Scribes Writing Scripture: Doublets, Textual Divination, and the Formation of the Book of Jeremiah 9789004472563, 9004472568

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Scribes Writing Scripture

Supplements to Vetus Testamentum Editor in Chief Christl M. Maier Editorial Board N. Calduch-Benages – D.M. Carr – J. Hutton – L.C. Jonker – C. Körting – S.L. McKenzie – M. Nissinen – W.T. van Peursen – J. Schaper – A. Schellenberg – N. Wazana

volume 189

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/vts

Scribes Writing Scripture Doublets, Textual Divination, and the Formation of the Book of Jeremiah

By

Justus Theodore Ghormley

LEIDEN | BOSTON

The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available online at https://catalog.loc.gov

Typeface for the Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic scripts: “Brill”. See and download: brill.com/brill-typeface. ISSN 0083-5889 ISBN 978-90-04-47247-1 (hardback) ISBN 978-90-04-47256-3 (e-book) Copyright 2022 by Justus Theodore Ghormley. Published by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Hotei, Brill Schöningh, Brill Fink, Brill mentis, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Böhlau Verlag and V&R Unipress. Koninklijke Brill NV reserves the right to protect this publication against unauthorized use. Requests for re-use and/or translations must be addressed to Koninklijke Brill NV via brill.com or copyright.com. This book is printed on acid-free paper and produced in a sustainable manner.

For Gerald H. Wilson (1945–2005), who taught me to cherish biblical prophecy

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Contents Preface xi Acknowledgements xiii Abbreviations xiv 1 Introduction: Inspired Scribes 1 1 Contents of Study 4 2 Scribal Scholars and Textual Divination in the Ancient Near East 7 1 Scribal Practice and Education in the Ancient Near East 7 2 The Scribal Scholar in Ancient Mesopotamia 16 3 Scribal Scholars and the Textualization of Divination 19 4 Ancient Near Eastern Divination 20 5 Textual Divination 26 3 Examples of Textual Divination in Ancient Near Eastern Texts 29 1 Literary Generation 30 2 Secondary Application 32 3 Textual Divination in Omen Compendia 33 3.1 Secondary Application of Omen Apodoses 33 3.2 Literary Generation of Omen Compendia 35 4 Textual Divination in the Mari Letters 36 5 Textual Divination in Neo-Assyrian Literary Prophecy 45 5.1 Literary Generation in Neo-Assyrian Oracle Collections 46 5.2 Secondary Application of Neo-Assyrian Oracles Collections 49 6 Conclusion: The Common Scribal Endeavor of Textual Divination 51 4 The Incremental Formation of the Book of Jeremiah 53 1 The Divinatory and Scribal Origins of Jeremiah 55 2 The Book of Jeremiah and the Deuteronomistic Tradition 56 3 The Formation of Jer+n 58 4 Describing the Final Literary Stages of Book of Jeremiah 60 4.1 First Consideration: Translation Quality of G 63 4.2 Second Consideration: Evidence from the Dead Sea Scrolls 65 4.3 Third Consideration: The Secondary Nature of Pluses in V M 68 4.4 Fourth Consideration: The Character of the prämasoretischen Idiolekt 72 5 Conclusion: Refining the Two-Editions Theory of Jeremiah 74

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5 Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah 78 1 Text #1: From the Least to the Greatest, All Are Greedy (Jer 6:13–15 // Jer 8:10b–12) 84 1.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function 84 1.2 Duplication Technique 88 1.3 Textual Analysis 89 2 Text #2: Your Wealth and Treasure I Give as Plunder (Jer 15:12–14 // Jer 17:1–4) 92 2.1 Preliminary Textual Issues 93 2.2 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function 97 2.3 Duplication Technique 101 2.4 Textual Analysis 103 3 Text #3: Look! Days Are Coming, Says the Yhwh! (Jer 23:5–6 // Jer 33:14–16) 108 3.1 Original Meaning of 23:5–6 110 3.2 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function 113 3.3 The Relationship of 33:14–16 to 33:17–26 116 3.4 Duplication Technique 119 3.5 Textual Analysis 120 4 Text #4: But You, My Servant Jacob, Do Not Fear! (Jer 30:10–11 // Jer 46:27–28) 124 4.1 Preliminary Textual Issues 125 4.2 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function 127 4.3 Duplication Technique 130 4.4 Textual Analysis 131 5 Text #5: Look! Like an Eagle (Jer 48:40b and 41b // Jer 49:22) 133 5.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function 133 5.2 A Comparison of the Doublet with the Other Additions to the Oracles against Moab 135 5.3 Duplication Technique 138 5.4 Textual Analysis 139 6 Text #6: I Will Make You to Be a Wall of Bronze (Jer 1:18–19 // Jer 15:20) 140 6.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function 141 6.2 Duplication Technique 144 6.3 Textual Analysis 145 7 Text #7: Shall I Not Punish for These Things? (Jer 5:9 // Jer 5:29 // Jer 9:8) 149 7.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function 149 7.2 Textual Analysis / Duplication Technique 151

Contents

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Text #8: Look! A People from the North (Jer 6:22–24 // Jer 50:41–43) 152 8.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function 152 8.2 Duplication Technique 157 8.3 Textual Analysis 158 Conclusions about Jeremiah’s Doublets 161

6 The Divinatory Role and Status of Ancient Jewish Scribes 164 1 Duplication Technique 165 2 Synonymity 168 3 Innovation 170 4 Intra-Jeremianic and Intra-Scriptural Traditioning 172 5 Post-Duplication Textual Development 174 6 Ancient Jewish Scribal Education 175 7 Scribal Divination in the Book Jeremiah and in the Ancient Near East 178 7.1 Literary Generation in Jeremiah and Ancient Near Eastern Divinatory Texts 185 7.2 Secondary Application in Jeremiah and Ancient Near Eastern Divinatory Texts 189 7 Conclusion: Inspiration as a Fruitful Category for Historical Reflection 192 Bibliography 195 Index of Names and Subjects 217 Index of Ancient Texts 219

ix

Preface This book examines how ancient Jewish scribes wrote Hebrew scripture— specifically the book of Jeremiah—through modes of divination comparable to the practice of divination in the ancient Near East. If the Bible were written today by “inspired” academics, it would involve—alongside various religious practices—the mundane tasks of library catalogue searches, peer review, and editorial boards. These tasks would be the mechanics of inspiration. What were the mechanics of inspiration for ancient Jewish scribes? In what follows, I present a historical investigation into the mechanics of inspiration. What can we know about the ancient Jewish scribes who wrote Jeremiah? Who did they think they were? What did they think they were doing? Since the responsible scribes are anonymous, answers to these questions must remain tentative. Nevertheless, a strong case can be made for considering these scribes to be the ancient Jewish equivalent of the ancient Near Eastern scribal scholar—that is, a scholarly scribe of the Near Eastern royal court charged with discerning the divine will through various means of divination. Through a textualized form of divination—what I term “textual divination”—scribal scholars created divinatory literature, written records of divination that were themselves revelatory. Like these Near Eastern counterparts, ancient Jewish scholarly scribes created divinatory texts like the book of Jeremiah in part through such textual divination. Their work of compiling, arranging, revising, expanding, and duplicating the text of Jeremiah was not a menial, mindless set of “scribal” tasks but reflects a well-established scholarly tradition of the ancient Near East. This work is the labor of textual diviners invested in the discovery of the deity’s will through the study, interpretation, and composition of divinatory literature. In the case of Jeremiah, what began as a record of oracles associated with the prophetic personality know as Jeremiah, became—under the stylus of ancient Jewish scholarly scribes—a fully-developed prophetic book whose divinatory relevance was not limited to the age of the figure Jeremiah. These ancient scribes faithfully prolonged Jeremiah’s significance, reimagining implications of older oracles according to traceable hermeneutical principles so that the oracles addressed new historical moments and concerns. To forecast one example considered in chap. 5 below, an oracle concerning king Zedekiah (Jer 23:5–6) becomes, through textual divination, an expectation for the restoration of Jerusalem after the exile (Jer 33:14–16). While Jeremiah’s generic form—the prophetic book—is markedly distinct from the forms of divinatory literature surviving from the ancient Near East,

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comparison is still possible. In fact, as I argue, examining the modes of textual divination used to create Near Eastern divinatory literature sensitizes the biblical scholar to detect and appreciate similar modes of textual divination at work in the formation of Jeremiah’s scroll. The reader may decide to what degree my argument succeeds. A word on the term “inspiration”: by inspiration, I simply mean the process through which a writer creates what she believes to be—or at least what her intended readers believe to be—scripture, that is, a religiously authoritative text that in some sense is the “word of God.” The category of inspiration is typically relegated to confessional contexts. The biblical scholar of a historical bent might avoid the category for the sake of objectivity: she might think that one’s views about inspiration should not influence how one undertakes historical investigation or the conclusions that one draws. Ideally, believer and nonbeliever could reach consensus on any historical question, so long as both parties bracket their faith assumptions. I argue, however, that the category of inspiration is itself a historical artifact that requires historical inquiry. People in the past thought Hebrew scripture to be inspired. More to the point, the scribes who wrote Hebrew scripture thought themselves to be inspired, or at least wanted to be perceived as such. This thought is not inconsequential; it determined the process through which scribes composed biblical texts and shaped the “final” form of those texts. For the book of Jeremiah—the focus of this study—the category of inspiration explains many of the peculiarities of the book’s formation, most notably its profusion of doublets. Put more strongly, the scribes’ belief that they were creating divine word may be the most important factor to consider when studying the formation of Jeremiah. As I argue in the following pages, Jeremiah is largely, if not chiefly, the yield of textual divination and the fruit of the labors of generations of divining scribes tasked with discerning Yhwh’s will. Take this insight into account and the strange course of Jeremiah’s formation can be more easily charted, the befuddling texture of the book’s “final” forms more readily enjoyed.

Acknowledgements Like the book of Jeremiah, an academic book—though attributed to one author—is the product of the toil and sweat of a community of scholars and companions. The completion of my book would not have been possible save the guidance, encouragement, correction, and labor of my dissertation directors Professor James VanderKam and Professor Eugene Ulrich, as well as my readers Professor Avi Winitzer and Professor Ronnie Goldstein. The revisions suggested by Professor Christl Maier among other reviewers vastly improved my writing and argument. Significant encouragement and assistance came from friends Michael Cover, Chris Stroup, Jeremiah Coogan, David DeJong, Brandon Bruning, and Sharls White. I am grateful, as well, for my many academic mentors who have helped me along the way, especially Professor Bill Yarchin at Azusa Pacific, who first introduced me to the puzzle of Jeremiah’s two forms; Professors Carolyn Sharp, Robert Wilson, John Collins and Elitzur Bar-Asher Siegal at Yale Divinity School; and Notre Dame Professors Blake Leyerle and the late Gary Knoppers. Finally, I also owe a debt of gratitude to my family—especially Heather, Eliyah, Julianna, and Thaddeus—who weathered with joy and patience many nights and days with a fretful and crotchety researcher, to my many friends and colleagues around Holy Cross College, Notre Dame, Valparaiso, San Pedro, and at Tree of Life, and to the mercies of Jeremiah’s God.

