneweg, “Das Gesetz und die Propheten,” ZAW 102 (1990) 169–80.

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deeds” and “terrifying displays of power” are attributed to Moses.121 The tradition usually attributes these to God, and only to God. Through Deut 34:11–12 Moses moves as close as possible to God—evidently in order to support his classification as the “arch-prophet.” It is also possible that the completely unique motif in the Hebrew Bible of Moses’ burial by God himself (34:6), which was already corrected in the Samaritan Pentateuch (“they buried him” instead of “he buried him”), was directed by the perspective of this declaration. Here as well Moses maintains an intimate closeness to God that is without analogy. This process of the “theologization” of Moses is, if anything, to be understood as the attempt to provide the Torah (“Moses”) with an authoritative status. “Moses” is brought into close connection with God, so that the Torah will take on corresponding authority. Finally, the declaration in Deut 34:7 that Moses died at the age of 120 reveals evidence of implicit theology. It is accorded more detail, namely that he was in good health (“his eyes were not dim, and his vitality had not given way”). Why does Deut 34:7 emphasize Moses’ good health against the flow of the narrative (see Deut 31:1–2)? Deut 34:7 is already brought into connection with Gen 6:3 by Josephus,122 which is self-evident for the biblical text because of the motif of the “120” years as a lifespan. Then the Lord said, ‘My spirit shall not abide in mortals for ever, for they are flesh; their days shall be one hundred and twenty years.’ The emphasis on Moses’ health in Deut 34:7 should accordingly be understood as follows: Moses dies in Deuteronomy 34 for no other reason than that his lifespan had reached the limit set in Gen 6:3.123 121.  Cf., for example, A. D. H. Mayes, Deuteronomy (NCB; London: Marshall, Morgan & Scott, 1979) 414; D. T. Olson, Deuteronomy and the Death of Moses: A Theological Reading (OBT; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994) 169–70; D. Nocquet, “La mort des patriarches, d’Aaron et de Moïse: L’apport de l’écriture sacerdotale à la constitution du Pentateuque à l’époque perse,” Transeu 29 (2005) 133–53; in differentiated manner, S. B. Chapman, The Law and the Prophets: A Study in Old Testament Canon Formation (FAT 27; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2000) 126–27. Noquet (“La mort,” 152) points for the “question of the identification of God and Moses” also to Exod 4:16; 14:30; 33:11; Num 12:6–8. 122.  Ant. 1:152; 3:95; 4:176–93; cf. K. Haacker and P. Schäfer, “Nachbiblische Traditionen vom Tod des Mose,” in Josephus-Studien: Untersuchungen zu Josephus, dem antiken Judentum und dem Neuen Testament (ed. O. Betz et al.; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1974) 147–74 (here 148). 123.  On the concrete number 120, cf. the reflections in H. S. Kvanvig, “Gen 6,1–4 as an Antediluvian Event,” SJOT 16 (2002) 79–112 (here 99). A similar but source-critical interpretation of Deut 34:7 is offered by P. Y. Yoo, “The Four Moses Death Accounts,” JBL 131 (2012) 423–41.

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This allusion by Deut 34:7 back to Gen 6:3 constitutes a further inclusio surrounding the Torah, as the end of the Torah in Deuteronomy 34 not only—like Deut 34:4—reaches back to the beginning of the ancestor story in Genesis 12–13, but also into the biblical Primeval History.124 This is more than just a formal feature; this inclusio can also be analyzed in terms of the intent of its content, which reveals a clear theological concern. The declaration that Moses must die for the simple reason that his lifespan is over in Deut 34:7—and not because of variously understood attributions of guilt, as is encountered elsewhere in the Pentateuchal tradition (see Num 20:12 and Deut 1:34–37; 3:25–27), is an alternative theological explanation for why Moses was not able to enter into the promised land. The Priestly influenced tradition in Num 20:12 assumes that Moses opposed the charge of God (20:8) which was to be a spoken miracle (“Speak to the rock . . .”). When he hits the rock, he may not have expected water to come forth,125 so he becomes guilty of lack of faith. The “Deuteronomistic” tradition includes Moses in the collective guilt of the people: “Yhwh also became enraged against me on account of you.”126 Both “explanations” assume that Moses was guilty, whether it be (in accordance with Priestly thought) of an individual or (rather Deuteronomistically conceived) of a collective nature. Deut 34:7 rejects both of these interpretations.127 It instead offers its own interpretation. Moses cannot enter the promised land simply because the 120 years of his life ran out on the day before the entrance. According to Deut 34:7, Moses’ death in the Transjordan does not come because of his own guilt but because of a certain destiny—the divinely decreed limit of human lifespans. Behind Deut 34:7 and the allusion back to Gen 6:3 there is a Pentateuch theology in a narrow sense. The Pentateuch represents—from the view of the Pentateuch redactor—a theology of law which does not see 124. Cf., however, the thematic relationships between Gen 6:5–8; 8:20–22 (“evil heart”) and Deut 30:6 (“circumcision of the hearts”), which Krüger has pointed out (cf. T. Krüger, Das menschliche Herz und die Weisung Gottes: Studien zur alttestamentlichen Anthropologie und Ethik [Zurich: TVZ, 2009]). 125.  The statement in Num 20:10, likely out of respect for Moses consciously kept unclear, would then be interpreted: “Should we then be able to bring water out of this rock for you?” Cf. the further discussion in O. Artus, Études sur le livre des nombres: récit, historie et loi en Nb 13,1–20,13 (OBO 157; Fribourg: Universitätsverlag / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997) 23 n. 107; C. Nihan, “La mort de Moïse (Nb 20,1–13; 20,22–29; 27,12– 23) et l’édition finale du livre des Nombres,” in Les dernières rédactions du Pentateuque, de l’Hexateuque et de l’Ennéateuque (ed. T. Römer and K. Schmid; BETL 203; Leuven: Peeters, 2007) 145–82. 126.  Cf. Deut 1:36 and 3:26. 127. Cf. Römer, So-Called Deuteronomistic History, 169–70; T. Römer and M. Z. Brettler, “Deuteronomy 34 and the Case for a Persian Hexateuch,” JBL 119 (2000) 401–19 (here 408).

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guilt as the reason for all human error. It can result from processes that could be interpreted as punishment but could also go back to the decreed order.

VI. Theology in the Psalter 1. The Torah Shape of the Psalter In the course of its literary history, the Psalter underwent various stages of formation.128 Its present shape is marked by a division into five parts—it is probable that the Psalter is seen in analogy to the Torah. The five-part structure is established by the four doxologies in Ps 41:14; 72:18–19; 89:53; 106:48.129 This “Torah shape” of the Psalter is also underlined by the introductory Psalm 1, which qualifies the study of the Psalter as Torah study, as well as Psalm 119. In light of the strongly divergent order of the Psalter in Qumran and the theological similarity of the framework of the Psalter as a whole in Psalms 1–2 and 146–50 with the contemporary non-Essene wisdom texts (Book of Mysteries [1Q27; 4Q299–301]; 1Q/4QInstruction), this five-part division hardly arose before the second century b.c.e.130 It is striking that the liturgical tradition in the Psalter was aligned with the form and content of the Torah. 2. The Psalter’s Theological Alignment with Chronicles In accordance with the literarily manifest thematic emphases of the five books, but also corresponding to the content of Psalms 41, 72, 89, and l06, with which the doxologies are connected, a presentation of the history of Israel is recognizable in the background of the present structure of the Psalms. It first evokes the epoch of David (Psalms 1–41) and Solomon (Psalms 42–72), then the periods of the monarchy (Psalms 73–89) and the Exile (Psalms 90–106), and finally flows into an image that can be brought into connection with the Restoration (Psalms 107–150). 128.  Cf. the most recent discussion in P. W. Flint and P. D. Miller, eds. The Book of Psalms: Composition and Reception (FIOTL 4 / VTSup 99; Leiden: Brill, 2005), as well as E. Zenger, ed. The Composition of the Book of Psalms (BETL 238; Leuven: Peeters, 2010), especially his own contribution, “Psalmenexegese und Psalterexegese: Eine Forschungsskizze,” in The Composition of the Book of Psalms, 17–65. 129.  R. G. Kratz, “Die Tora Davids: Psalm 1 und die doxologische Fünfteilung des Psalters,” ZTK 93 (1996) 1–34. 130. Cf. A. Lange, “Die Endgestalt des protomasoretischen Psalters und die Toraweisheit: Zur Bedeutung der nichtessenischen Weisheitstexte aus Qumran für die Auslegung des protomasoretischen Psalters,” in Der Psalter in Judentum und Christentum (ed. E. Zenger; HBS 18; Freiburg i. B.: Herder, 1998) 101–36; M. Leuenberger, Konzeptionen des Königtums Gottes im Psalter (ATANT 83; Zurich: TVZ, 2004); idem, “Aufbau und Pragmatik des 11QPsa–Psalters,” RevQ 22 (2005) 165–211.

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David I (Pss 1–41) Ps 41:13 Blessed be Yhwh, the God of Israel

from everlasting to everlasting! Amen and Amen!

Solomon II (Pss 42–72) Ps 72:18–19 Blessed be Yhwh, the God of Israel who alone does wondrous things. Blessed be his glorious name forever; may his glory fill the whole earth. Amen and Amen!

Monarchy III (Pss 73–89) Ps 89:52 Blessed be Yhwh,

forever!

Amen and Amen!

Exile Restoration IV V (Pss 90–106) (Pss 107–50) Ps 106:48 Pss 146–50 Blessed be Yhwh, the God of Israel

from everlasting to everlasting! And let all the people say, ‘Amen!’ Hallelujah!

Ps 150:6: Hallelujah!

It is easy to recognize that this implicit historical picture of the Psalter as a whole is quite close to the theology of Chronicles. The decisive, foundational period for the centralized Israel of the Jerusalem cultic community is the time of David and Solomon, which is accorded by far the most space within Chronicles (1 Chr 11–2 Chr 9). David and Solomon are the central figures of Israelite history as temple founder and temple builder. Their functions are presumably also to be understood as pointing to the Persian kings Cyrus and Darius, who receive comparable functions with regard to the Second Temple. Along with Chronicles, the five-part Psalter presents—following the theological location of the combined psalms of the individual131 in Books IV and V—an image of a settled world under the authority of Yhwh, who cares for its basic needs, and within which no more foundational upheaval of relationships is to be expected. It is likely that this depiction results from intentional theological processes. This contention is supported by the particular compositional juxtapositions of psalms of the individual from which this depiction arises. The goal of the Psalter is formed by a reflective synthesis of preexisting individual texts. 131. Cf. Leuenberger, Konzeptionen des Königtums Gottes im Psalter.