Abbreviations

Abbreviations for the Book of Jeremiah

BOC Book of Consolations (Jer 30–33) G Septuagint Jer+n The hypothetical common textual ancestor of Jeremiah M and G Jer A+B A hypothetical early form of Jeremiah containing at least Jeremiah’s A and B material M Masoretic Text OAN Oracles against the Nations (Jer 46–51) V G The Vorlage of the Septuagint of Jeremiah V M The Vorlage of the Masoretic Text of Jeremiah



Abbreviations of Journals and Book Series

AB Anchor Bible ABG Arbeiten zur Bibel und ihrer Geschichte ABRL The Anchor Bible Reference Library AMD Ancient Magic and Divination AOAT Alter Orient und Altes Testament AOS American Oriental Series ARM Archives Royales de Mari ATSAT Arbeiten zu Text und Sprache im Alten Testament AYBRL Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library BA Biblical Archaeologist BASOR Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research BBET Beiträge zur biblischen Exegese und Theologie BCSMS Bulletin of the Canadian Society for Mesopotamian Studies BETL Bibliotheca ephemeridum theologicarum lovaniensium BHS Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia. Edited by K. Elliger and W. Rudolph. Stuttgart, 1983 Bib Biblica BJS Brown Judaic Studies BM Bibliotheca Mesopotamica BIOSCS Bulletin of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies BST Basel Studies of Theology

Abbreviations

xv

Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft A Concise Akkadian Dictionary. Edited by Jeremy Black et al. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2000. CAIBL Comptes rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres CANE Civilizations of the Ancient Near East. Edited by J. Sasson. 4 vols. New York, 1995 CBET Contributions to Biblical Exegesis and Theology CBQ Catholic Biblical Quarterly CBQMS Catholic Biblical Quarterly Monograph Series CHANE Culture and History of the Ancient Near East CM Cuneiform Monographs CQS Companion to the Qumran Scrolls CurBR Currents in Biblical Research CurBS Currents in Research: Biblical Studies DJD Discoveries in the Judaean Desert DMOA Documenta et Monumenta Orientis Antiqui ER Encyclopedia of Religion Eretz Israel ErIsr Exp Expedition FAT Forschungen zum Alten Testament FRLANT Forschungen zur Religion und Literatur des Alten und Neuen Testaments GMS Grazer Morgenländische Studien HALOT Koehler, L., W. Baumgartner, and J.J. Stamm, eds. The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament. Translated and edited under the supervision of M.E.J. Richardson. 4 vols. Leiden, 1994–1999. HAT Handbuch zum Alten Testament HBAI Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel HBGHS Historische Bibliothek der Gerda Henkel Stiftung HBV Hebrew Bible and Its Versions Heb Hebraica HS Hebrew Studies HSM Harvard Semitic Monographs HSS Harvard Semitic Studies HThKAT Herders theologischer Kommentar zum Alten Testament HTR Harvard Theological Review ICC International Critical Commentary Int Interpretation JAJSup Supplements to the Journal of Ancient Judaism JANER Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions

BZAW BZNW CAD

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Abbreviations

Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society JANES JAOS Journal of the American Oriental Society JBL Journal of Biblical Literature JCS Journal of Cuneiform Studies JNES Journal of Near Eastern Studies JNSL Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages JPSTC Jewish Publication Society Torah Commentary JQR The Jewish Quarterly Review JSJSup Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism JNSL Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages JSOT Journal for the Study of the Old Testament JSOTSup Journal for the Study of the Old Testament: Supplement Series JSS Journal of Semitic Studies JTS Journal of Theological Studies KAT Kommentar zum Alten Testament KHAT Kurzgefasstes exegetisches Handbuch zum Alten Testament KHC Kurzer Hand-Commentar zum Alten Testament LAI Library of Ancient Israel LHBOTS Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies MNABU Mémoires de Nouvelles assyriologiques breves et utilitaires MSU Mitteilungen des Septuaginta-Unternehmens NATCP Catalogue of the 10th Anniversary Exhibition of the Neo Assyrian Text Corpus Project NCB New Century Bible NETS New English Translation of the Septuagint NICOT New International Commentary on the Old Testament NINOL Uitgaven van Het Nederlands Instituut Voor Het Nabije Oosten Te Leiden NRSV New Revised Standard Version NWS Nordostafrikanisch/Westasiatische Studien OBE Jeyes, Ulla. Old Babylonian Extispicy: Omen Texts in the British Museum. Istanbul: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut te İstanbul, 1989. OBO Orbis biblicus et orientalis OIS Oriental Institute Seminars Or Orientalia OrTr Oral Tradition OTL Old Testament Library OtSt Oudtestamentische Studiën PEQ Palestine Exploration Quarterly PSJCO Princeton Symposium on Judaism and Christian Origins

Abbreviations

xvii

Qadmoniot: A Journal for the Antiquities of Eretz-Israel and Bible Lands / ‫ישראל וארצות המקרא‬-‫עת לעתיקות ארץ‬-‫ כתב‬:‫קדמוניות‬ RAAO Revue d’assyriologie et d’archéologie orientale RB Revue biblique RevQ Revue de Qumran SAA State Archives of Assyria SAAS State Archives of Assyria Studies SANER Studies in Ancient Near Eastern Records SAOC Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization SBB Stuttgarter biblische Beiträge SBLAIL Society of Biblical Literature Ancient Israel and Its Literature SBLDS Society of Biblical Literature Dissertation Series SBLSCS Society of Biblical Literature Septuagint and Cognate Studies SBLSP Society of Biblical Literature Seminar Papers SBLSym Society of Biblical Literature Symposium Series SBLWAW Society of Biblical Literature Writings from the Ancient World SBSI Schriftenreihe zum Bayerischen Schulmuseum Ichenhausen, Zweigmuseum des Bayerischen Nationalmuseums Scripta Hierosolymitana ScrHier SDSS Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature SEÅ Svensk Exegetisk Årsbok Sem Semitica SJOT Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament SO Sources orientales SOTI Studies in Old Testament Interpretation STDJ Studies on the Texts of the Desert of Judah TAPS Transactions of the American Philosophical Society TCS Text-Critical Studies TCT Textual Criticism and the Translator Text Textus TOTC Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries VT Vetus Testamentum VTSup Supplements to Vetus Testamentum WAWSup Writings from the Ancient World. Supplements WBC Word Biblical Commentary WBCR Wiley Blackwell Companions to Religion WMANT Wissenschaftliche Monographien zum Alten und Neuen Testament ZAVA Zeitschrift für Assyriologie und Vorderasiatische Archäologie ZAW Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft ZKT Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie Qad

chapter 1

Introduction: Inspired Scribes Long before the arrival of authors and editors, there were scribes. It was scribes in the ancient world who developed the art of writing, created the first literary genres, and first captured the divine word in text. Often misunderstood as mere copyists, such ancient scribes were the original educated elites of society, responsible not only for the transmission of texts from one generation to the next, but also the study, revision, and formation of traditional texts. In the ancient Near East, certain scribes acquired an additional role; to them fell the responsibility of discovering, recording, and interpreting divine revelation. To this end, these scholarly scribes developed techniques of decoding and reading the writing of the gods in the movements of the stars, in abnormal markings of animal exta (entrails), and, above all, in textual records of such divine communications; for written records of divine communication were also considered to be sources of divine revelation. Scholarly scribes did not simply study and interpret written records passively. They played an active role both in the initial formation of such records and in the subsequent expansion and adaptation of those records in light of new contexts. This process of study, interpretation, expansion, and adaptation may be termed textual divination—a textually-focused and textually-expressed means of discerning the divine will. Through textual divination, records of divine communication grew and evolved as scholarly scribes folded new interpretations of existing records into those records, the former becoming a constituent part of the latter. As discussed in the second chapter, such scholarly scribes functioned in their societies as “inspired,” that is, legitimate and divinely sanctioned conduits of divine revelation.1 In this study, I contend that in the Second Temple period of ancient Judea (and perhaps earlier) there existed a similar class of scholarly scribes who were responsible for the formation and transmission of written records of Jewish divination. Put more specifically, I argue that the book of Jeremiah is in part created through textual divination in the hands of Jewish scholarly scribes. These Jewish scribes were not simply passive guardians of divination records, 1 In this study I use the term “inspiration” to refer to the process through which ancient writers created texts that they hoped would be received as scripture, that is, religiously authoritative writing that in some sense was thought of as the word of God or the gods. Writers who are “inspired” are those who were authorized by their community to create scripture.

© Justus Theodore Ghormley, 2022 | doi:10.1163/97890

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but akin to scholarly scribes in the ancient Near East, played an active role in the ongoing expansion and adaptation of these records through textual divination. This is to say, they were themselves diviners, participants in the discovery of the divine will and contributors to an expanding body of revelatory literature.2 In other words, these Jewish scholarly scribes, like their ancient Near Eastern counterparts, were “inspired.” Support for this contention is most clearly observed through a close examination of the formation of the Bible’s prophetic books. Unique among the scrolls of Hebrew scripture, prophetic books originated as collections of prophetic oracles and, for this reason, never lacked status as revelatory texts. Consequently, in many cases the literary growth of a prophetic book coincides with occasions of textual divination. Studying the literary growth of prophetic books thus opens a window into the divinatory role exercised by certain scholarly Jewish scribes. Among the prophetic books of the Bible, the book of Jeremiah stands out for its exceptionally complicated literary history. A diverse assortment of prose and poetry, of complaints and narrative, Jeremiah3 likely underwent a long literary journey from initial oracle collection to full-fledged prophetic book. To our great fortune, Jeremiah survives in two remarkably different forms: a shorter and presumably older form—attested mainly by the Septuagint (G)— and a longer and presumably more recent form—known from the Masoretic Text (M).4 This fortuity has afforded scholars an opportunity for understanding how prophetic books grew and developed in the hands of creative, divining scribes. Through comparing the long and short forms of Jeremiah, one may glimpse the final stages of the book’s literary growth. In these last stages, Jeremiah grew through the filling out of names and titles and the insertion of headings and intra-textual repetitions—i.e., repetitions of material already found in 2 The creative role played by scribes in the composition of biblical texts has been appreciated by a number of scholars: e.g., Shemaryahu Talmon, “The Textual Study of the Bible: A New Outlook,” in Qumran and the History of the Biblical Text, ed. Frank Moore Cross and Shemaryahu Talmon (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975), 381; Eugene C. Ulrich, “The Canonical Process, Textual Criticism, and Latter Stages in the Composition of the Bible,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Origins of the Bible, SDSS (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1999), 51–78; David M. Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart: Origins of Scripture and Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005); Karel van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007). 3 Throughout this study, I use the name Jeremiah to refer to the biblical book of Jeremiah and not to the prophetic figure featured within this book unless otherwise noted. 4 Reasons for considering G to be a witness to an older form of Jeremiah are discussed in chap. 4, §4.

Introduction: Inspired Scribes

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Jeremiah—to name a few examples. Of notable size are seven lengthy doublets added to the long form of the book.5 Each doublet marks an occasion of expansion, when a scribe lifted a set of verses already found in Jeremiah and copied them elsewhere in the book. Significantly, the shorter (and presumably earlier) form of Jeremiah appears to be in part the product of a similar process of expansion. This form is already replete with doublets of comparable size and tenor. By my count, the shorter form of Jeremiah contains at least twentynine internal, or “intra-Jeremianic” doublets.6 For several reasons, this study makes the book’s doublets its primary subject of inquiry. First, since Jeremiah contains such a large number of doublets, any satisfying study of the formation of the book must account for the creation of these doublets. Second, examining the earlier doublets—those that are part and parcel of the book’s short form—allows one to comment on the growth of Jeremiah during earlier literary stages not attested by manuscript variants. Third, since scribes practiced duplication over an extended period of time—both in the production of the short form of Jeremiah and afterwards in the production of the long form—examining the book’s doublets enables one to assess changes and constants in scribal practice during the period of Jeremiah’s formation. Fourth, and most importantly, doublets frequently mark 5 For a list of Jeremiah’s doublets see: Jean Daniel Macchi, “Les doublets dans le livre de Jérémie,” in The Book of Jeremiah and Its Reception: Le livre de Jérémie et sa réception, BETL 128 (Peeters: Leuven University Press, 1997), 120; Macchi points toward earlier lists compiled by Samuel R. Driver, An Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament (New York: C. Scribner’s, 1913), 276–7, and Franz D. Hubmann, Untersuchungen zu den Konfessionen: Jer 11, 18–12, 6 und Jer 15, 10–21 (Würzburg: Echter Verlag, 1978), 219–20, 225. More recently, see: Geoffrey H. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah: Doublets and Recurring Phrases (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000). The seven doublets unique to the long form of Jeremiah are: 6:13–15 // 8:10b–12; 15:12–14 // 17:1–4; 23:5–6 // 33:14–16; 24:8–10 // 29:16–20; 30:10–11 // 46:27–28; 48:40b, 41b // 49:22; 39:4– 10 // 52:7–16. The absence of two doublets—15:12–14 // 17:1–4; 24:8–10 // 29:16–20—from the long form of Jeremiah could be the result of haplography. 6 With the term “intra-Jeremianic” doublets I mean doublets created through the duplication of verses found elsewhere in Jeremiah. See discussion of intra-Jeremianic and intrascriptural tradition in chap. 2, §1. The twenty-nine intra-Jeremianic doublets found in the short form are: 1:18–19 // 15:20; 2:26b, 27b // 32:32b–33a; 4:4b // 21:12b; 5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8; 6:22– 24 // 50:41–43; 7:6 // 22:3; 7:16 // 11:14; 7:30–32 // 19:5–6,11 // 32:34–35; 7:34 // 16:9 // 25:10 // 33:10a, 11a; 8:2b // 16:4a // 25:33; 8:15 // 14:19b; 9:14 // 23:15a; 10:12–16 // 51:15–19; 11:20 // 20:12; 11:23b // 23:12b // 48:44b; 16:14–15 // 23:7–8; 17:25 // 22:4; 18:16 // 19:8 // 49:17 // 50:13; 21:9 // 38:2; 21:14b // 50:32b; 23:19–20 // 30:23–24; 26:3 // 36:3; 32:4 // 34:3; 32:44 // 33:13 // 17:26; 34:22a // 37:8; 49:18 // 50:40; 49:19–21 // 50:44–46; 49:26 // 50:30; 50:23b // 51:41b. Not included in this count are the book’s twenty-five external or “intra-scriptural” doublets, i.e., doublets shared by Jeremiah and another biblical book; see list in See Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 213–42.

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occasions of textual divination, when scribes generated new revelatory meaning out of existing revelation through applying that revelation to new literary contexts. The prevalence of doublets in Jeremiah offers ample opportunities for investigating how early Jewish textual divination was practiced. Not only do doublets serve as primary evidence of textual divination, Jeremiah’s doublets also provide a chance to study the various ways Jewish scribes “copied” their master texts. Considered in depth in the fifth chapter, such scribes enjoyed a range of creative license when duplicating. At times, the scribe would produce a nearly identical copy of the original text. At other times, the scribe would adapt, enlarge, interpret, and/or paraphrase his or her7 source. In essence, doublets are of immense historical value, granting us access to the intentions and practices of early Jewish scholarly scribes. 1

Contents of Study

Given the purposes of this study—to understand the scribes who composed Jeremiah as inspired scholarly scribes responsible for discerning the deity’s will through textual divination—I must be clear about what I mean by the terms “scribal scholar,” “divination,” and, in particular, “textual divination.” In chap. 2, I discuss these terms and problems that arise when one tries to define them. The emergence of the scribal scholar and the practice of textual divination 7 While the overwhelming majority of scribal scholars were undoubtedly men, women in the ancient Near East were at times employed as scribes and could commission and perhaps even compose literary works (for example, Enheduanna, daughter of Sargon of Akkad, is credited with a compilation of forty-two hymns to the temples of Sumer and Akkad); see: Brigitte Lion, “Literacy and Gender,” The Oxford Handbook of Cuneiform Culture, ed. Karen Radner and Eleanor Robson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 90–112. Lion, 91, notes an association of the feminine with literacy: “In mythological texts goddesses, more than gods, have mastered writing and calculation.” Such examples point to the possibility that women may have functioned from time to time as scholarly scribes involved in the discernment of the divine will. Good candidates for women divining scribes may be found in the kingdom of Mari. King Zimri-Lim’s sister and high priest, Inibšina, advised the king on matters of divination, offering her own interpretation of a prophetess’s oracle (ARM 26 197; see chap. 3, §4). In another letter (ARM 26 237), the king’s aunt, Addū-duri, does the same. Oracles in Mari are transmitted and to different degrees interpreted by women on many other occasions: for example, by Zimri-Lim’s wife Šibtu in ARM 26 207, 208, 211, 212, 213, 214, 236; and by the women Zunana in ARM 26 232, Šimatum in ARM 26 239, and Timlû in ARM 26 240. All of the known scholars of Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal in the Neo-Assyrian period, however, are men. Still, given the possibility of women scribal scholars, I will make use of gender-neutral language whenever possible and appropriate. For the occasional role of women in education and text production, see Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 11–12.

Introduction: Inspired Scribes

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reflect certain assumptions about the nature of texts and the telos of scribal training. For this reason, chap. 2 also reviews recent perspectives on ancient scribal education and the nature of scribal practice that illuminate the formation of a range of divinatory texts from Old Babylon omen compendia to the book of Jeremiah. Most notably, ancient scribal education relied on the memorization or internalization of an extensive intellectual tradition. Such memorization impacted the art of writing texts in at least two ways: first, it shaped the content of written texts, as memorized bits of tradition served as building material in text construction. Texts composed and copied within a single scribal environment are traditioned; that is, they are interlinked by echoes and allusions to a common tradition. Second, the memorization of tradition shaped the practice of writing, endowing written texts with an “oral” character. This character is evidenced in part by the presence of synonymous variation. As argued in chap. 6, the abundance of traditioning and synonymous variation in Jeremiah’s doublets suggests ancient Jewish scribes may have enjoyed a scribal training akin to their counterparts in the ancient Near East. In chap. 3, I survey examples of textual divination from a variety of texts and genres from the ancient Near East, namely, Old Babylonian omen compendia, oracle-reporting Mari letters, and oracle collections from the neo-Assyrian State Archives. The differences of these three corpora in terms of sociohistorical context as well as genre hamper efforts to compare them. For this reason, I provide two umbrella categories of textual divination—literary generation and secondary application—which facilitate such comparative work. Literary generation refers to the creation or discovery of new revelation that results when existing revelatory data are placed in a (new) literary context. As the examples considered in chap. 3 demonstrate, literary generation occurs (1) when omens are compiled and arranged in compendia (e.g., Old Babylonian omen compendia), (2) when spoken oracles are transcribed into letters (as in the Mari letters), and (3) when recorded oracles are compiled into oracle collections (as found in the neo-Assyrian State Archives). Such (re)contextualization shapes existing revelation in two ways. First, it subjects such revelation to the generic constraints of that context. Second, (re)contextualization opens existing revelation to vertical reading—i.e., when a text is understood in light of its context—and to intra-textual harmonization—when a text is rewritten towards its context. As demonstrated in chap. 5, moments of duplication in the book of Jeremiah offer comparable moments of literary generation when scribes created/discovered new revelation through (re)contextualization. Secondary application refers to the creation or discovery of a secondary (or additional) interpretation of an omen that extends the existing interpretation(s) of that omen. Examples of secondary application considered in chap. 3 include

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the insertion of secondary apodoses in Old Babylonian omen compendia and the recycling of earlier oracles for later historical horizons in the neo-Assyrian oracle collections. In chap. 5, I present occasions when duplication in Jeremiah is profitably explained as similar moments of secondary application. As a final preliminary to my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets, I offer in chap. 4 an overview of the formation of the book focusing primarily on scholarly theories that address the most recent stages of the book’s textual growth. For the conclusions I draw about Jeremiah’s doublets depend upon a particular understanding of the formation of the book. Following the work of J. Janzen and H.-J. Stipp, I assume the two forms of Jeremiah—those attested by G and M— are snapshots of an ongoing, gradual process of composition—involving some combination of large-scale revision, small-scale revision, and incremental growth—that produced the book of Jeremiah. With the previous chapters as necessary context, the fifth chapter delivers an extensive treatment of a sampling of Jeremiah’s doublets. Each doublet is put to detailed analysis in order to ascertain the duplication technique which produced the doublet, the responsible scribe’s rationale for creating the doublet, and the duplicate’s divinatory function in its (new) literary context. Through such analyses, one may observe how scholarly Jewish scribes practiced textual divination, discovering new revelation out of existing records of divination through literary generation and secondary application. Finally, in chap. 6, I discuss several significant observations about ancient Jewish scribal education and practice that emerged out of my examination of Jeremiah’s doublets; and I close with a brief comparison of the practice of textual divination attested by my study of Jeremiah’s doublets and by the ancient Near Eastern divinatory texts examined in chap. 3. As I show, Jeremiah and these Near Eastern texts utilize the same categories of textual divination to accomplish comparable divinatory tasks. In all cases one encounters the creation of new revelation through the intentional arrangement and harmonization of disparate oracles into a single text and through the reapplication of existing oracles to secondary contexts on the basis of coherent principles. In light of these similarities, I conclude that the scribes who produced the book of Jeremiah, like those responsible for Near Eastern divinatory texts, are the ancient Jewish equivalent to scribal scholars entrusted with the vocation of discerning the will of the deity anew through the study and interpretation of records of divination. In short, these scribes were the loci of inspiration for ancient Judaism.

chapter 2

Scribal Scholars and Textual Divination in the Ancient Near East To establish the claim that the book of Jeremiah is in part the product of textual divination in the hands of scholarly Jewish scribes, it is necessary to explain what I mean by the terms “textual divination” and “scribal scholar.” Explaining these terms requires a description of the nature of scribal practice and the character of scribal education in the ancient Near East. It also requires a discussion of divination in the Near East, the textualization of divination, and the emergence of the scribal scholar. This chapter will address each of these subjects in turn. 1

Scribal Practice and Education in the Ancient Near East

In recent years, a number of key studies on scribes and scribal practice in the ancient Near East present a picture of ancient scribes that complicates the traditional understanding of scribes.1 Often, the word scribe conjures up the image of a monk devoted to the mechanical, albeit painstaking task of producing exact copies of master texts. There is much truth to this portrayal of scribes, as illustrated, for example, by the practice of the Masoretes, accredited with the faithful transmission of the consonantal text of the Hebrew Bible for

1 The following discussion relies upon several studies on scribes, especially: Niek Veldhuis, “Levels of Literacy,” in The Oxford Handbook of Cuneiform Culture, ed. Karen Radner and Eleanor Robson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011) 68–89; Martin Worthington, Principles of Akkadian Textual Criticism, SANER 1 (Boston: De Gruyter, 2012); Dominique Charpin, Reading and Writing in Babylon, trans. Jane Marie Todd (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010); David M. Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart: Origins of Scripture and Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005); Karel van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007); as well as Raymond F. Person, “The Ancient Israelite Scribe as Performer,” JBL 117 (1998): 601–9; cf. Alger N. Doane, “The Ethnography of Scribal Writing and Anglo-Saxon Poetry: Scribe as Performer,” OrTr 9 (1994): 420–39. Note the critique of van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, in John Van Seters, “The Role of the Scribe in the Making of the Hebrew Bible,” JANER 8 (2008): 99–129.