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The pacifist position of the overall composition of the Psalter is then relativized once more by very late Psalms like Psalsm 102 or Psalms 149 which expect an impending judgment of Yhwh’s enemies.132 One can characterize this process as a theological corrective of the earlier overarching theological perspective.

VII. Processes of Theologization in Canon Formation Theologizing processes were also in play in the literary formation of larger text complexes that later developed into the sections of the biblical canon. This is not the place to retrace the countless and widely discussed problems of the history of the canon.133 However, several basic aspects of 132.  Cf. on Psalm 102, E. Bosshard-Nepustil, “Ferne und Langzeitigkeit Jhwhs: Zur theologischen Auseinandersetzung in Jes 63,7–66,4 und Ps 102,” in Diasynchron: Beiträge zur Exegese, Theologie und Rezeption der Hebräischen Bibel (ed. T. Naumann and R. Hunziker–Rodewald; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2009) 39–55; on Psalm 149, see M. Leuenberger, “‘. . . und ein zweischneidiges Schwert in ihrer Hand’ (Ps 149,6): Beobachtungen zur theologiegeschicht­lichen Verortung von Ps 149,” in The Composition of the Book of Psalms (ed. E. Zenger; BETL 238; Leuven: Peeters, 2010) 635–42. 133.  Cf. (a selection): J. Assmann, Fünf Stufen auf dem Wege zum Kanon: Tradition und Schriftkultur im frühen Judentum und seiner Umwelt (Münstersche Theologische Vorträge 1; Münster: LIT, 1999; repr. in Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis: Zehn Studien [Beck’sche Reihe 1375; Munich: Beck, 2000] 81–100); J. Barton, “The Significance of a Fixed Canon,” in Hebrew Bible / Old Testament: The History of Its Interpretation (ed. M. Sæbø; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996) 1:67–83; M. Becker, “Grenzziehungen des Kanons im frühen Judentum und die Neuschrift der Bibel nach 4. Buch Esra,” in Qumran und der biblische Kanon (ed. M. Becker and J. Frey; Biblisch-theologische Studien 92; NeukirchenVluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 2009) 195–253; R. T. Beckwith, The Old Testament Canon of the New Testament Church and Its Background in Early Judaism (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1985); D. M. Carr, “Canonization in the Context of Community: An Outline of the Formation of the Tanakh and the Christian Bible,” in A Gift of God in Due Season: Essays on Scripture and Community in Honor of James A. Sanders (ed. R. D. Weis and D. M. Carr; JSOTSup 225; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1996) 22–64; J. J. Collins, “Before the Canon: Scriptures in Second Temple Judaism,” in Old Testament Interpretation: Past, Present and Future: Essays in Honor of Gene M. Tucker (ed. J. L. Mays et al.; Nashville: Abingdon, 1995) 225–44, repr. in Seers, Sybils and Sages in Hellenistic–Roman Judaism (ed. J. J. Collins; VTSup 54; Leiden: Brill, 1997) 3–21; F. Crüsemann, “Das ‘portative Vaterland,’ ” in Kanon und Zensur: Beiträge zur Archäologie der literarischen Kommunikation (ed. A. and J. Assmann; Archäologie der literarischen Kommunikation 2; Munich: Fink, 1987) 63–79; S. Dempster, “Torah, Torah, Torah: The Emergence of the Tripartite Canon,” in Exploring the Origins of the Bible: Canon Formation in Historical, Literary, and Theological Perspective (ed. C. A. Evans and E. Tov; Acadia Studies in Bible and Theology; Grand Rapids: Baker, 2008) 87–127; B. Lang, “The ‘Writings’: A Hellenistic Literary Canon in the Hebrew Bible,” in Canonization and Decanonization: Papers Presented to the International Conference of the Leiden Institute for the Study of Religion (LISOR): Held at Leiden 9–10 January 1997 (ed. A. van der Kooij and K. van der Toorn; SHR 82; Leiden: Brill, 1997) 41–66; L. M. McDonald, The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission, and Authority (3rd ed.; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2007); O. H. Steck, “Der Kanon des hebräischen Alten Testaments,”

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canon-historical activities will be discussed that can be described as theologizing processes. Along with the formation of the Torah comes the perception of its reception by the prophecy collected in Joshua–Malachi as the application and interpretation of the Torah. The closing of the Neviʾim (Josh–Mal), for its part, leads to the building of a separate commentary literature, which is manifest especially in the Pesharim from Qumran. Finally, the formation of the Ketuvim, which is a comparably loose combination (the order of the writings varies dramatically in the manuscripts), presupposes both the closing of the Torah and of the Neviʾim. It aligns itself with the content of both corpora of tradition and interprets them as suitable for everyday life. These developments are presented in some detail in the following sections. 1. The Formation of the Torah and the Establishment of the Prophets as Its Commentary The closing of the Torah as one textual unit of content and literature that claimed a certain normativity134 can be set in the late Persian period, in Verbindliches Zeugnis (ed. W. Pannenberg and T. Schneider; Diolog der Kirchen 7; Freiburg i. B.: Herder/ Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992) 1:11–33; J. Steinberg, Die Ketuvim – ihr Aufbau und ihre Botschaft (BBB 152; Hamburg: Philo, 2006); J. C. Trebolle Barrera, “Origins of a Tripartite Old Testament Canon,” in The Canon Debate (ed. L. M. McDonald and J. A. Sanders. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2002) 128–45; E. C. Ulrich, “The Canonical Process, Textual Criticism, and Latter Stages in the Composition of the Bible,” in Shaʿarei Talmon: Studies in the Bible, Qumran, and the Ancient Near East Presented to Shemaryahu Talmon (ed. M.  Fishbane; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1992) 269–76; idem, “The Non-Attestation of a Tripartite Canon in 4QMMT,” CBQ 65 (2003) 202–14; J. C. VanderKam, “Questions of Canon Viewed through the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in The Canon Debate (ed. L. M. McDonald and J. A. Sanders; Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2002) 91–109. The Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament were constructed in different ways, though in both cases no actual final activity is manifest. This is especially clear for the Old Testament, whose core (the writings of the Hebrew Bible) are accepted by all churches to the same degree, but various additional books are accepted by different denominations, in part as canonical. An actual church polity decision on the canon in Christianity took place only in the Roman Catholic church at the Council of Trent in 1545, as a Counter-Reformational measure (cf. G. Bedouelle, “Le canon de l’Ancien Testament dans la perspective du Concile de Trente,” in Le canon de l’Ancien Testament: Sa formation et son histoire [ed. J.-D. Kaestli and O. Wermelinger; Le monde de la Bible; Geneva: Labor et Fides, 1984] 253–82). In the Hebrew Bible at first a uniform impression emerges, but it should be kept in mind that the text was not uniformly solidified, and also the situation in the first millennium c.e. was possibly also more diverse in Judaism than has been accepted so far (D. Mendels and A. Edrei, Zweierlei Diaspora: Zur Spaltung der antiken jüdischen Welt [Toldot 8; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2010]). 134.  The concept “canon” should not be used for the Torah at this point; cf. Schmid, “Abschluss.”

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that is, in the late fourth century b.c.e.135 The formation of the Torah is important for the question of theology in the Hebrew Bible not only with regard to the orientation of the final redaction (see above). It is also meaningful in terms of the external interpretive texts that followed in its wake. First to be mentioned here is the reinterpretation of the Former (Joshua–2 Kings) and Latter (Isaiah–Malachi) Prophets as commentary on the Torah. This reinterpretation would have taken place in various stages. Although the literary substance of Joshua–2 Kings and Isaiah–Malachi is of course older than the formation of the Torah, in the wake of the Torah’s formation, this text complex was evidently reworked and provided with a new orientation. The most striking expression of this development is, first off, the recourse to the “Torah of Moses” or similar expressions that appear in numerous places within Joshua–2 Kings (Josh 8:31–32; 23:6; 1 Kgs 2:3; 2 Kgs 14:6; 18:6[, 12136]; 21:8; 22:8–13; 23:25), as well as in Mal 3:22 [ET: 4:4] from the prophetic books (compare Dan 9:11). The fixed text of the Torah of Genesis–Deuteronomy is apparently in view, and it now operates as the benchmark for the actions of the kings and the people in history (or, as the case may be, it should have operated in this fashion). While this is naturally an historical anachronism, after the formation of the Torah, this became the benchmark by which history was measured. In the further development of the older Deuteronomistic interpretive perspective in Joshua–2 Kings or books like Amos or Jeremiah, the law or the will of Yhwh is generally identified as the criterion for historically experienced deliverance or doom. Especially important, however, is the inclusio created by Josh 1:7, 9 and Mal 3:22–24 [ET: 4:4–6] surrounding the whole canonical section of the Neviʾim (Joshua–Malachi). This inclusio subordinates the Neviʾim to the Torah, which thereby presents itself to the audience as the interpretation of the Torah:137 135.  Most recently A. Fantalkin and O. Tal, “The Canonization of the Pentateuch: When and Why?” ZAW 124 (2012) 1–18, 201–12; see also Schmid, “Persische Reichsautorisation und Tora,” TR 71 (2006) 494–506; idem, “Abschluss,” and also above p. 92 n. 116. 136.  For the Torah perspective in 2 Kgs 18:(5–)12, in which Israel is measured against the Mosaic law, Aurelius has shown that this alludes to the opening scene in Exod 19:3b–8, which declares Israel a nation of “priests”; cf. E. Aurelius, Zukunft jenseits des Gerichts: Eine redaktionsgeschichtliche Studie zum Enneateuch (BZAW 319; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2003) 95– 110, 141–68. 137. W. Rudolph, Haggai – Sacharja – Maleachi (KAT XIII/4; Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlaghaus, 1976) 290–93; cf. also K. Schmid, “La formation de Neviim: Quelques observations sur la genèse rédactionnelle et les profils théologiques de Josué–Malachie,” in Recueils prophétiques de la Bible: Origines, milieux, et contexte proche-oriental (ed. J.-D. Macchi et al.; MdB 64; Geneva: Labor et Fides, 2012).