© Justus Theodore Ghormley, 2022 | doi:10.1163/97890

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centuries.2 Producing exact copies of texts was also a primary goal of scribes in the ancient Near East.3 Yet, as recent studies show, this sketch does not offer a complete picture of Near Eastern scribes. Of particular relevance are multiple studies reconstructing the extent and nature of Sumerian scribal curriculum in the Old Babylonian period as well as that of scribal education in the first millennium BCE.4 The purpose 2 Emanuel Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible, 3rd rev. and exp. ed. (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 2012), 30, draws attention to the meticulous care of Jewish scribes in the words of R. Ishmael: “My son, be careful, because your work is the work of heaven; should you omit (even) one letter or add (even) one letter, the whole world would be destroyed” (b. Sot. 20a). Worthington, Principles of Textual Criticism in Akkadian Literature, 17, nn. 58, 59, 61, collates illustrative examples of precise scribes from different historical eras and regions. 3 For example in the building of Ashurbanipal’s library, scribes were tasked with the reproduction of identical replicas of master texts (gabarû); see, A. Leo Oppenheim, Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Dead Civilization, rev. ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977), 244. For the rigid fixing of Old Babylonian lexical and traditional texts in the Middle Assyrian and later periods, see: Niek Veldhuis, “Domesticizing Babylonian Scribal Culture in Assyria: Transformation by Preservation,” in Theory and Practice of Knowledge Transfer: Studies in School Education in the Ancient Near East and Beyond, Papers Read at a Symposium in Leiden, 17–19 December 2008, ed. Wolfert S. van Egmond and Wilfred H. van Soldt, NINOL 121 (Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten, 2012), 11–24. In the first millennium, we also encounter scribal colophons asserting the accuracy of reproductions of given texts; cf., Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 38; for examples of such colophons, see: Hermann Hunger, Babylonische und assyrische Kolophone, AOAT 2 (Kevelaer: Butzon & Bercker, 1968), 125–45. Addressing the subject of scribal accuracy more generally, van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, 126, writes, “It suffices to look at cuneiform compositions represented by copies from different periods to be struck by the scrupulous adherence on the part of successive generations of scribes to the ‘master copy’ (gabarû) or the ‘original’ (labīru) of their texts,” also noting that such scribes counted lines and even left lacunae unrestored. 4 For a summary of scribal education in the ancient Near East, see: Charpin, Reading and Writing in Babylon, trans. Jane Marie Todd (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010), 17–52; Veldhuis, “Levels of Literacy,” 82–86; Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 17–34; Paul Delnero, “Sumerian Extract Tablets and Scribal Education,” JCS 62 (2010): 53–69; Piotr Michalowski, Correspondences of the Kings of Ur: Epistolary History of an Ancient Mesopotamian Kingdom (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2011), 47–53; Alexandra Kleinerman, Education in Early 2nd Millennium BC Babylonia: The Sumerian Epistolary Miscellany, CM 42 (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 4–5, 75–94; for the phases of scribal education in the Old Babylonian period, see: Niek Veldhuis, “Elementary Education at Nippur: The Lists of Trees and Wooden Objects” (Ph.D. diss., Rijksuniversiteit, 1997); idem, “Sumerian Proverbs in Their Curricular Context,” JAOS 120 (2000): 383–99; Steve Tinney, “Texts, Tablets, and Teaching: Scribal Education in Nippur and Ur,” Exp 40 (1998): 40–50; idem, “The Curricular Setting of Sumerian Literature,” Iraq 61 (1999): 159–72; Eleanor Robson, “The Tablet House: A Scribal School in Old Babylonian Nippur,” RAAO 95 (2001): 39–66; Paul Delnero, “Variation in Sumerian Literary Compositions: A Case Study Based on the Decad” (Ph.D. diss., Philadelphia: University of

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of scribal education was not to produce mere copyists or secretaries.5 Among student texts excavated from scribal schools there is a noted dearth of exercises devoted to teaching basic practical or mechanical “scribal” skills.6 Instead, archeological finds suggest that scribal education had as its goal the formation of an elite class of educated and “enculturated” intelligentsia who had mastered and ingested the great literary and intellectual traditions of the day.7

Pennsylvania, 2006); idem, “Sumerian Literary Catalogues and the Scribal Curriculum,” ZAVA 100 (2010): 32–55; idem, “Sumerian Extract Tablets and Scribal Education.” For scribal education in the Middle Babylonian period, see: Niek Veldhuis, “Kassite Exercises: Literary and Lexical Extracts,” JCS 52 (2000): 67–94. For the phases of education in the Late Babylonian period, see: Petra D. Gesche, Schulunterricht in Babylonien im ersten Jahrtausend v. Chr., AOAT 275 (Münster: Ugarit-Verlag, 2001); Niek Veldhuis, “On the Curriculum of the Neo-Babylonian School,” JAOS 123 (2003): 627–33. Finally, Andrew George, “In search of the É.DUB.BA.A: The Ancient Mesopotamian School in Literature and Reality,” in “An Experienced Scribe who Neglects Nothing”: Ancient Near Eastern Studies in Honor of Jacob Klein, ed. Yitschak Sefati et al. (Bethesda, MD: CDL Press, 2005), 127–37, compares the reality of Old Babylonian scribal schooling with the portrayal of scribal education in Sumerian literary texts. 5 Veldhuis, “Levels of Literacy,” 82–83, writes, “Most of what we know about scribal education in Mesopotamia clearly aims at scholarly literacy, involving the knowledge of an ancient language (Sumerian), including obsolete words and rare orthographies. This scholarly literacy was part of what one may call an elite cultural literacy that included knowledge of the literacy heritage of the time.” 6 Piotr Michalowski, “Review of Luigi Cagni, Briefe Aus Dem Iraq Museum. Altbabylonische Briefe 8 [Leiden 1980],” JCS 35 (1983): 226; idem, “Charisma and Control: On Continuity and Change in Early Mesopotamian Bureaucratic Systems,” in The Organization of Power: Aspects of Bureaucracy in the Ancient Near East, ed. M. Gibson and R.D. Biggs, SAOC 46 (Chicago: Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 1987), 63. Veldhuis, “Elementary Education at Nippur,” 81–83; Veldhuis, ibid., 82, “strongly disagree[s]” with earlier scholars who emphasized “the practical character of education …”; cf. Bendt Alster, “Sumerian Literary Dialogues and Debates and their Place in Ancient Near Eastern Literature,” in Living Waters: Scandinavian Orientalistic Studies: Presented to Professor Dr. Frede Løkkegaard on his Seventy-Fifth Birthday, January 27th 1990, ed. Egon Keck, Svend Søndergaard, and Ellen Wulff (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 1990), 11; Harmut Waetzoldt, “Keilschrift und Schulen in Mesopotamien und Ebla,” in Erziehungs- und Unterrichtsmethoden im historischen Wandel, ed. Lenz Kriss-Rettenbeck and Max Liedtke, SBSI 4 (Bad Heilbrunn: Verlag Julius Klinkhardt, 1986), 41; cf., summary in van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, 57–59. 7 Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 20, uses the adjective “enculturated” to describe scribes who are living embodiments and stewards of the traditions, institutions, and values of their respective cultures; cf. van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, 57–59; Veldhuis, “Levels of Literacy,” 82–85.

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This is not to say that all scribes were created equal.8 Scribal education in the ancient Near East was multi-tiered. Only a select few became scholars who studied and composed divinatory texts.9 And exceptional scribes occasionally arose and creatively reshaped the literary landscape.10 Yet schooled scribes— as a consequence of their education—were prepared, not just to make exact copies of traditional texts, but to contribute creatively to the composition and revision of such texts. For this reason, it is difficult to maintain a hard and fast division of labor between scribe (narrowly defined as copyist) and author/editor, as is typically 8

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Cf. Van Seters, “The Role of the Scribe in the Making of the Hebrew Bible,” 112–3. This is also not to say that literacy at its most basic levels belonged to the scribal elite alone; see: Claus Wilcke, Wer las und schrieb in Babylonien und Assyrien: Überlegungen zur Literalität im Alten Zweistromland: Vorgetragen in der Sitzung vom 4. Februar 2000 (München: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2000); Dominique Charpin, “Lire et écrire en Mésopotamie: une affaire de spécialistes?” CAIBL 148 (2004): 481–508; Idem, Reading and Writing in Babylon, 53–67. Helpful here are the distinctions made by Veldhuis, “Levels of Literacy,” between different levels of literacy: Veldhuis distinguishes (1) functional literacy useful for simple communication tasks such as letter writing; (2) technical literacy for specialized writing as found in omen compendia; and (3) scholarly literacy required for erudite study and interpretation of the cuneiform writing system itself. Individuals apparently acquired lower levels of literacy through informal education and apprenticeship. As noted, scholarly literacy was the goal of formal scribal schooling. The divining, scholarly scribes featured in this study, while the creators of “technical” divinatory literature, undoubtedly possessed a scholarly literacy. Their scholarly literacy is clearly visible in their creative manipulation of language as described in the following chapters. The distinction between technical and scholarly literacy is question by Abraham Winitzer, Early Mesopotamian Divination Literature, AMD 12 (Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2017), 13, n. 75. A. Leo Oppenheim, “The Position of the Intellectual in Mesopotamian Society,” Daedalus 104 (1975): 38–42, saw the scribal “scholar” as only one possible role that a scribe could have; the ummânū or at least the rab ummânū, for Oppenheim, were a distinct class of scribe; Laurie E. Pearce, “The Scribes and Scholars of Ancient Mesopotamia,” in CANE 4:2265–78, reserves the tile of ‘scholar’ for a few extraordinary scribes only; cf. Jean Bottéro, Mesopotamia: Writing, Reasoning, and the Gods, trans. Zainab Bahrani and Marc Van de Mieroop (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 291. Similarly, Carr, Written on the Tablet of the Heart, e.g. 36, uses the term “master scribe” to distinguish scribes with a higher level of training; in the Late Babylonian period aspirant scholars completed a second, more advanced educational phase; cf. Gesche, Schulunterricht in Babylonien im ersten Jahrtausend v. Chr., 150, 201–18. This possibility is reflected by the practice of attributing the traditional literary works to famous scribes of old: e.g., Gilgamesh to Sin-liqi-unninni and Etana to Lunanna; cf. Wilfred G. Lambert, “A Catalogue of Texts and Authors,” JCS 16 (1962): 67. The existence of such a literary genius in 7th or 6th century BCE Judea would explain the emergence of the hugely influential “Deuteronomistic movement” that irrevocably altered the literary, religious, and linguistic landscape of the people of Judah.

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assumed by much biblical scholarship.11 According to this modernist, romantic model of authorship, authors (or, editors) are the artistic geniuses responsible for creatively composing texts, whereas scribes are mere technicians, with a technical skill of writing but lacking in creative inspiration or academic interest.12 Currently, it is more fashionable to speak of editors (or redactors)13 of the books of the Hebrew Bible rather than of authors—though the former is often a mere cipher for the latter. In any case, the use of the term editor typically maintains the artificial boundary between those who creatively shape texts (authors/editors) and those who mechanically make copies (scribes). The standard division of biblical studies into the two subfields of “higher” and “lower” criticism reflects this artificial boundary. Granted our understanding of scribal education in the Near East, it would not be surprising to discover that an individual ancient Jewish scribe could work as a “copyist” in one moment and as an “editor”—or better, reviser—in the next. Likewise, we would not be astonished to learn that for ancient Jewish scribes the task of copying a text could also be an occasion for expansion and adaptation. When describing the formation of Jeremiah, scholars must move beyond traditional methodology that rigidly separates all scribal interventions into one of two categories: “literary” changes (the subject of redaction criticism) on the one hand and “textual variants” (the subject of textual criticism) on the other. The need for more nuanced methodology becomes increasingly apparent when we consider the nature of scribal education in greater detail. One dimension of scribal education in particular is especially consequential: in the course of their training, scribes were required to put great amounts of traditional material to memory.14 At each educational stage, the scribe acquired a larger repertoire of memorized tradition. In the end, a scribe could recite by heart 11 12 13 14

Van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and The Making of the Bible, 109, on this point writes, “The traditional distinction between authors, editors, and scribes is misleading because it obfuscates the fact that authorship and editorship were aspects of the scribal profession.” For rise and fall of the romantic view of authors in biblical scholarship see, van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and The Making of the Bible, 29–31. Van Seters has identified numerous problems with the way modern biblical scholars use the term “editor”; see especially, The Edited Bible: The Curious History of the “Editor” in Biblical Criticism (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006). Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 8–9, 21ff. See for example, Veldhuis, “Elementary Education at Nippur,” 26, 143–44; idem, “Continuity and Change in the Mesopotamian Lexical Tradition,” in Aspects of Genre and Type in Pre-Modern Literary Cultures, ed. Bert Roest and Herman L.J. Vanstiphout (Groningen: Styx, 1999), 109; Herman L.J. Vanstiphout, “Some Remarks on Cuneiform Écritures,” in Scripta Signa Vocis: Studies About Scripts, Scriptures, Scribes and Languages in the Near East Presented to J.H. Hospers by His Pupils, Colleagues and Friends, ed. Herman L.J. Vanstiphout (Groningen: Forsten, 1986), 225–6.

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everything from lengthy strings of words15 to traditional phrases and sayings to larger literary works and full-scale epics. Indeed, as H. Vanstiphout argues, “it is even probable, that quite a few scribes in the [Old Babylonian] period carried the whole of Classical Sumerian Literature if not in their heads, then at least in their broader awareness.”16 The prominent role of memorization and memory in scribal training impacted scribal practice and the character of written texts in two significant ways. First, the content of scribal memory—memorized bits and pieces of tradition—equipped scribes with textual building material with which they could construct literary works.17 Whether creating a fresh copy of an existing text or composing a new, original text, scribes drew upon a common trove of memorized traditional phrases, images, and themes.18 Consequently, texts transmitted and composed within a single scribal stream are traditioned: that is, interlinked by a complex web of (intended) allusions to and (unintended) echoes of their common tradition and specific texts within that tradition.19 When one examines the doublets of Jeremiah in chap. 5, it becomes apparent that Jewish scribes possessed their own treasury of traditional material from 15

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Veldhuis, “Elementary Education at Nippur,” 13; Veldhuis argues that surviving written exempla of archaic (third millennium BCE) Sumerian lexical lists are all excerpts from larger comprehensive lists that probably “primarily existed in the memories of those who had learned them by heart, and were, as such, rarely put into writing.” Vanstiphout, “Some Remarks on Cuneiform Écritures,” 226. On this note, Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 36, writes: “the shape of the educational system did not just teach the master scribe-author a set of cuneiform signs and rules of grammar. It also gave him (or occasionally her) a set of broader textual chunks, templates, and motifs. When a scribe reached a high level of mastery of the tradition, he could then use this memorized compositional lexicon to create new works.” To this list could be added traditional characters, plots, narratives, and genres; cf. van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, 21–22. Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 35–36, uses the language of “intertextuality” to describe the network of echoes and allusions found in texts of a common tradition: “the educational matrix encouraged a rich form of intertextuality in which earlier compositions were created partly out of a tissue of memorized quotations of earlier works.” At present the meaning of the term “intertextuality” is contested in biblical studies. For example, Russell L. Meek, “Intertextuality, Inner-Biblical Exegesis, and Inner-Biblical Allusion: The Ethics of a Methodology,” Bib 95 (2014): 280–91, reserves the term intertextuality for post-structuralist, reader-centered studies unconcerned with questions of authorial intent and diachrony. In contrast, Joachim J. Krause, “Aesthetics of Production and Aesthetics of Reception in Analyzing Intertextuality: Illustrated with Joshua 2,” Bib 95 (2015): 416–27, includes authored-intended allusion under the category of intertextuality. What Carr describes as “intertextuality” fits with neither definition. For two reviews of scholarship on intertextuality in Hebrew scripture, see: Geoffrey David Miller, “Intertextuality in Old Testament Research,” CurBS 9 (2011): 283–309; and Patricia Tull, “Intertextuality and the Hebrew Scriptures,” CurBS 8 (2000): 59–90.

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which they could construct duplicates. These duplicates contain both intraJeremianic traditioning and intra-scriptural traditioning. Here the term “traditioning” refers to the process of writing or rewriting a text in light of a scribal tradition through allusions to and echoes of that tradition.20 Intra-Jeremianic traditioning refers to the writing or rewriting of texts in Jeremiah in light of other texts in this same book. A consequence of such traditioning—perhaps intended—is the creation of a distinct Jeremianic tradition and Idiolekt.21 Similarly, intra-scriptural traditioning refers to the writing or rewriting of texts (in this case, texts found in Jeremiah) in light of the wider corpus of nascent Hebrew scripture. In the case of Jeremiah, intra-scriptural traditioning most frequently consists of allusions to or echoes of the Deuteronomistic History (DtrH) and Deuteronomy. Such intra-scriptural traditioning has the effect of creating out of disparate religious texts a single scriptural tradition. The abundance of both intra-Jeremianic and intra-scriptural traditioning in Jeremiah suggests that memorization was an important component of scribal education in Second Temple Judea. To recap, the memory-dependent nature of scribal education encouraged the production of traditioned texts, that is texts interlinked through frequent allusions to and echoes of a common scribal tradition. Second, the practice of writing from memory endows a written text with a distinct “oral” character. To understand why this would be the case, I must digress slightly and discuss the oral mentality of scribes and the dual (oral/ written) nature of texts in the ancient world. Although ancient scribes were literate, they inhabited a largely oral culture and—relying on their memory— approached their literary tasks with an oral mentality. In the previous century, it was common for scholars to draw a hard line between oral and literary texts and between oral cultures and literary cultures.22 It was once thought that with the introduction of literacy and written texts, oral culture would swiftly come to an end. More recent studies, however, have eroded the supposed hard line between oral and literary cultures.23 As literacy emerges among the scholarly 20 21 22

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Cf. the use of the terms “harmonization” and “coordination,” in David M. Carr, The Formation of the Hebrew Bible: A New Reconstruction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 90. See discussion in chap. 4 §4.4. Most notably, Albert B. Lord, The Singer of Tales (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1960); for a summary of Lord’s position, see: John Miles Foley, The Theory of Oral Composition: History and Methodology (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988); also consult discussion in Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 6–8. E.g., Susan Niditch, Oral World and Written Word: Ancient Israelite Literature (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1996); Robert C. Culley, “Orality and Writtenness in the Prophetic Texts,” in Writings and Speech in Israelite and Ancient Near Eastern Prophecy, ed. Ehud Ben Zvi and Michael H. Floyd, SBLSym 10 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000), 45–64.

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elite of an oral society, that society’s oral worldview does not immediately disappear; and so, scribes may operate with an oral mentality even when creating written texts. For the literate scribe (operating with an oral mentality and relying on memory), texts possessed a dual nature.24 This is to say that while texts existed physically as written documents inscribed on clay or scroll, this physical existence was in some ways secondary to text’s conceptual existence as a memorized and internalized oral (or mental) text.25 For instance, of certain Near Eastern texts, V. Hurowitz writes, “written and oral transmission existed side by side as supplementary media, equally necessary for perpetuating the same composition.”26 Hurowitz points to a sampling of literary texts that contain written instructions to keep the words of the text “in the mouth” and “in the ear.”27 In other words, a text’s written state served to perpetuate the text’s existence as a performed and memorized oral/mental text. Each written copy of a text can be understood as a different written performance of that text, whose primary oral/mental existence transcended its various written embodiments.28 As a mental text, the wording of the text—and even its structure—would not be fixed necessarily but would be subject to the limitations and open to the possibilities of memory. As actors memorize scripts in order to perform them, 24

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27 28

Cf. the language of “dual transmission” in Victor Hurowitz, “Spanning the Generations: Aspects of Oral and Written Transmission in the Bible and Ancient Mesopotamia,” in Freedom and Responsibility: Exploring the Challenges of Jewish Continuity, ed. Rela M. Geffen and Marsha B. Edelman (New York: KTAV, 1999). Such a dual nature is assumed by Carr’s terminology of “oral-written”; e.g., Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 13. Cf. van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, 11–13. On the relationship between written and oral texts in an oral culture, Niditch, Oral World and Written Word, 76–77, writes, “The written text provides a portion of tradition that becomes set, an icon, perhaps a sacred object that may be ritually studied sequentially or read in for special occasions, or copied when the old papyrus begins to succumb to age. The stories, the customs, the rituals, and the proverbs live, however, in the oral culture, in the lives and words of people.” Victor Hurowitz, “Spanning the Generations,” 12. Cf. discussion of Sumerian Liturgical texts in Paul Delnero, “Text and Performance: The Materiality and Function of the Sumerian Liturgical Corpus,” in Texts and Contexts: The Circulation and Transmission of Cuneiform Texts in Social Space, ed. Paul Delnero and Jacob Lauinger, SANER 9 (Boston: Walter de Gruyter, 2015) 87–118. Hurowitz, “Spanning the Generations,” 13–20. Following the lead of Robert Cully, among others, I use the language of perform and performance deliberately to draw an analogy from the theatrical and musical performances of scripts and songs: Robert C. Culley, “An Approach to the Problem of Oral Tradition,” VT 13 (1963): 113–25; idem, “Orality and Writtenness in the Prophetic Texts”; cf. Doane, “The Ethnography of Scribal Writing and Anglo-Saxon Poetry”; Person, “The Ancient Israelite Scribe as Performer.”