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Josh 1:7–8, 13:  Only be strong and very courageous, being careful to act in accordance with all the law that my servant Moses commanded you; do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, so that you may be successful wherever you go. This book of the Torah shall not depart out of your mouth; you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to act in accordance with all that is written in it. For then you shall make your way prosperous, and then you shall be successful. . . . ‘Remember the word that Moses the servant of Yhwh commanded you, saying, “Yhwh your God is providing you a place of rest, and will give you this land.”

Mal 3:22 [ET: 4:4]:  Remember the teaching of my servant Moses, the statutes and ordinances that I commanded him at Horeb for all Israel.

Through the forward reference in the first chapter of the Neviʾim to the last one and, vice versa, the allusion back from the last chapter to the first one, on the level of these interpretative passages, it is clear that the entire body of text in between from Joshua–Malachi is depicted as the successful, failed, or also future effective observance of the Torah. 2. The Ketuvim as Interpretation of the Law and the Prophets The later, third part of the canon, the Ketuvim, do not possess a frame like that found in the Neviʾim—the order of the books of the Ketuvim is too variable for this in the textual tradition. There is, however, a programmatic introduction.138 In the majority of the extant manuscripts, the order of books of the Hebrew Bible begins the Ketuvim139 with the Psalter, and in it with Psalm 1:140 138. Cf. Schmid, “Kanon,” 532–34. 139.  Psalm 1 does not seem to have been composed for this purpose. It is older than the presumable formation of the Ketuvim, which did not take place before the first century c.e. 4QFlor 2:14 is already familiar with Psalm 1 (just as 3:18 is with Psalm 2). A number of manuscripts of Acts 13:33 cite Ps 2:7 in striking fashion as the “first” psalm. Cf. J. Maier, “Psalm 1 im Licht antiker jüdischer Zeugnisse,” in Altes Testament und christliche Verkündigung (ed. M. Oeming and A. Graupner; Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1987) 353–65. 140. Cf. Kratz, “Tora”; E. Zenger, “Der Psalter im Horizont von Tora und Prophetie. Kanongeschichtliche und kanonhermeneutische Perspektiven,” in The Biblical Canons (ed. J.-M. Auwers et al.; BETL 168; Leuven: Peeters, 2003) 111–34.

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Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path that sinners tread, or sit in the seat of scoffers; but their delight is in the law of Yhwh, and on his instruction they meditate day and night. They are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in their season, and their leaves do not wither. In all that they do, they prosper. The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away. Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for Yhwh watches over the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish. Psalm 1 maintains that whoever orients themselves toward instruction (“Torah”) will have a successful life. It is not merely incidental that the Torah in this psalm is the Torah of Yhwh (and not the Torah of Moses), recalling the terminology of Chronicles. This statement makes clear that Psalm 1 subordinates itself to the Torah. Torah is the entity toward which the pious should orient themselves. In addition to this explicit reference, there are also implicit allusions in Psalm 1 that are meaningful in terms of a specific canon theology. Psalm 1 recalls the above-mentioned opening text from the Neviʾim (Josh 1:8), where God speaks to Joshua after the death of Moses: This book of instruction shall not depart out of your mouth; you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to act in accordance with all that is written in it. For then you shall make your way prosperous, and then you shall be successful. By way of this reference, Psalm 1 places its reader, that is every reader, back into the position of Joshua immediately after the death of Moses. One could even say that Psalm 1, on the one hand, returns the history of Israel’s salvation back to the point before the entrance into the land so that every possibility is again open for the individual. Psalm 1 thereby places the responsibility on each individual. Each person is charged with Torah observance, which is linked to one’s welfare—not only the leaders like Joshua or the kings.

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Because Psalm 1 is tied to the beginning (Joshua 1) and not the end of the Neviʾim section of the canon, this means further that the Ketuvim, according to the view in Psalm 1, is a separate, ancillary and not postprophetic interpretation of the Torah. As Norbert Lohfink underlined,141 the logic of the three-part canon is thus not constructed linearly such that the Torah, Neviʾim, and Ketuvim attach to one another in successive fashion. Texts like Psalm 1 show that the Ketuvim itself can manufacture an unmediated connection to the Torah, thereby bypassing the Neviʾim. This view is supported by a second inner-biblical allusion in Psalm 1. The image of the tree by the streams of water is clearly taken from Jer 17:7–8:142 Blessed are those who trust in Yhwh, whose trust is Yhwh. They shall be like a tree planted by water, sending out its roots by the stream. It shall not fear when heat comes, and its leaves shall stay green; in the year of drought it is not anxious, and it does not cease to bear fruit. By alluding to Jer 17:8, Psalm 1 fundamentally relativizes the judgment prophecy of Jeremiah for the Ketuvim. Whoever acts in accordance with Psalm 1 does not need to fear the kind of judgment that Jeremiah announced and suffered under because it will not take place (or, following Psalm 1 more precisely: it will not take place for those following Torah, but still will come upon the wicked). The allusions to Joshua 1 and Jeremiah 17 do not mean, however, that the overall theology of judgment from the Neviʾim is set aside in every aspect. Psalm 1 instead asserts that the overarching judgment theology does not have any determinative effect on the level of the individual behavior of the pious. From this perspective, especially the wisdom texts of the Ketuvim can be understood as exemplary instructions for a Torah-oriented life. Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Qoholeth, etc. show—when read canonically—how the pious should behave, and how they can acquire life, even in spite of all the adversities of life that one like Job knows and articulates. As a whole, one can describe the new canonical logic of the progression of Law, Prophets, and Writings as a great “de-eschatologization” of the previous complex of Law and Prophets, which depicted the application of the Torah in history. 141. N. Lohfink, “Moses Tod, die Tora und die alttestamentliche Sonntagslesung,” TP 71 (1996) 481–94. 142. Cf. B. Janowski, “Freude an der Tora: Psalm 1 als Tor zum Psalter,” EvT 67 (2007) 18–31 (here 24–25).

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God’s historical path with his people is no longer in the foreground, but rather the individual and his well-being and deliverance in everyday life.143

VIII. Theological Interpretation from the Second Temple Period 1. Jubilees and the Mosaic Coloring in Genesis In the ancient Jewish literature of the second century b.c.e., writings emerged that are dedicated theological efforts to reworking and solving difficulties in the preexisting tradition. A special member of this group is the book of Jubilees, often called “the little Genesis.” It offers a relecture of Genesis 1 to Exodus 24 in which the ancestors of Israel follow the Law without having physically received it. This relecture is set in a narrative frame that depicts an angel explaining all the preceding to Moses on Sinai. Jubilees’ interest clearly lies in adding Mosaic coloring to the primeval and ancestral histories, so that they too can be set within the Torah theology found in the Moses narrative beginning with Exodus. The book of Jubilees solves this problem by way of “heavenly tablets” that were shown to the ancestors of Genesis, thereby making it possible for them to live according to the law. There are indications that this revelatory solution of the “heavenly tablets” rests on a secondary interpretation.144 The earliest layer of the book of Jubilees may possibly have understood the ancestor figures’ obedience to the law in such a way that their obedience took place as an intuitive following of the law—in the sense of a natural law. This then gave way to an explicit secondary interpretation of a legal theology. If this argument is accepted, then the book of Jubilees, itself driven by a fundamental theological issue—how could the law have been valid before its promulgation by Moses?—would have itself been redacted to address a resulting theological question—how explicit could the law have been before Moses? But even without the differentiation between “natural” and “revealed” law, the theological orientation of the book of Jubilees is quite apparent. 143.  A certain countermovement is marked first in some manuscripts (also in the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia [BHS] in comparison with its base text of Codex B 19A) that place Chronicles at the end of the Ketuvim. Chronicles implies a hope for a final effective exodus and temple with the Cyrus edict of 2 Chr 36:22–23 and the final word, wĕyaʿal (“and he went up”). 144.  Cf. J. Kugel, “The Figure of Moses in the Book of Jubilees,” Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel 1 (2012) 77–92. Cf. on the composition history of the book of Jubilees, M.  Segal, The Book of Jubilees: Rewritten Bible, Redaction, Ideology, and Theology (VTSup 117; Leiden: Brill, 2007).

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2. The Appearance of Prophetic Commentaries After the end of prophecy, a distinct type of prophetic commentary developed, called Pesharim. Some of these have become known from the textual discoveries at Qumran between 1947 and 1955 and come from the time between 200 b.c.e. and 68 c.e.145 It is remarkable that there were apparently no Pesharim produced on the Torah,146 but only on the prophetic books and the Psalms, which counted as “prophecy” in Qumran (11QPsa 27:11).147 The Pesharim follow the text of a biblical book of prophecy and interpret its statements for the present time in the second century b.c.e. Especially well preserved is the commentary on the biblical book of Habakkuk. In its seventh column it says: And God told Habakkuk to write down what was coming upon the last generation, but the fulfillment of the time he did not make known to him. And when it says: in order that one can read them speedily [Hab 2:2], its meaning concerns the teacher of righteousness, to whom God made known the entirety of the mysteries of the words of his servants, the prophets. For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end, and does not lie. [Hab 2:3]. Its meaning is that the last time will stretch itself out and more than what the prophets have said because the mysteries of God are wonderful. (1QpHab 7:19) The citations from the biblical book are rendered in italics, and the interpretation of the Habakkuk commentary from Qumran is written in normal characters. Two aspects are remarkable in this interpretation. The first is that it is evident that the Habakkuk commentary relates the prophecy of Habakkuk, in the Bible set in the Babylonian period, to its own time, to the community at Qumran in the 2nd century b.c.e. This application is made explicit in the interpretation of Hab 2:2: “. . . its mean145. J. H. Charlesworth, The Pesharim and Qumran History: Chaos or Consensus? (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002); C. Metzenthin, Jesaja-Auslegung in Qumran (ATANT 98; Zurich: TVZ, 2010). 146.  Controversially discussed are texts like 4Q180, 4Q252, and 4Q464. See S. Tzoref, “Pesher and Periodization,” DSD 18 (2011) 129–54; J. H. Charlesworth and C. D. Elledge, “Exposition on the Patriarchs (4Q464 = 4QExposition on the Patriarchs = 4QExpPat),” in Pesharim, Other Commentaries and Related Documents, vol. 6B of The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations (ed. J. H. Charlesworth; The Princeton Theological Seminary Dead Sea Scrolls Project; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2002) 274–85. 147.  Cf. M. P. Horgan, Pesharim: Qumran Interpretations of Biblical Books (CBQMS 8; Washington, DC: Catholic Biblical Association of America, 1979).