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so scribes memorized texts in order to copy them anew. While memorization helped guarantee the accuracy of new copies, memorization also opened up several creative opportunities that utilized scribal memory. In addition to promoting the creation of traditioned texts (described above), memorization invites the use of synonymous variation—variations in wording that have the same meaning.29 To expand upon an image used by D. Carr, as jazz musicians riff on traditional songs producing new melodies that echo the originals, so scribes could riff on traditional poetic verse or storyline creating a fresh literary expression of their memorized sources.30 When copying a text, scribes enjoyed a range of creative license depending on the occasion and the text in view.31 Sometimes—akin the careful and strict performance of classical music—scribes meticulously copied a text word for word. At other times, however, scribes felt at liberty to paraphrase, revise, or restructure a text. In chap. 5, I show that Jewish scribes had at their disposal the same range of creative options when composing Jeremiah’s doublets. Even when a scribe produced a copy of a given text through the direct consultation of a written exemplum, the scribe’s memorized mental text is still a factor.32 The mental text could 29

30 31

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Following Shemaryahu Talmon, “Synonymous Readings in the Textual Traditions of the Old Testament,” in Studies in the Bible: Edited on Behalf of the Institute of Jewish Studies in the Faculty of Humanities, ed. Chaim Rabin, ScrHier 8 (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1961), 335–83, the concept of synonymous variation (or synonymous readings) typically describes interchangeable variations in wording that were often preserved (from variant manuscripts) by scribes as double readings. Following the lead of Raymond Person, “The Ancient Israelite Scribe as Performer,” 604–5, I expand the term to refer to all variations in wording and order that do not change the meaning of the text at hand (i.e., that do not introduce, omit, or replace a reference to a concrete entity). For the connection between the oral mentality of scribes and the use of synonymity, see: Person, ibid.; Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 42; although Doane, “The Ethnography of Scribal Writing and Anglo-Saxon Poetry,” does not use the terminology of “synonymity” or “synonymous variant,” he describes occurrences of such phenomena in Anglo-Saxon poetry. Carr, The Formation of the Hebrew Bible, 17–18, describes synonymous variants as “memory variants.” Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 41. For a medieval parallel, consider the creative activity of Chaucerian scribes observed by Ralph Hanna III, Pursuing History: Middle English Manuscripts and Their Texts (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996), 160: “For although scribes typically produce predictable sorts of minor errors, they are also capable both of improving the texts they copy and of extensive rewriting of their exemplars. Such changes can occur for various reasons, ranging from simple incomprehension of the authorial lection all the way to a desire to join in the fun and write some poetry too.” On this point, Worthington, Principles of Akkadian Textual Criticism, 14–15, writes that knowing a text by memory could affect the transmission of a text in a few ways: “it might help the transmitter make sense of the external source [the written exemplum or person dictating], improving the accuracy of transmission; but it might also lead them to

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unconsciously cause interference with the written exemplum, even when a scribe’s aim was to produce a verbatim copy. In summary, as a consequence of the role of memorization in scribal education, texts copied and transmitted in the ancient Near East display varying amounts both synonymous variation as well as traditioning. As the reader will see, many of the doublets of Jeremiah display both features: traditioning (in this case, intra-Jeremianic and intra-scriptural traditioning) and synonymous variation—characteristics that suggest the text of these doublets was filtered through the duplicating scribe’s memory. Furthermore, they suggest the duplicating scribes underwent a scribal education similar in nature to that of Near Eastern scribes, a possibility explored further in chap 6. 2

The Scribal Scholar in Ancient Mesopotamia

This study focuses on a particular class of scribes, namely the scribal scholar, that is, high-ranking scribes who served as diviners in ancient Near Eastern courts.33 My thesis is that the duplicating scribes who expanded Jeremiah played an analogous role in ancient Judean society as these scribal scholars played in the Near East. In chap. 6, I will present a full argument for this thesis. My immediate task in this and the following section is to provide a description of the scribal scholar and the practice of textual divination. Assyriologists use the term “scribal scholar” to identify a class of educated professionals found in the ancient Near Eastern world who shared a common scholarly and divinatory function in their respective societies often working

33

misinterpret the external source; and they might, consciously or unconsciously, merge wording from the external source together with that which they remembered. This could account for instances of interference between passages which are far apart in a composition, and also for interference between compositions.” In the first millennium, scribal scholars traced their wisdom and scholarly traditions back to renowned ancient scholars (ummânū) (see the Catalogue of Texts and Authors, from the first quarter of the first millennium BCE, which ascribes Gilgamesh to Sin-liqi-unninni and Etana to Lunanna; cf. Lambert, “A Catalogue of Texts and Authors,” 67 VI.10–11) and to legendary sages (apkallū) from the mythic past (ibid., 67 VI.15–16; there, the legendary sage Adapa is credited with texts from before the flood.), and ultimately to divine revelation from the mouth of Ea (ša pî Ea), the god of wisdom (ibid., 72); cf. Erica Reiner, “The Etiological Myth of the Seven Sages,” Or 30 (1961): 1–11; a succinct overview is found in Parpola, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars, xvii–xix. Additionally, the art of divination itself was considered a gift from the gods; see: Wilfred G. Lambert, “Enmeduranki and Related Matters,” JCS 21 (1967): 132.

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on behalf of a king.34 These scholarly scribes served as the king’s spiritual guardians and moral advisors alongside a host of other diviners.35 It was their responsibility to keep the king abreast of any and all divine communication.36 34

A. Leo Oppenheim, “The Position of the Intellectual in Mesopotamian Society,” 1; Simo Parpola, Letters from Assyrian Scholars to the Kings Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal, 2 vols. (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1983), e.g., 2:xiii; idem, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars (Helsinki: Helsinki University Press, 1993), e.g., xiii; Laurie E. Pearce, “The Scribes and Scholars of Ancient Mesopotamia,” CANE 4:2274–6; Francesca Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing: Divination, Horoscopy, and Astronomy in Mesopotamian Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004). Cf. the category of “scholarly literacy” in Veldhuis, “Levels of Literacy,” though Veldhuis distinguishes this category from the “technical literacy” required for divination. The term “scribal scholar” is roughly comparable to the classification “diviner-scholar” used, for instance, in Abraham Winitzer, “Writing and Mesopotamian Divination: The Case of Alternative Interpretation,” JCS 63 (2011): e.g., 92; idem, “The Generative Paradigm in Old Babylonian Divination,” (Ph.D. diss. Harvard, 2006), e.g., 17. More recently, Winitzer, Early Mesopotamian Divination Literature, 12, prefers the term “diviner” by itself, explaining that scholastic aspect of divination is so central that what is needed is not a new term such as diviner-scholar, but an adjustment in “our perception of the work of diviners to include considerable literary activity.” For an overview of scribes as scholars, see van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, 54–63. With the word “scholar,” I do not intend to conceive of these scribes anachronistically as scholars in the modern sense of the word. Cf., in contrast, the anachronism of A. Leo Oppenheim, “Perspectives on Mesopotamian Divination,” in La divination en Mésopotamie ancienne et dans les régions voisines: XIV e Rencontre assyriologique internationale, Strasbourg, 2–6 juillet 1965. (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1966), 40. In order to create some conceptual distance between the modern scholar and the scholar of Mesopotamia (and Judea), I will intentionally refer to the latter as a scribal scholar. Like most terminology employed by historians to make sense of phenomena observed in the ancient world, the concept of the scribal scholar is a modern etic construction. There is no single Akkadian, Hebrew, or Aramaic word used in ancient texts that corresponds with the conception of the scribal scholar. For example, in the Neo-Assyrian period, the Akkadian word ummânu refers with some frequency to a class of scholarly diviners who advise the king; see, for example, Parpola, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars, xiii. Yet, this is not the only meaning of the word ummânu (cf., “ummânu,” CAD 20:108–15). Neither is this word the only term utilized in ancient texts to demarcate scholarly diviners in the royal court: other employed titles include: ṭupšarru “astrologer,” bārû “seer/haruspex,” āšipu “conjuror/exorcist,” asû “physician,” and kalû “lamentation chanter”; see: Parpola, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars, xiii. The presence or absence of a particular word in a given text is not as important as the role played by a given person within that text. The term “scribal scholar” identifies a variety of figures that perform a similar divinatory function in their respective societies regardless of the specific terminology used in ancient texts to describe these figures. 35 For what follows in this section, cf. van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, 60–61. 36 The gods conversed with the king—both revealing their will and warning of coming punishment for disobedience—through omens, dreams, oracles, and similar modes of divine

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To this end, such scholars occupied themselves with the observation, collection, and transcription of omens and oracles. Additionally, these scribes discovered new revelation through the practice of textual divination, a concept discussed below in detail. Their vocation can be summed up with the phrase maṣṣartu ša šarri naṣāru, “to keep the king’s watch,” a phrase recurring frequently in the letters of scribal scholars to the Neo-Assyrian throne.37 Scribal scholars were active in royal courts throughout the history of the ancient Near East.38 During the reigns of Neo-Assyrian kings Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal—reigns that are roughly contemporaneous with the period of “classic prophecy” in ancient Israel and not far removed from the advent of Hebrew literary prophecy—the institution of royal divination appears to have reached a new apex.39 Ashurbanipal alone employed no less than forty-five scholars who earned their keep as practitioners of divination for the crown.40 It would thus be unextraordinary if the Judean monarchy of the seventh century—itself an Assyrian vassal—had its own guild of scholarly scribes

37

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39 40

communication (including revelatory texts). For examples of such warnings and ritual responses, see: Simo Parpola, “Mesopotamian Astrology and Astronomy as Domains of the Mesopotamian ‘Wisdom’,” in Die Rolle der Astronomie in den Kulturen Mesopotamiens, ed. Hannes D. Galter, GMS 3 (Graz: Grazkult, 1993), 53–54; compare the warnings found in A. Leo Oppenheim, “A Babylonian Diviner’s Manual,” JNES 33 (1974): 197–220. The raw data of divine revelation had to be interpreted and their meaning expressed in understandable human language, a process that frequently involved putting such revelation into (human) writing. Here, the king was at the mercy of his scribes who could read, write, interpret, and transcribe divine communication in whatever form it happened to manifest. Parpola, “Mesopotamian Astrology and Astronomy,” 53, writes, “[The king] was not able to understand the ways of the gods or the language they spoke. It was only a handful of learned men trained to read the signals sent by the gods who could do this.” Famously, Ashurbanipal boasted of his education as a student of divination comparable to that of an ummânu; yet even he would not entrust divination to himself but relied heavily on his scholarly advisors. For a discussion of Ashurbanipal’s self-praise, see: van der Toorn, Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible, 54–55. Parpola, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars, xxi. In the Old Babylonian period, the diviner in the royal court was described as wāšib maḫar šarrim, “the one who sits in front of the king,” and as a mālikum, “an adviser.” For references to these phrases, see: Ulla Jeyes, Old Babylonian Extispicy: Omen Texts in the British Museum (Istanbul: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut te İstanbul, 1989), 23–24 and 27–28. For diviners in the Old Babylonian period, see: Jeyes, Old Babylonian Extispicy, 15–36; for Egyptian “sages” who played an analogous role in the pharaoh’s court, see: Ronald J. Williams, “The Sage in Egyptian Literature,” in The Sage in Israel and the Ancient Near East, ed. John G. Gammie and Leo G. Perdue (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1990), 25–29. One cannot, however, be completely sure on this point; the survival of plentiful evidence of scribal divination from this period may be simply due to fortune. Parpola, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars, xiv.