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ing concerns the teacher of righteousness.” The “teacher of righteousness” is the founder and leader of the Qumran community. He belongs historically to the middle of the second century b.c.e. and was supposedly a high priest from Jerusalem who had a falling out with the establishment over theological questions. This dispute brought about the secession of his followers.148 He then claims that the prophecy of Habakkuk from the Babylonian period relates, in reality, to activities that took place 500 years later. And connected with this is a second, equally important point. The Habakkuk commentary appears to presuppose that Habakkuk himself was not completely aware of what he prophesied about. This conclusion arises from the opening sentence of the column presented above: And God told Habakkuk to write down what was coming upon the last generation, but the fulfillment of the time he did not make known to him. The content of the prophecy that Habakkuk received from God relates to the end time, which the Qumran community believed to be happening in their time, but Habakkuk apparently did not know when it would take place: “the fulfillment of the time he [God] did not make known to him [Habakkuk].” On the contrary, the teacher of righteousness is accorded this understanding which was withheld from the prophet himself, because to him “God made known . . . the entirety of the mysteries of the words of his servants, the prophets.” This understanding of the prophets also appears mutatis mutandis in the New Testament.149 The birth narrative of Jesus in the gospel of Matthew is written from the perspective that the prophet Isaiah foresaw and announced this birth and its miraculous circumstances: Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy 148.  Cf. H. Stegemann, “The Qumran Essenes – Local Members of the Main Jewish Union in Late Second Temple Times,” in The Madrid Qumran Congress: Proceedings of the International Congress on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Madrid 18–21 March, 1991 (ed. J. Trebolle Barrera and L. Vegas Montaner; STDJ 11/1; Leiden: Brill, 1992) 1:73–166 (here 149). 149.  A Hebrew Bible precursor to the Pesharim is found in the exegesis of the Jeremiah prophecy in Daniel 9, which belongs to the Maccabean period (cf. H. Rigger, Siebzig Siebener: Die “Jahrwochenprophetie” in Dan 9 [TThSt 57; Trier: Paulinus, 1997]). While Daniel 9 does not provide any word-for-word citations of biblical verses that are then applied to the contemporary time, it does present the view that the prophecy of Jeremiah will first be fulfilled in a much later time than its original context of composition.

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At the same time, it is clear from this passage that the gospel of Matthew does not seem to assume that Isaiah himself knew that this prophecy really concerns the particular figure of Jesus of Nazareth. Like Habakkuk in the Habakkuk commentary from Qumran, Isaiah is in fact a prophet who—to a certain degree unconsciously—speaks and announces, but he is not aware of the actual time of fulfillment. In the latter case, this is first revealed to the evangelist Matthew and his readers. 3. The Temple Scroll Among the writings from the Dead Sea is one extensive work that could hardly have arisen from within the Qumran community itself. On the basis of various factors, its origin should be seen as pre-Qumran.150 On the basis of its program, which consists of instructions for the building of a temple, the specifications of which incorporate those from the Priestly Document (Exodus 25–29 and 35–40) as well as from the book of Ezekiel (40–48). This work is called the “Temple Scroll” (11Q19–21). Unfortunately the extant text is not complete; it begins first with column 2. Because it can be recognized to be taking up Exod 34:10–16 and integrating it with Deut 7:25–26, it evidently reflects the imagined narrative setting of the giving of the law before the entrance into the land. However, it is not certain that the Temple Scroll should be interpreted as a document that places an additional revelation on Sinai because both the Sinai and the (according to the Bible, the one recorded in Deuteronomy) Transjordanian presentations of the law are evidently seen as one. The respective laws are rearranged thematically and formulated anew into the speech of God in the first person. It is possible that the Temple Scroll could also be understood as an attempt to outdo the Torah. However, the extant text does not allow for an unequivocal verdict. It is clear here as in other places, however, that the Temple Scroll is, both literally and in terms of its exegetical technique, a “theologizing” text.151 It attempts to produce a systematic order for the Torah and ex150.  Cf. the overview in S. Paganini, “Nicht darfst du zu diesen Worten etwas hinzufügen”: Die Rezeption des Deuteronomiums in der Tempelrolle: Sprache, Autoren und Hermeneutik (BZABR 11; Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2009) 3–16. 151.  B. M. Levinson, A More Perfect Torah: At the Intersection of Philology and Hermeneutics in Deuteronomy and the Temple Scroll (Critical Studies in the Hebrew Bible 1; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2012) 41–42: “Understanding the Temple Scroll’s use of language

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presses its position as the direct speech of God. The bold claim made by the Temple Scroll evidently fell by the wayside in ancient Judaism because it is not even alluded to within the literature of the Qumran community who at least preserved the text. And this is the case despite the close thematic relationship between the Temple Scroll and the highly esteemed book of Jubilees at Qumran (for example, with regard to the solar calendar).

IX. The Septuagint’s Attempts at Theological Reconciliation with Platonic Philosophy An early example of the attempt at theological reconciliation with philosophy appears in the Septuagint, the translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek beginning in the third century b.c.e., which originally only concerned the translation of the Torah.152 It adopts the terminology of the means of creation from Plato’s Timaeus for the creation of the world in its translation of Genesis 1. The concepts and implicit assumptions evidently attempt to harmonize biblical and Platonic cosmology.153 The world described in the Bible is, according to the Septuagint, none other than the one addressed in Greek philosophy and science. The proximity to Timaeus is apparent in Gen 1:2, for example: the Septuagint expresses the state of the world before creation, which is Hebrew is described by the proverbial tohuwabohu (that is, ‘life-threatening wasteland’; cf. Isa 34:11; Jer 4:23), as ἀόρατος καί ἀκατασκεύστος (‘unseen and unformed’), which appears to indicate a correspondence to requires understanding the redactor’s hermeneutics. In his reuse of the legal material of the Pentateuch, the Temple Scroll’s redactor inevitably needed to confront and resolve the Pentateuch’s lack of a unified system—not just in the arrangement and content of its laws but also in their formulation. The redactor’s historical distance from the biblical text only intensified the difficulty of understanding its diverse systems of law and syntax on their own terms, let alone the complex literary and redactional history that brought them together. Later rabbinic law sought to harmonize the Pentateuch’s legal inconsistencies and redundancies by means of exegesis. In the case of the Temple Scroll, the corresponding drive to ameliorate the Pentateuch’s ‘disorder’ took place on the level of the text by means of reordering and expanding. The commitment to Torah therefore required reordering the Torah.” 152.  Cf. F. Siegert, Zwischen Hebräischer Bibel und Altem Testament: Eine Einführung in die Septuaginta (Münsteraner judaistische Studien 9; Münster: LIT, 2001); M. Tilly, Einführung in die Septuaginta (Darmstadt: WBG, 2005); S. Kreuzer, “Entstehung und Entwicklung der Septuaginta im Kontext alexandrinischer und frühjüdischer Kultur und Bildung,” in Septuaginta Deutsch: Erläuterungen und Kommentare zum griechischen Alten Testament (ed. M. Karrer and W. Kraus; Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 2011) 1:3–39. For more detail on the following section, cf. K. Schmid, ed., Schöpfung (Themen der Theology 4; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012) 336–37; also M. Karrer, “Septuaginta und Philosophie,” in Juda und Jerusalem in der Seleukidenzeit: Herrschaft – Widerstand – Identität (ed. U. Dahmen and J. Schnocks; BBB 159; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2010) 191–212. 153. M. Rösel, Übersetzung als Vollendung der Auslegung: Studien zur Genesis–Septuaginta (BZAW 223; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1994) 31, 36, 60, 81–87.

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the distinction between the world of ideas and the material world that is central in Timaeus. The rendering of rāqiaʿ (‘firmament’) in Gen 1:6 by στερέωμα (‘structure’) should likely also be explained as a reference to Timaeus, where the related adjective, στερεός (‘firm, solid’) is used repeatedly for the heavenly bodies (31b; 43c, among others).154 The Septuagint therefore allows for the recognition of a clear tendency within the Judaism of the third and second centuries b.c.e. to mediate between Jewish traditional lore and the leading contemporary philosophical conceptions. This mediation allows for the identification of a desire that will prove central for later theology.