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practicing divination. This present monograph—exploring the formation of Jeremiah’s doublets—lends credence to this possibility. The vast amounts of resources invested in the enterprise of divination on behalf of the king were largely a consequence of the religious and political convictions of the ancient Near Eastern world. The king was understood to be the gods’ representative on earth.41 For things to go well in the state, so it was thought, it was imperative that the king faithfully execute the divine will and maintain harmony in the world. This imperative required that the king walk in step with the divine will, obeying the gods’ commandments and maintaining cultic purity. Should the king come into error, he would need to be alerted of his mistake and would have to follow specific measures to atone for his sins and thereby avoid divine punishment on himself and his land.42 With the textualization of divination, these religio-political convictions about kingship made the monarch dependent upon the skills of the divining scribal scholar. 3

Scribal Scholars and the Textualization of Divination

The emergence of the scribal scholar corresponds with what could be termed the textualization of divination, i.e., the development of divinatory texts and of a textual approach to divination.43 Ancient Mesopotamia knew numerous disciplines of divination, from extispicy to astrology. Each discipline required the specialized skills of a different class of diviner, though one figure could be trained in more than one discipline.44 Extispicy, for example, was the domain 41

42

43

44

See: ibid., xv–xvii; idem, Simo Parpola, “Mesopotamian Astrology and Astronomy,” 52–53. Peter Machinist, “Kingship and Divinity in Imperial Assyria,” in Text, Artifact, and Image: Revealing Ancient Israelite Religion, ed. Gary M. Beckman and Theodore J. Lewis, BJS 346 (Providence, RI: Brown Judaic Studies, 2006), 152–88. As suggested by Parpola, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars, xvii, see: Wilfred G. Lambert, “Dingir. s̆à. dib. ba Incantations,” JNES 33 (1974): 267–322, for examples of incantation used to appease the gods from the Late Assyrian and Late Babylonian periods. Cf. Winitzer, “Writing and Mesopotamian Divination,” 77; regarding the textualization of prophecy, see: Martti Nissinen, “Prophecy and Omen Divination: Two Sides of the Same Coin,” in Divination and Interpretation of Signs in the Ancient World, ed. Amar Annus, OIS 6 (Chicago: Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 2010), 344. Parpola, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars, xiii, mentions a letter (no. 160) listing the five scholarly disciplines (ṭupšarru “scribe/astrologer,” bārû “diviner,” āšipu “exorcist,” asû “physician,” and kalû “lamentation chanter”), noting that “the author [of letter no. 160] is careful to point out that many of the scholars, including himself, were proficient in more than one discipline, and that their ability was based on the study and mastery of an extensive technical lore.”

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of the bārû, and astrology the ṭupšarru. Over time, after the invention of writing, many of these disciplines developed a textual counterpart: the practice of extispicy was supplemented by the formation of textual records of extispicy which were subsequently arranged into literary collections. Astrology, in turn, saw the development of the highly literary Enūma Anu Enlil, an extensive compilation of astrological omens, empirical and theoretical. Importantly, these collections and compilations were themselves considered sources of divine revelation, worthy of study and interpretation. Just as diviners sought the divine will through the interpretation of the empirical world, so too could diviners discover this will through the exegesis of divinatory literature. This textual development of the practice of divination, i.e., the textualization of divination, necessitated the existence of a distinct category of diviner trained to read the writing of the gods not only in abnormal markings of animal livers or in the movements of stars, but also in textual records of such divine communication. In short, the textualization of divination required the emergence of the scribal scholar, a diviner trained to perform textual divination. 4

Ancient Near Eastern Divination

Before discussing textual divination in detail, it is important to define what I mean by divination in the ancient Near East.45 Divination can be defined in a variety of ways. Most broadly, divination refers to “… the art or practice of discovering the personal, human significance of future or, more commonly, present or past events.”46 When limiting one’s focus to divination in the ancient Near East, a narrower definition of divination is expedient. The forms of divination attested by ancient Near Eastern texts (including ancient Jewish texts) typically involve communication between specifically human persons and personal (or anthropomorphized) deities in the divine realm.47 45

46 47

Or, more specifically, what is meant by ancient Near Eastern divination as practiced and described by the educated elite; on this subject, Frederick H. Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel and Its Near Eastern Environment: A Socio-Historical Investigation, JSOTSup 142 (Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1994), 127, reminds us that “… we are perforce compelled to deal with written sources alone, which means in practice that we have information stemming from only the diviners themselves or from their correspondence with other literati….” Evan M. Zuesse, “Divination: An Overview,” ER 4:2369. Cf. the definition of divination found in Michael Loewe and Carmen Blacker, eds., Oracles and Divination (Boulder, CO: Shambhala Press, 1981), 1: “By divination we mean the attempt to elicit from some higher power or supernatural being the answers to questions beyond the range of ordinary human understanding.” For a description of divination in

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Most frequently, the goal of such communication was discerning the divine will, often in response to specific requests posed to the gods or a god.48 This study adopts the helpful definition provided by E. Hamori: the term divination refers to “… any type of action culturally understood to allow acquisition of knowledge otherwise restricted to the divine realm.”49 There are three indicators of divination: (1) an intent to acquire such restricted divine knowledge, (2) an act of interpretation (involving either “technical skill” or “divine inspiration”), or (3) the special status of a diviner, a status acquired through “training” or “divine call.”50 Hamori is quick to clarify that while these indicator are helpful in determining occasions of divination, they are not a “hard-and-fast list of requirements.”51 She explains, “Ancient authors did not define divination, were not restricted to categorizing each act as either divinatory or not divinatory, and differed in their portrayals of such activity.”52 Still, Hamori’s indicators of divination greatly assist in explaining how disparate phenomena recognized by modern scholars as divination in the ancient Near East hold together. Note that by this definition, prophecy is to be counted as a form of divination. In some quarters of biblical scholarship, however, it is common to think of prophecy as something distinct and even superior to divination rather than as a subset of the latter. There are two main reasons for this dichotomy.53 First,

48

49 50 51 52 53

the ancient Near East, see Oliver R. Gurney, “The Babylonians and Hittites,” in Oracles and Divination, ed. Michael Loewe and Carmen Blacker (Boulder, CO: Shambhala Press, 1981), 142–73; Walter Farber, “Witchcraft, Magic, and Divination in Ancient Mesopotamia,” CANE 3:1895–1909; and Erica Reiner, Astral Magic in Babylonia, TAPS 85.4 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1995), 61–80. For a description of divination in ancient Israel, see: J. Roy Porter, “Ancient Israel,” in Oracles and Divination, ed. Michael Loewe and Carmen Blacker (Boulder, Co: Shambhala Press, 1981), 191–214; and, Jean-Michel de Tarragon, “Witchcraft, Magic, and Divination in Canaan and Ancient Israel,” CANE 3:2071–81. For the purpose of divination in the ancient Near Eastern royal court, see §2 above, and: Oppenheim, Ancient Mesopotamia, 206–77; Beate Pongratz-Leisten, Herrschaftswissen in Mesopotamien: Formen der Kommunikation zwischen Gott und König in 2. und 1. Jahrtausend v. Chr, SAAS 10 (Helsinki: The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, 1999); Martti Nissinen, “Comparing Prophetic Sources: Principles and a Test Case,” in Prophecy and Prophets in Ancient Israel: Proceedings of the Oxford Old Testament Seminar, ed. John Day, LHBOTS 531 (London: T & T Clark, 2010), 15–16. Esther J. Hamori, Women’s Divination in Biblical Literature, AYBRL (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2015), 4. Ibid., 5. Ibid., 6. Ibid. A third reason might be a persistent modernist bias against divination; see, for example, the discussion of magic (a larger umbrella term which includes divination) in Cryer,

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more than a century ago, biblical scholars, following the social sciences, began overzealously and uncritically interpreting historical data through an evolutionary schema, viewing prophecy—and especially ‘biblical’ prophecy—as a higher, more evolved form of religion than divination. Diviners and their byzantine divinatory rites are artifacts of primitive and superstitious religion. Prophecy, by contrast, is a pure, direct channel to God. Second, this modernist dichotomy dovetails neatly with a dominant perspective of the Hebrew Bible which distinguishes divination from prophecy. Divination is what foreigners and Canaanites do, and thus is to be avoided. Prophecy is the only licit and orthodox way to hear from God.54 However, many scholars today—suspicious of evolutionary models of religious development and desiring a neutral posture towards biblical perspectives—subsume prophecy under the larger umbrella category of divination.55 Classifying prophecy as a form of divination pays dividends; it invites the expectation that prophecy—like the other forms of divination—developed a textual counterpart. Textual prophecy—that is, a textually focused, textually expressed scribal enterprise—existed alongside “conventional” oracular prophecy. The textualization of prophecy is first seen with the writing down, compilation and arrangement of prophetic oracles. As demonstrated in the following chapters, these three operations are not neutral but shape and even

54

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Divination in Ancient Israel and Its Near Eastern Environment, 43–51; cf. Bottéro, Mesopotamia, 126. On this subject see, Hans M. Barstad, “No Prophets: Recent Developments in Biblical Prophetic Research and Ancient Near Eastern Prophecy,” JSOT 57 (1993): 47–48; Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel and Its Near Eastern Environment, 232–41; Rannfrid I. Thelle, Ask God: Divine Consultation in the Literature of the Hebrew Bible, BBET 30 (New York: Peter Lang, 2002), 16–27. For early arguments in favor of understanding prophecy as a form of divination, see: Maria deJong Ellis, “Observations on Mesopotamian Oracles and Prophetic Texts: Literary and Historiographic Considerations.” JCS 41 (1989): 127–86; Thomas W. Overholt, Channels of Prophecy: The Social Dynamics of Prophetic Activity (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress, 1989), 140–47; Lester L. Grabbe, Priests, Prophets, Diviners, Sages: A Socio-Historical Study of Religious Specialists in Ancient Israel (Valley Forge, PA: Trinity Press International, 1995): 139–41, 150–51; cf. also Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel and Its Near Eastern Environment, 243–50; James C. VanderKam, “Prophecy and Apocalyptics in the Ancient Near East,” CANE 3:2083; Eva Cancik-Kirschbaum, “Prophetismus und Divination: Ein Blick auf die keilschriftlichen Quellen,” in Propheten in Mari, Assyrien und Israel, FRLANT 201 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2003), 33–53; Martti Nissinen, “What is Prophecy? An Ancient Near Eastern Perspective,” in Inspired Speech: Prophecy in the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of Herbert B. Huffmon, ed. John Kaltner and Louis Stulman, JSOTSup 378 (London: T & T Clark, 2004), 21; ibid., “Comparing Prophetic Sources,” 15–18. Jonathan Stökl, Prophecy in the Ancient Near East: A Philological and Sociological Comparison, CHANE 56 (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 7–11.