X. The Theology of Revelation in Apocalyptic Literature The importance of apocalypticism for the development of theology was treated especially in the 1960s in response to the provocative thesis by Ernst Käsemann that apocalypticism is the “mother of all Christian theology.”155 At that time Käsemann distinguished—following his understanding—between the non-apocalyptic Jesus and the apocalyptic-influenced theologies of the New Testament in the synoptics, Paul, and John. This discussion, still relevant for the history of scholarship, will not be elaborated here. In this section the question addressed is how apocalyptic literature might be inserted into the previous reflections on the rise of theology in the Hebrew Bible and early Jewish literature. For this, several historical and literary-historical aspects should first be discussed.156 Ever since the Qumran discoveries,157 it has become clear that the intellectual movement and literary characteristics treated under the title 154.  In this context the debated thesis of Mendels and Edrai, “Diaspora” should be mentioned. It proposes a fundamental difference between the eastern diaspora, which was influenced by rabbinic thought, and the western diaspora, which was influenced by Greek literature and culture. Only with the writing of the Talmud did the rabbinic orientation begin to become established in the West as well. “Theological” approaches to the Hebrew Bible, as witnessed in the Septuagint, arise especially in the traditional regions of the western diaspora. 155.  Cf. E. Käsemann, “Die Anfänge christlicher Theologie,” ZTK 57 (1960) 162–85 (here 180); for a discussion see F. Vouga, “Ist die Apokalyptik die Mutter der neutestamentlichen Theologie? Eine alte Frage neu gestellt: Einleitung zur Kontroverse,” Zeitschrift für Neues Testament 22 (2008) 44. 156.  Cf. for a more detailed discussion of the following, K. Schmid, “Die Zerstörung Jerusalems und seines Tempels als Heilsparadox: Zur Zusammenführung von Geschichtstheologie und Anthropologie im Vierten Esrabuch,” in Zerstörungen des Jerusalemer Tempels: Geschehen – Wahrnehmung – Bewältigung (ed. J. Hahn; WUNT 147; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2002) 183–206. 157.  Cf. H. Stegemann, “Die Bedeutung der Qumranfunde für die Erforschung der Apokalyptik,” in Apocalypticism in the Mediterranean World and the Near East: Proceedings of the International Colloquium on Apocalypticism, Uppsala, August 12–17, 1979 (2nd ed.;

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“apocalyptic” must be older than the Maccabean-period book of Daniel, which had customarily been seen—in particular because of the Maccabeanperiod materials in chapters 2, 7–12—as the oldest apocalypse. The origins of apocalypticism are clearly—this conclusion holds regardless of the problems of historical classifications and definitions,158 which are closely related to one another—to be grasped not in the Daniel literature, but in the sphere of the Enoch literature, the manuscripts of which are witnessed comparatively early. These apocalyptic origins belong to the third preChristian century, not only in the second.159 This conclusion is of considerable interest because it indicates that the priestly knowledge recorded in the astronomical sections of the Enoch literature must have played a decisive role in the development of apocalypticism. Furthermore, it is also probable, therefore, that the phenomenon of apocalypticism, in the past often seen as an import from Iran in terms of its religious history, was anchored much more strongly in the intellectual history of ancient Judaism. It should instead be explained much more than has been customarily accepted as a development from within ancient Judaism itself. In particular, the destruction of the Persian empire by Alexander the Great correlates to the demise of the theocratically oriented—and customarily located within priestly circles—conceptions such as those of the Priestly Document or later Psalms. These texts viewed the pax persica as the divinely ordained end of history, which could have been decisively beneficial for the construction of an apocalyptic theology of history. The thematic outline of the (priestly) ideals of theocracy were basically maintained in the postPersian period—God is the ruler and one steering the world. However, the contention that God’s reign achieved its earthly realization in the Persian period in the sense of a “realized eschatology” had to be abandoned. Just what God’s dominion over the world would finally look like then becomes an object of apocalyptic speculation about history. The intellectual experience of catastrophe with the collapse of the Persian-period order and the related crisis in present-oriented theocratic conceptions must have steered toward the construction of apocalyptic conceptions, possibly in the sense of an initial spark. Later experiences of the catastrophes such as the desecration of the Jerusalem temple by ed. D. Hellholm; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1989) 495–509; F. García Martínez, Qumranica minora I: Qumran Origins and Apocalypticism (STDJ 63; Leiden: Brill, 2007). 158.  Cf. O. H. Steck, “Überlegungen zur Eigenart der spätisraelitischen Apokalyptik,” in Die Botschaft und die Boten (ed. J. Jeremias and L. Perlitt; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1981) 301–15; S. Beyerle, Die Gottesvorstellungen in der antik-jüdischen Apokalyptik (Journal for the Study of Judaism Supplement 103; Leiden: Brill, 2005). 159. Cf. Stegemann, “Die Bedeutung der Qumranfunde,” 502–8.

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Antiochus IV Epiphanes and the subsequent destruction of the temple in 70 c.e. by the Romans along with the destruction of the city of Jerusalem significantly influenced its further development. In view of these historical events, apocalypticism can be comprehended as a theological reaction to the loss of the explanatory value of theocractic conceptions in the wake of political events that contradicted these conceptions. This viewpoint suggests itself on the basis of the theological-historical division that generally occurs in texts classified as apocalyptic. They can be grouped for the most part around these two central dates. They reflect, sometimes quite directly and—as far as can be conceived within the framework of historical fiction—explicitly on the respective experiences. Especially worthy of note here are 1 Enoch 90:6–12; 93:9–10; 4 Ezra 10:21–23; 2 Bar. 7:1; 8:2; 10:5–19; Apoc. Abr. 27:3; cf. also PsPhilo 19:7. Apocalyptic conceptions arose in ancient Israel in the wake of historical experiences that appeared to refute the presence of divine deliverance in the world traditionally, the perspective that was postulated in theocratic circles. Where is God? Will he be hidden from now on? Has he completely rejected his people? In many apocalyptic texts these questions are answered by way of a revelation that paints a picture of the comprehensive creative power of God at work in history, which nonetheless can appear and must be differentiated historically into very different—for salvation and for destruction—manifestations. The destruction of the temple in 70 c.e. presents an experience of particular magnitude with regard to the question of God’s presence in the world. It should not be surprising, then, that this event called for special attempts for coming to terms with the experience on a theological basis. Among the responses within Jewish apocalypticism, in addition to 4 Ezra, the conception found in 2 Baruch should be mentioned; less important are Apocalypse of Abraham and Pseudo-Philo. In any case, neither 4 Ezra nor 2 Baruch had any effect on the rabbinic direction that developed after 70  c.e. Their reception and transmission remain extant only with Christianity. Characteristic of these two writings is that in their answers to the catastrophe of the destruction of the temple they provide the first explicit witnesses to the two-ages doctrine, which nearly became the constitutive characteristic for apocalypticism in various locations. Complementary to this negative result, the two-ages doctrine can plausibly be brought into connection with the destruction of the Second Temple. The elimination of the temple as the location of God’s presence in the world in what appeared to be an ultimate fashion thrust to the fore the

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interpretation that the world as a whole could not be reconciled to God in its present form. Instead, God must have created not one but rather two worlds (or eras) from the beginning—the two ages, or aeons. The first age is characterized not by the continual retreat of God himself from the history of the world, as is sometimes offered as a sweeping critique of the apocalyptic view of history, but by the retreat of God’s salvific will from history. God naturally remains the decisive historical power, also in catastrophes. His saving presence, in contrast, is shifted to the second age. As a result, the classical priestly temple theology, described poignantly in the formula of a “creation in the creation,”160 is transformed into a theology of the “creation after the creation.” The coming age moves the one creation of God to its goal. It is recognizable on the basis of what has been presented so far that apocalyptic literature not only bears characteristics of theological reflection, but it arose out of such reflection. While it did not develop any literary forms of theological secondary literature, its reports of visions link up with the prophetic tradition. These reports present its positions as revelatory knowledge rather than the result of human reflection. Yet this distinction is synonymous with the basic approach of an apocalyptic text and its actual formation. What introduces an apocalypse as revelation is naturally in reality the theological view of its author, which—as is recognizable through the historical approach to such texts—is wrought by the theological survey of tradition and experience. Especially important is the recognition of the influence of theocratic views in Hebrew Bible literature on apocalyptic theology. The foundational grid for the orientation of apocalyptic theology of history is especially the model of thought taken from the dynamic theocratic conception of a universal history. Apocalypticism can therefore be interpreted as an attempt to mediate between a basic theological starting point and historical data that appears to contradict it. Its attempts to address this problem are so radical that they generally call for new revelations. In terms of form, apocalyptic literature is therefore more “revelatory” than “theological,” but its concerns are genuinely theological. 160. Cf. Blum, Studien, 289–332, esp. 311. The temple sanctuary practice reactivated and reconstituted features of the original creation.

Chapter 4 Is There Theology in the Hebrew Bible? Striking a Balance between Conceptual History and Exegesis

I. Theologizing in Traditional Literature How can the previous considerations be synthesized to answer the question posed in this book’s title? The difficulties with the concept of theology in Hebrew Bible studies—is there theology in the Hebrew Bible, or conceived somewhat more broadly, in the Hebrew Bible and early Jewish traditions?—is especially rooted in terms of intellectual history in five foundational decisions of varying importance from five distinct epochs. These primarily concern the Christian history of reception because the concept of theology in Judaism remained rather marginal or, where it was used, moved in dependence on the contemporary Christian molds. (1) The ancient usage of the concept of theology is nonspecific and can be shaped in quite diverse manners. It is therefore only of subordinate importance for the development of that which has been understood by “theology” particularly since Scholasticism. In any case, more recent appropriations of “theology” in biblical studies return proximally to the ancient dimensions of the concept as “stories of the gods”: texts of any religious content—also those lacking reflective character—can generally be classified as “theological,” as for example in Rendtorff’s The Canonical Hebrew Bible: A Theology of the Old Testament. (2) In High Medieval Scholasticism, the concept of theology took on the shape it retains into the present day, including the connotation of the theoretical construction of a system. This basic element is responsible for the caution with regard to the application of the concept of theology to biblical texts in many circles in the past and present. While the biblical texts speak of God, they do not formulate a theological system. 114

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(3) The reason that the concept of theology was not simply kept at a distance from the Bible and the ancient literature in its context is largely linked with the Reformational decision to retain the concept of theology (despite the anti-scholastic aversions of the reformers) and to tie its systematic orientation to practical life experience. Also, texts that formulate and reflect existential experiences can be theological. As a result, the Bible was in any case once again fundamentally “capable of theology.” (4) The historicism and psychologizing of the nineteenth century led to the recognition of the plurality and diversity of theological positions in the Bible. It shifted the accent in the engagement with biblical texts to their religious-historical imprints and development. The concept of theology subsequently disappeared almost completely from Hebrew Bible studies. (5) With the publication of new “theologies of the Old Testament” from the broader circle of Neo-Orthodox theology at the beginning of the twentieth century, the concept of theology again became anchored in biblical studies, understood in a strongly systematic fashion. Von Rad’s outline was the first to become free from this form of Old Testament theology. They had been influenced by recent systematic approaches. This development in the wake of von Rad’s outline had broad consequences for this subdiscipline of Hebrew Bible studies, whose task and execution had become completely unclear. The current situation is marked by the long-term consequences of these basic decisions, which raise their heads here and there and whose effects have also been identified in the meantime. However, the effects are largely omitted out of politeness as supposedly off-limits questions arising from different personal theological convictions. In reality, however, they do not concern personal convictions. They are rather basic questions of content, and it can only be detrimental if they are left unclarified. As a result of the strongly divergent influences on the concept of theology (one need only recall the Scholastic and Reformational differences), it appears from this study that it is neither sensible to claim the unquestionable presence of theology in the Hebrew Bible and early Jewish traditions nor to state its complete absence. Rather, the Hebrew Bible is shown from a number of angles to be a collection of books that, while they do not formulate explicit theologies, because of their implicit theological character can count in a broader sense as theological writings. This conclusion is, then, a modification to the formulation of Rolf Rendtorff1 in the sense put 1. Rendtorff, Theologie 1:1.

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forward by James Barr.2 It also applies to the post-canonical literature of ancient Judaism that arose in the wake of the Hebrew Bible. Theology in the didactic sense or as a systematically explicit entity is not extant in the Hebrew Bible or early Jewish tradition. However, implicit theology—and beyond this also with initial degrees of explicitness— is recognizable in various ways. Specifically, the numerous processes of inner-biblical exegesis indicate that religious texts were furnished with theological reflections that were added textually as expansions to the respective underlying statements. These theologically reflective texts show the intent to interpret and update traditional textual material in the light of new historical experience.3 No simple arbitrariness is exercised. Instead, the explicative passages attach themselves to the thematic logic of the preexisting texts and interpret them in creative, but quite rational and—commensurate with the content of their object—theological fashion. An increasingly theological form is observable where the theological reflection required a literary break and led to the construction of new texts. This study has named—exemplary but not comprehensively—Deuteronomy, the Priestly Document, Deutero-Isaiah, and Chronicles. If one intends to speak of “theological” books in the Hebrew Bible, then these books—with the above-mentioned qualifications—should most likely be considered. Additionally, in the broader purview, Job and Qoheleth also are to be included, as their literary horizons extend beyond those writings already mentioned. Worthy of mention also are the respective literary reactions to the step-by-step establishment of the three parts of the canon, which are interpretable as the development of theology. The Torah exhibits a specific theological outlook as a whole corpus. The Neviʾim are summarized by a clear inclusio, which interprets the textual material gathered in this part of the canon under an overarching definitively Torah-oriented perspective. The Ketuvim possess an introduction that can likewise be recognized as oriented toward the keeping of the Torah. Following the formation of the more-or-less fixed and attached collections of biblical texts that then develop into the notion of a canon, the form-critical genre of theological exegetical literature changed. Theological interpretation no longer took place within the text of the Bible itself; it instead stood next to it. However, early Jewish literature, whose genres ei2. Cf. Barr, Concept, 498. 3.  Cf., for example, Steck, Prophetenbücher; Steck, Gott in der Zeit entdecken; see also R. G. Kratz, “Innerbiblische Exegese und Redaktionsgeschichte im Lichte empirischer Evidenz,” in Das Judentum im Zeitalter des Zweiten Tempels (FAT 42; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004) 126–56.

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ther derived from their traditional predecessors, or—even when new literary genres formed, as with the example of apocalyptic literature—retained their fundamental orientations, was not composed as reflective literature. It was first in the second century c.e., with the incipient disputation literature, that genres of theological secondary literature developed. These then became formative for the subsequent eras.

II. Implications for a Theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament To what degree are these considerations of the presence of theology in the Hebrew Bible and early Jewish traditions important for the shaping of a theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament? Commensurate with the limited scope of this study, only suggestions are possible, which will attempt to formulate a few basic conditions with regard to their subjects. Since the discovery of—or more cautiously: since von Rad’s assertion of the possibility of identifying—“theologies in the Hebrew Bible,” it has become increasingly common to integrate “the theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament” into the introductory genre—through the discussion of the theological characteristics of the various writings. This is especially clear in the textbook Handbook of the Old Testament, which attempts to provide an introduction to the literature, religion, and history of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. It is structured in four main parts. The first addresses “Sources and Methods” (pp. 1–57), the second “History and Religion of Ancient Israel” (pp. 59–234), and the third extensive part [in this English version parts 3–6] the “Literature of the Old Testament” (pp. 235–766). The fourth, comparatively short, main section is dedicated to a “Basic Outline of a Theology of the Old Testament” (pp. 767–92) to which an explanation is noted: The preceding discussions of the literature of the Old Testament/ Hebrew Bible have also in and of themselves begun to develop a theology of the corresponding part of the . . . canon and texts. This approach is based on the presupposition that theology of the Old Testament should be understood as a descriptive task, attempting to describe the theological ideas of the authors and redactors of the biblical literature in their historical contexts. One can speak of “theology” in the Old Testament wherever an overarching understanding of reality is expressed, which gives meaning to a contingent individual experience. Within the Old Testament literature such a concept of reality takes on different

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This definition is naturally both possible and sensible, but it is clear that this alternative no longer compellingly requires a separate subdiscipline of “theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament” from the perspective of the organization of the field. Note that this is not yet a critique, because improvements must be possible within the scholarly field. Nonetheless, it should be examined whether something is lost in Hebrew Bible studies through the adoption of such an understanding of “theology.” In my view, there is something forfeited, but not of the sort that necessitates a fundamental change of course within Hebrew Bible studies. Instead, for any ongoing determination of the task of a “theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament,” the allocation of tasks within theology as a whole must be addressed. The often—from my perspective misunderstood—“normatively”5 defined part of a theology of the Hebrew Bible/ Old Testament need not be treated within the framework of Hebrew Bible studies itself. There are strikingly few reflections on the demarcation of the boundaries between “theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament,” “hermeneutics,” “systematic theology,” etc.6 However, many problems within the sphere of a “theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament” are left to be addressed from a reflection on the allocation of responsibilities within the discipline of theology as a whole. Nonetheless, at the same time—at least within the context of Protestant theology—a return on the part of the other theological disciplines to biblical exegesis remains a basic requirement. Accordingly, Eberhard Jüngel once 4.  Gertz, Grundinformation, 587 [ET: Handbook, 767]; see further (ibid.): “Since the approach to a ‘Theology of the Old Testament’ outlined here is not the only possible or sensible one, the following discussion will focus on the history and problems of the discipline as well as elucidate competing conceptions of the subject.” 5.  Cf. on this de Pury and Knauf, “La théologie de l’Ancien Testament.” 6. Cf. Barr, Concept, 62–171. See also H. D. Preuss, JHWHs erwählendes und verpflichtendes Handeln, vol. 1 of Theologie des Alten Testaments (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1991) 23: “Thus the evaluative question should . . . not be treated within the presentation of a theology of the Old Testament, but this belongs to the realm of hermeneutics and systematic theology. . . . The theology of the OT should help, however, to answer these questions, and it should therefore attempt to form its presentation with a view toward the entirety of theology, clarifying the location of OT within it.” Cf. also Gerstenberger, Theologien, 10: “Theology is then, in reality, exclusively concerned with the temporally determined faith experiences, statements, and building of systems—in short, with the notions of God, and not with the nature of the essence of God. Old Testament theology should be—formulated as an orientation for our present time—content with the contextual images of God in the Hebrew Bible and for the modern period in similar, preliminarily time-bound statements of binding but only limited validity.”

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characterized the task of systematic theology pointedly as: “consequent exegesis.”7 In addition, however, Hebrew Bible studies should present, for that part of the Christian Bible for which it is responsible, the formulation of theological conceptions and the theological dynamics at work in the Hebrew Bible and resulting literature, which accounts for individual texts, groups of texts, books, or collections of books. Decisive in this is not the reduction of the perception of the Bible to something of a florilegium of possible theological positions. It should also recognize and describe the interpretive network of these positions within the Bible itself and the inherent types of logic at work. In view of Christian and also Jewish theology, one should always remain aware of the foundational difference between the biblical text and the later development of doctrine. Historical criticism applied to biblical texts does not lead to the doctrinal structure of one particular confession or religious community, but to one in many aspects made available for the later exegetical communities of foreign theology and theological history. Even though Julius Wellhausen had planned to work out and publish the “Attempt at a Criticism of So-Called Old Testament Theology as an Academic Discipline”8 in light of contemporary, and for him evidently less convincing, approaches to a theology of the Old Testament, it remains valid: abusus non tollit usum (abuse does not take away use). Hebrew Bible studies would not be justified in terms of the adequate investigation of its subject of study if it would omit the separate subdiscipline of “theology of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament.” However, neither does the discipline do its subject of study justice if it approaches this subdiscipline in a naïve, truncated, or uncritical manner. In the same way that it is possible and sensible to investigate Plato’s philosophy, it is also possible and sensible to reconstruct the theology of the Hebrew Bible. The fact that the Hebrew Bible, in contrast to the literary legacy of Plato, is not the work of a single author, but is rather largely anonymous or pseudonymous traditional literature, does not in principle erect an obstacle. This reality instead calls for a thematically as well as historically differentiated methodology to its literature, which, while difficult, is not impossible.9 7. E. Jüngel, Gottes Sein ist im Werden: Verantwortliche Rede vom Sein Gottes bei Karl Barth: Eine Paraphrase (4th ed.; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1986) 25 n. 32; idem, “Besinnung auf 50 Jahre theologische Existenz,” TLZ 128 (2003) 471–84 (here 476). 8.  Cf. the note in Smend, Jr., “Theologie im Alten Testament.” 9.  Cf. also U. Becker, “Abschied von der Geschichte? Bemerkungen zu einem aktuellen Grundproblem der alttestamentlichen Hermeneutik,” in Ex oriente Lux: Studien zur Theologie des Alten Testaments (ed. A. Berlejung and R. Heckl; Arbeiten zur Bibel und ihrer

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A theology of the Hebrew Bible10 must, because of its nature as an academic pursuit, also present a project that is intelligible to non-theological perspectives, which—one should note, also for theological reasons—must satisfy accepted academic standards. As a result, the theology of the Hebrew Bible should also be understandable and comprehensible in terms of its questions, execution, and results for a position (in an approving or, as the case may be, also a disapproving sense) that is located, for example, outside Judaism or Christianity. For this reason a theology of the Hebrew Bible should not and is not permitted to fall back behind the attempts at rationalization in the movements of its inner-biblical predecessors, which, while they did not themselves formulate explicit theologies, certainly created the conditions for that possibility in their later development. Geschichte 39; Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2012) 592–604 (here 601): “The task of a theology of the Old Testament consists, therefore, not in metaphysical inflation of the story lying at the foundation of the Old Testament, but rather in articulation of the literary and religious ‘universe of expression’ sketched in it. . . . Because the particular distinction of the Old Testament is not found in its underlying political, religious, and cultural history, it is, therefore, to be elevated by means of historical studies, as ancient Israel and its religion should in no way appear as being without analogy in the ancient Near East. [Its distinction] is in fact found in the special transmission and transformation process from which the Old Testament emerged as Holy Scripture—of Judaism and then also of Christianity.” 10.  The problem of the so-called “canon boundary” remains difficult to handle. From a literary-historical standpoint, this break does not represent a closed body of ancient Hebrew and early Jewish literature. Writings such as Jubilees and the Temple Scroll are not qualitatively different than the biblical books—above all Jubilees, which also counts as “biblical” in some formations of the canon. These books can only be excluded from a theology of the Hebrew Bible for pragmatic or reception-historical reasons, not as a matter of principle.

Bibliography Ahlers, Botho. Die Unterscheidung von Theologie und Religion: ein Beitrag zur Vorgeschichte der Praktischen Theologie im 18. Jahrhundert. Gütersloh: Gerd Mohn, 1980. Albertz, Rainer. “Das Deuterojesaja-Buch als Fortschreibung der Jesaja–Prophetie.” Pp. 241–56 in Die Hebräische Bibel und ihre zweifache Nachgeschichte. Edited by E. Blum et al. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1990. _________. Religionsgeschichte Israels in alttestamentlicher Zeit. GAT 8/1–2. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992. Translated as A History of Israelite Religion in the Old Testament Period. 2 Volumes. Trans. by J. Bowden. OTL. Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 1994. _________. “Die Theologisierung des Rechts im Alten Israel.” Pp. 187–207 in Geschichte und Theologie: Studien zur Exegese des Alten Testaments und zur Religionsgeschichte Israels. Edited by I. Kottsieper and J. Wöhrle. BZAW 326. Berlin: de Gruyter, 2003. Ammon, Christoph Friedrich von. Entwurf einer Christologie des Alten Testaments: ein Beitrag zur endlichen Beilegung der Streitigkeiten über messianische Weissagungen und zur biblischen Theologie des Verfassers. Erlangen: Palm, 1794. _________. Entwurf einer reinen biblischen Theologie. Erlangen: Palm, 1792. Artus, Olivier. Études sur le livre des nombres: récit, historie et loi en Nb 13,1–20,13. OBO 157. Fribourg: Editions Universitaires Fribourg / Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1997. Assmann, Jan. Ägypten: Theologie und Frömmigkeit einer frühen Hochkultur. 2nd edition. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1991. . Fünf Stufen auf dem Wege zum Kanon: Tradition und Schriftkultur im frühen Judentum und seiner Umwelt. Münstersche Theologische Vorträge 1. Münster: LIT, 1999. Repr. pp. 81–100 in Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis: Zehn Studien. Beck’sche Reihe 1375. Munich: Beck, 2000. . Das kulturelle Gedächtnis: Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identität in frühen Hochkulturen. Munich: Beck, 1992. . Maʾat: Gerechtigkeit und Unsterblichkeit im alten Ägypten. 2nd edition. Munich: Beck, 2006. . Politische Theologie zwischen Ägypten und Israel. Carl Friedrich von Sie­ mens Stiftung Themen 52. Munich: Carl-Friedrich-von-SiemensStiftung, 1992.

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Zimmerli, Walther. “Alttestamentliche Traditionsgeschichte und Theologie.” Pp. 632–47 in Probleme biblischer Theologie. Edited by H. W. Wolff. Munich: Kaiser, 1971. . “Biblische Theologie I: Altes Testament.” Pp. 426–55 in vol. 6 of TRE. . Ezechiel. BK XIII/1.2. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1969. Translated as Ezekiel: A Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Ezekiel. 2 vols. Vol. 1 translated by R. E. Clements, vol. 2 translated by J. D. Martin. Hermeneia. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979/1983. . Grundriss der alttestamentlichen Theologie. ThWAT 3. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1972. . “Review of Gerhard von Rad, Theologie des Alten Testaments.” VT 13 (1963) 105. . “Sinaibund und Abrahambund: Ein Beitrag zum Verständnis der Priesterschrift.” TZ 16 (1960) 268–80. Repr. as pp. 205–17 in Gottes Offenbarung: Gesammelte Aufsätze zum Alten Testament. TB 19. Munich: Kaiser, 1963. Zobel, Hans-Jürgen. “Otto Eißfeldt als Theologe: Zum Verhältnis von ‘Israelitisch–jüdischer Religionsgeschichte’ und ‘Alttestamentlicher Theologie’ im Lebenswerk Otto Eißfeldts.” Pp. 19–44 in Otto-Eissfeldt-Ehrung 1987. Edited by G. Wallis. Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg Wissenschaftliche Beiträge 1988/36 (A 108). Halle (Saale): University of Halle-Wittenberg, 1988. Zwickel, Wolfgang. “Religionsgeschichte Israels: Einführung in den gegenwärtigen Forschungsstand in den deutschsprachigen Ländern.” Pp. 9–56 in Religionsgeschichte Israels: Formale und materiale Aspekte. Edited by B. Janowski and M. Köckert. Veröffentlichungen der Wissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft für Theologie 15. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlaghaus, 1999.

Index of Authors Ahlers, B.  16 Albertz, R.  44, 45, 55, 76 Ammon, C. von  13 Artus, O.  96 Assmann, J.  6, 51, 52, 53, 76, 77, 83, 99 Asztalos, M.  8 Aurelius, E.  82, 101 Bacher, W.  32 Bahrdt, C.  13 Baier, J.  10 Balz, H.  7 Barr, J.  35, 52, 116, 118 Barstad, H.  67 Barth, H.  59 Barton, J.  99 Bauer, B.  20 Bauks, M.  87 Baumgärtel, F.  41, 42 Bayer, O.  7 Becker, M.  99 Becker, U.  59, 119 Beckwith, R.  99 Bedouelle, G.  100 Bendemann, R. von  27 Ben Maimon, Mose  32 Ben Zvi, E.  29 Berges, U.  65, 66, 67, 68 Berlejung, A.  6, 52 Berner, C.  54, 88 Bernhardt, R.  52 Beyerle, S.  111 Biddle, M.  62 Blanco, W.  81 Blenkinsopp, J.  94 Blum, E.  54, 55, 83, 84, 91, 113

Bornkamm, H.  10 Bosch, L. van den  21 Bosshard-Nepustil, E.  63, 71, 99 Bousset, W.  23 Brann, M.  30 Brenner, M.  30 Brunner, E.  1, 35, 37 Bultmann, R.  39, 40, 50, 51, 52 Büsching, A.  12 Carr, D.  84, 99 Carroll, R.  63 Chapman, S.  95 Charlesworth, J.  106 Childs, B.  39 Clements, R.  55 Clines, D.  93 Collins, J.  33, 38, 46, 99 Cölln, D. von  12, 15, 20 Colpe, C.  23 Cowell, E.  21 Crüsemann, F.  99 Davidson, H.  32 Dempster, S.  99 De Wette, W.  17 Dibelius, M.  27 Dillmann, A.  14, 20 Döderlein, C.  13 Dohmeier, H.-J.  12 Dörrfuss, E.  92 Duhm, B.  17, 18, 49, 63, 71 Ebeling, G.  5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 48, 50 Edrei, A.  100 Eichrodt, W.  34, 35, 36, 39, 40 Eissfeldt, O.  33

149

150

Index of Authors

Eldredge, L.  12 Elledge, C.  106 Elliger, K.  67 Ewald, H.  15, 20

Hofmann, J.  12, 25 Horgan, M.  106 Hornig, G.  16 Hufnagel, W.  15

Fantalkin, A.  101 Feil, E.  16 Finkelstein, I.  58 Fischer, G.  3, 44 Fishbane, M.  50, 59 Fitzgerald, A.  62 Fleming, D.  58 Flint, W.  97 Fohrer, G.  38 Frevel, C.  87 Frey, J.  6, 13, 14 Frymer-Kensky, T.  31 Fürst, J.  32

Jacobs, L.  31 Janowski, B.  6, 104 Japhet, S.  2, 56 Jeremias, J.  34, 35, 60, 61, 63 Josephus  5, 29, 95 Jüngel, E.  118, 119

García Martínez, F.  111 Gerstenberger, E.  3, 118 Gertz, J.  43, 60, 87, 88, 118 Gesundheit, S.  29, 32 Geyer, B.  8 Gladigow, B.  16 Graetz, H.  29 Gramberg, C.  14 Grondin, J.  45 Grund, A.  30, 77 Gunkel, H.  27, 28, 40, 42, 44 Gunneweg, A.  94 Gyllenberg, R.  1, 37 Haacker, K.  95 Habermas, J.  46 Halivni, D.  31 Hall, S.  7 Harnack, A. von  23, 24 Hävernick, H.  14 Hayes, J.  4, 7, 11, 12 Hayoun, M.-R.  32 Hazony, Y.  32 Helmer, C.  14 Hermisson, H.-J.  45 Hess, H.  16 Hitzig, F.  14, 20

Käsemann, E.  110 Kattenbusch, F.  5, 7 Kaufmann, Y.  30, 31 Kayser, A.  14, 26 Keel, O.  44, 45, 49, 51, 52 Keller, C.  42, 43 Kessler, R.  83 Kiesow, K.  67 Kittel, R.  33 Klimkeit, H.-J.  21, 22, 23 Klumbies, P.-G.  6 Knauf, E.  1, 2, 118 Koch, C.  76 Koch, K.  54 Köckert, M.  85 Kohler, K.  30 Köhler, L.  34, 35, 36, 40, 48 König, E.  34 Körtner, U.  45 Kratz, R.  3, 12, 50, 54, 55, 56, 58, 59, 61, 64, 65, 66, 67, 81, 84, 97, 102, 116 Kraus, H.-J.  4 Krauter, S.  39 Kreuzer, H.  46 Kreuzer, S.  109 Krüger, T.  47, 67, 75, 96 Kuenen, A.  20 Kugel, J.  105 Kvanvig, H.  95 Laato, A.  56 Lang, B.  2, 99 Lange, Armin  97

Index of Authors Lemche, N.  1, 8, 45 Leuenberger, M.  97, 98, 99 Levenson, J.  8, 32 Levin, C.  4, 49, 57, 58, 62, 63, 64, 81, 85, 88 Levinson, B.  54, 77, 108 Lohfink, N.  49, 50, 104 Macchi, J.-D.  67 Maier, C.  74 Maier, J.  102 Markschies, C.  7, 52 Marti, K.  25, 26 Mayes, A.  95 McDonald, L.  99 McKane, W.  63 Mendels, D.  100, 110 Merk, O.  10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 17 Metzenthin, C.  106 Michaels, A.  24 Miller, P.  97 Müller, F.  21, 22, 23, 24 Najman, H.  5, 53 Neumark, D.  32 Neusner, J.  31 Nihan, C.  96 Nissinen, M.  61 Nocquet, D.  95 Oehler, G.  25, 26 Oeming, M.  1, 2 Ollenburger, B.  11 Olson, D.  95 Origen 6 Otto, E.  58, 76 Paganini, S.  108 Pannenberg, W.  7, 100 Parpola, S.  61 Paul, S.  64 Perlitt, L.  21, 87 Peters, A.  7 Pezzoli-Olgiati, D.  24 Plöger, O.  92 Pohlmann, K.-F.  64

151

Preuss, H.  118 Procksch, O.  35, 36 Prussner, F.  4, 7, 11, 12 Pury, A. de  1, 2, 88, 90, 118 Rad, G. von  1, 37, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 48, 49, 52, 64, 67, 115, 117 Rendtorff, R.  3, 31, 83, 114, 115 Rendtorff, T.  16 Reventlow, H. von  4, 11, 20, 38 Rigger, H.  107 Ringmüller, J.  16 Ritschl, D.  13, 52 Rogerson, J.  19, 39, 45 Rohrbacher, S.  30 Römer, T.  81, 93, 96 Rom-Shiloni, D.  74 Rösel, M.  109 Rothen, B.  10 Rudolph, U.  6, 32 Rudolph, W.  101 Ruiten, J. van  56 Sæbø, M.  12 Sandys-Wunsch, J.  12, 13 Schäfer, P.  95 Scherer, A.  64 Schmid, H.-W.  4 Schmid, K.  26, 35, 45, 50, 51, 58, 59, 60, 64, 66, 69, 71, 72, 75, 81, 83, 84, 85, 91, 92, 93, 100, 101, 102, 109, 110 Schmid, S.  10 Schmid, W.  24 Schniedewind, W.  58 Scholder, K.  11 Schultz, H.  24, 25, 27 Schwöbel, C.  7, 9, 12 Segal, M.  56, 105 Semler, J.  16 Seybold, K.  52 Siegert, F.  5, 109 Ska, J.-L.  87 Smend Jr., R.  2, 11, 14, 17, 35, 49, 50, 119

152

Index of Authors

Smend Sr., R.  18, 19, 25, 26 Snow, C.  46 Sommer, B.  29, 30 Spieckermann, H.  43, 54 Spriggs, D.  35 Stackert, J.  54 Stade, B.  20, 25 Staerk, W.  33 Steck, K.  25 Steck, O.  57, 60, 63, 64, 65, 66, 68, 71, 74, 91, 99, 111, 116 Stegemann, H.  107, 110, 111 Steiger, J.  10 Steinberg, J.  100 Steins, G.  56 Stemberger, G.  31, 32, 52 Stendahl, K.  38 Steuernagel, C.  33 Stietencron, H. von  6, 52 Stipp, H.-J.  90 Stökl, J.  60 Stolz, F.  21 Stolz, S.  24 Strecker, G.  11, 27 Sundermeier, T.  51 Sweeney, M.  29, 31 Tal, O.  101 Tiemeyer, L.-S.  66, 67 Tilly, M.  109 Trebolle Barrera, J.  100, 107 Tzoref, S.  106

Uehlinger, C.  45 Ulrich, E.  100 Ulrich, P.  24 VanderKam, J.  100 Vatke, W.  1, 15, 19, 20, 21, 22 Via, D.  52 Vollenweider, S.  6, 23, 24 Vouga, F.  110 Vriezen, T.  36 Wagner, F.  16, 17, 36 Wallmann, J.  6, 7, 9, 10, 12 Watts, J.  92 Welker, M.  6 Wellhausen, J.  14, 20, 21, 74, 88, 119 Westermann, C.  67 Wiese, C.  30 Wilhelm, K.  30 Wöhrle, J.  54, 86, 88 Wrede, W.  26, 27 Yoo, P.  95 Zahn, M.  56, 86 Zenger, E.  97, 99, 102 Zimmerli, W.  12, 14, 35, 42, 59, 90 Zobel, H.-J.  33 Zwickel, W.  44

Index of Scripture

Hebrew Bible Genesis 1–3  74, 86 1:2 109 1:6 110 6–9 86 6:3  93, 95, 96 6:5–8 96 6:13 89 8:20–22 96 12–13 96 12–50  83, 84, 85, 88 12:1 85 12:1–3 84 12:2 94 12:7 85 13:14 85 13:15 94 15:7 85 17:7 90 28:10–22 84 28:11–12 84 28:13  84, 85 28:13–15 84 32:27 86 50:24 93 Exodus 1:13–14 80 4:16 95 6:2–3 91 12:12 91 14:30 95 19:3–8 101 20:2–6 82

Exodus (cont.) 21–23 76 21:2  78, 79 21:2–11  77, 78, 79, 80, 81 21:6 79 23:13 82 23:23–24 82 25–29 108 32:13 93 33:1 93 33:11 95 34:10–16 108 Leviticus 25:39 80 25:39–46  79, 80, 81 26:42 93 Numbers 12:6–8 95 20:1–13 93 20:8 96 20:10 96 20:12 96 32:11 93 Deuteronomy 1:34–37  93, 96 1:36 96 3:25  93, 96 3:26 96 4:34 94 6:4–9 75

153

Deuteronomy (cont.) 6:22 94 7:25–26 108 15:12  78, 79 15:12–18  77, 78, 79, 80, 81 15:15 79 15:18 79 26:8 94 28:6 94 28:30 74 30:6 96 31:1–2 95 34:4  93, 94, 96 34:6 95 34:7  93, 95, 96 34:10 94 34:10–12 93 34:11–12 95 Joshua 1:7  63, 101 1:7–8  82, 102 1:8 103 8:30 82 8:31–32 101 22:5 82 23:6 101 23:6–7 82 23:16 82 1 Samuel 7:3–4 82 8:8 82

154 1 Samuel (cont.) 12:10 82 26:19 82 1 Kings 2:1–3 82 2:3 101 3:2–3 82 6:11–13 82 9:6 82 9:8 82 11:1 82 11:9–10 82 12:25–30 82 14:7–9 82 14:22 82 14:22–24 82 15:1–3 82 15:11–15 82 15:25–26 82 15:33–34 82 16:18–19 82 16:25–26 82 16:29 82 16:30–33 82 21:25–26 82 22:41 82 22:52–53 82 22:54 82 2 Kings 3:1–3 82 8:16–19 82 8:25–27 82 10:18 82 10:29 82 10:31 82 12:1–4 82 13:1–2 82 13:10–11 82 14:1–4 82 14:6  82, 101 14:23–24 82 15:1–4 82 15:8–9 82 15:17–18 82

Index of Scripture 2 Kings (cont.) 15:23–24 82 15:27–28 82 15:32–35 82 16:1–4 82 17:1–2 82 17:9–12 82 17:15–17 82 17:35 82 17:38–39 82 18:2 82 18:6  82, 101 18:12 82 18:17–18 82 18:22 82 21:1–2 82 21:3 82 21:7 82 21:8 101 21:19–22 82 21:21 82 22:1–2 82 22:8  82, 101 22:10–11 82 22:17 82 23:1–3 82 23:25  82, 101 23:31–32 82 23:36–37 82 24:8–9 82 24:17–20 82 Isaiah 1–32 56 1–39 71 2:2–5 63 7:14 108 33:15–16 29 34:2–4 93 34:11 109 40–48 56 40–55  55, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 71 40–66 64 40:1 56 43:16–17 67

Isaiah (cont.) 43:16–21  66, 67, 68, 74 43:18 67 43:18–19 67 43:20–21 67 45:1 70 45:1–7 65 52:7–10 56 56–66 60 65:17–25  66, 74 65–66 71 Jeremiah 4–10 62 4:11–12 62 4:13–15 62 4:23 109 4:29–30 62 17:7–8 104 17:8 104 22:18–19  69, 71 22:30  69, 71 23:5 72 23:5–6  72, 73 25:1 70 25:9 70 25:27–31 93 27:6 70 29:10  72, 73 30–33  60, 64 31:31–34 75 32:21 94 33:14–16  72, 73 33:14–26 72 36:1 69 36:9 69 36:30  69, 70 43:10 70 45:4 93 49:7–22 63 Ezekiel 7:2–3 89

Index of Scripture Hosea 4–14 61

Zephaniah 3:8 93

Joel 4:12–16 93

Malachi 3:22  101, 102 3:22–24  63, 101

Amos 8:2 89 Micah 4:1–5 63 6:8 29 7:12 93 Habakkuk 2:2 106 2:3 106 2:4 29

Psalms 1–2 97 1–41  97, 98 2:7 102 41:13 98 41:14 97 42–72  97, 98 72:18–19  97, 98 73–89  97, 98 89:52 98 89:53 97 90–106  97, 98 106:48  97, 98

155 Psalms (cont.) 107–50  97, 98 146–50 98 150:6 98 Daniel 6:13 75 9:11 101 Ezra 10:21–23 112 1 Chronicles 3:17–21 69 11 98 2 Chronicles 9 98 36:22–23 105

Deuterocanonical Literature 2 Baruch 7:1 112 8:2 112 10:5–19 112

New Testament Matthew 1:18–23 108 John 4:24 48

Acts 13:33 102

1 John 1:5 48 4:8 48