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determine the interpretation of the given oracles. For example, disparate oracles presented alongside each other in a single text are naturally read in light of each other through what could be called “vertical reading.”56 Scribes, recognizing this possibility, strategically arranged the oracles of a given compilation to control the meaning of those oracles. To anticipate one example considered in the next chapter, Neo-Assyrian scribes arranged oracles chronologically to tell a narrative supporting the kingship of Ashurbanipal. Similarly, in the book of Jeremiah, scribes skillfully placed duplicated oracles in contexts where their words would clarify and interpret those contexts. The textualization of prophecy at times developed further. In the case of ancient Israel, collections of oracles were expanded and revised with the addition of various literary content: prose narratives, poetry, complaints, and the like. These literary additions are formally distinct from orally composed oracles, such as those recorded in the Mari letters and Neo-Assyrian oracle collections (analyzed in the next chapter). They originate from the stylus of the scribe, not the mouth of the prophet. Yet, modern scholars should not be too quick to dismiss such literary content as insignificant for understanding the practice of divination, let alone as inferior to the prophets’ ipsissima verba. With the textualization of divination—prophecy included—the literary features of divinatory texts are potentially divinatory in nature. Scribal poetry found embedded alongside an “original” oracle of Jeremiah, for example, may carry the same divinatory gravity as the oracle. Both are scribal creations. From the original writing down of prophetic oracles to the final revisions of a sophisticated biblical prophetic book, scribes worked as textual diviners, reinterpreting existing revelation and discovering fresh divine words through textual divination. To restate the central implication, even literary features are potentially divinatory in nature. I surmise that resistance to this implication stems in part from three false dichotomies rampant in biblical studies. First, as addressed in the preceding pages, many still operate with a rigid distinction between authors—who, when stirred by some muse or deity, compose inspired texts—and scribes who mechanically make copies. By extension, prophets—and not scribes—are the loci of inspiration. For biblical books like Jeremiah, what matters is uncovering the original words of the prophet; scribal additions are but dross. Once the concepts of authorship and inspiration are unmoored from the romantic, modernist notion of authors, however, all ancient scribal activity becomes intrinsically valuable, worthy of historical investigation and theological reflection. 56

See chap. 3, §1.

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Second, many contemporary scholars in their analysis of history assume a modernist dichotomy between the sacred and the secular. Ritual, divination, prayer: these things are sacred. Transcription, compilation, organization: these are secular tasks. For the ancient world, however, such a distinction did not exist. Transcription, compilation, and organization can all be tools of textual divination. Even seemly innocuous “editing” of divinatory texts should not be immediately dismissed as lacking divinatory import. Third, prophecy is frequently distinguished from forms of divination which involve the technical skills of a scribal scholar. In Assyriology, scholars commonly divide ancient Near Eastern divination into two major types: inductive (or “technical”/ “mechanical”) and non-inductive.57 This bifurcation, in part, serves to distinguish forms of divination that do and do not necessitate the technical skills of a learned scribal scholar. The first, inductive divination, such as extispicy58 or astrology,59 requires the skills of an experienced scribal scholar trained to read divine writing wherever it is inscribed, for instance, on the liver of a sheep, in the night sky, or in a written record of divine revelation. 57

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Martti Nissinen, References to Prophecy in Neo-Assyrian Sources, SAAS 7 (Helsinki: NeoAssyrian Text Corpus Project, 1998), 6. Jean Bottéro, Mesopotamia, 106, 125–6, prefers the terms “deductive” and “inspired” divination for the same bifurcation. Reiner, Astral Magic in Babylonia, 61–63, utilizes the terms “provoked” and “unprovoked” for a similar distinction. With his broader definition of divination, Zuesse, “Divination,” 4:2370, divides divination into three types: “intuitive divination,” “wisdom divination,” and “possession divination,” with the second corresponding more or less with “inductive” divination— that is involving learned technical skills—and the first and third roughly approximating the non-inductive type. Noted by Gurney, “The Babylonians and Hittites,” 142, as early as the Roman period, ancient authors distinguished types of divination along lines similar to the modern inductive/non-inductive dichotomy: cf., for instance, Cicero, Div. 1.71–72, for the use of the terms divinatio naturalis (“natural divination,” i.e., inspired by revelation or possession) and divinatio artificiosa (“artificial divination” deduced through the interpretation of signs). For a summary of how divination has been classified through western history, see Thérèse Charmasson, “Divinatory Arts,” in Dictionary of Gnosis & Western Esotericism, ed. Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 313–5. For a summary of the history of modern scholarship on ancient Near Eastern divination, see Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel and Its Near Eastern Environment, 127–38. For an overview of extispicy, see Stefan M. Maul, Die Wahrsagekunst im Alten Orient: Zeichen des Himmels und der Erde, HBGHS (München: Beck, 2013), esp. 29–129; cf. Ivan Starr, The Rituals of the Diviner, BM 12 (Malibu: Undena Publications, 1983), esp. 1–23; Ulla Jeyes, “The ‘Palace Gate’ of the Liver: A Study of Terminology and Methods in Babylonian Extispicy,” JCS 30 (1978): 209–33; ibid., Old Babylonian Extispicy; for a short summary, see: Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel and Its Near Eastern Environment, 168–80. For recent studies on ancient Near Eastern astrology, see: David Brown, Mesopotamian Planetary Astronomy-Astrology, CM 18 (Groningen: Styx, 2000); Rochberg, The Heavenly Writing; cf., also: Reiner, Astral Magic in Babylonia.

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The second, non-inductive divination—sometimes referred to as “intuitive”/ “inspired” divination—includes forms of divination, such as prophecy and oneiromancy,60 which do not necessarily require the expertise of a scribal scholar but simply the availability of an intermediary such as a prophet. There are various shortcomings of this model.61 The term “inductive” could suggest that this form of divination is always “induced,” that is, intentionally brought about or solicited through the manipulation of something in the natural world. While this might be the case with forms such as extispicy or lecanomancy,62 astrology—which can be classified as inductive63—may respond to unsolicited omens observed in the heavens. Conversely, forms of non-inductive divination can be solicited, as when a king requests an oracle from a prophet.64 Another problem speaks directly to the question of the involvement of scribal scholars in the practice of divination. While it is the case that forms of non-inductive divination are frequently practiced by intermediaries that do not necessarily have the formal training of scribal scholars, such scribal scholars often play a significant, even determinative role in non-inductive divination filtering, interpreting, and transcribing the raw data of non-inductive divinatory experience. With oneiromancy, this is clearly the case; dreams, with great frequency, require the interpretation of skilled diviners.65 One has only to consider the extensive compendia of dream oracles which offered scholarly 60

61 62

63

64 65

For resent studies on oneiromancy, see: Scott B. Noegel, Nocturnal Ciphers: The Allusive Language of Dreams in the Ancient Near East, AOS 89 (New Haven: American Oriental Society, 2007); cf. also: Bottéro, Mesopotamia, 105–24; Jack M. Sasson, “Mari Dreams,” JAOS 103 (1983): 283–93; A. Leo Oppenheim, The Interpretation of Dreams in the Ancient Near East: With a Translation of an Assyrian Dream-Book, TAPS 46.3 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1956). See: Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel and Its Near Eastern Environment, 141–2; and, Anne Marie Kitz, “Prophecy as Divination,” CBQ 65 (2003): 23–24. Giovanni Pettinato, “Zur Überlieferungsgeschichte der aB-Ölomentexte und einige Erwägungen zur Stellung der Ölwahrsagung in der Religionsgeschichte,” in La divination en Mésopotamie ancienne et dans les régions voisines: XIV e Rencontre assyriologique internationale, Strasbourg, 2–6 juillet 1965 (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1966), 95–107. E.g., Nissinen, References to Prophecy, 6. Bottéro, Mesopotamia, 125–6, perhaps manages to avoid this problem through employing the label “deductive” instead of “inductive:” thus, while astrological phenomena are not (necessarily) induced, accessing the meaning of such phenomena does requires technical expertise, i.e. deduction. To offer an example, prophetic oracles are frequently solicited by kings such as Zimri-Lim in the Mari Letters. In Hebrew scripture, king also solicit oracles: e.g., 2 Kgs 19:1–4 (= Isa 37:1–4); Jer 21:1–2. Bottéro, Mesopotamia, 113–6. Note the category of “symbolic dream” in Oppenheim, The Interpretation of Dreams in the Ancient Near East, 206–17, which marks dreams that require the technical skills of a scribal scholar.

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guidelines for dream interpretation.66 Moreover as I will show in the following chapters, the interpretation of prophetic oracles also fell to the scribal scholar.67 5

Textual Divination

Given the focus of this study, one manifestation of divination must be further expounded: textual divination. In order to understand the phenomenon of textual divination, it may be useful to rehearse its origins. Mentioned briefly above, with development of writing, scribes eventually began recording empirically observed or experienced omens, prophetic oracles included. The decision to put revelation down into writing was probably multifaceted.68 Writing plays an obvious role as an aid to memorization. Also, through writing one could more easily transmit divination results across geographical distances— for example from a prophet in one town to a king in another69—as well as over temporal distances; i.e., omens were preserved in writing for future reference.70 66 67 68

69

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Oppenheim, ibid.; cf. the dream interpretation of Joseph (Gen 40:8–19; 41:1–32) and of Daniel (Dan 2:1–45; 4:2–24 [4:5–27 Eng.]) in Hebrew scripture. For significant overlapping of prophecy and scribal arts in the biblical book of Habakkuk, see: Michael H. Floyd, “Prophecy and Writing in Habakkuk 2,1–5,” ZAW 105 (1994): 470–8. For reasons why prophetic oracles were inscribed, see Karel van der Toorn, “From the Mouth of the Prophet: The Literary Fixation of Jeremiah’s Prophecies in the Context of the Ancient Near East,” in Inspired Speech: Prophecy in the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of Herbert B. Huffmon, ed. John Kaltner and Louis Stulman, JSOTSup 378 (London: T & T Clark, 2004), 191–202. Some evidence of divination in the ancient Near East comes from letters written by scholars or deputies reporting the results of divination to their respective kings. For instance, the Mari letters contain many transcriptions of prophetic oracles addressed to King Zimri-Lim, who was not present to witness the original divinatory experience. These Mari letters are collected in Martti Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, ed. Peter Machinist, SBLWAW 12 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003). From the Neo-Assyrian period, Parpola, Letters from Assyrian Scholars to the Kings Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal, has collected numerous letters from scribal scholars to kings Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal, which report divination results; see further: Parpola, Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. For existence of both disposable and library-quality copies of oracles in Nineveh, see: Karen Radner, “The Relation between Format and Content of Neo-Assyrian Texts,” in Nineveh, 612 BC: The Glory and Fall of the Assyrian Empire, ed. Raija Mattila, NATCP (Helsinki: Helsinki University Press, 1995), 63–77; Simo Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies, SAAS 9 (Helsinki: Helsinki University Press, 1997), 1; Martti 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. Ehud Ben Zvi and Michael H. Floyd, SBLSym 10 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000), 247–8.

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If given omens proved to be accurate, as in the case of “fulfilled” prophecy, their textual preservation would become all the more pertinent. As confirmed divine revelation, such written results could be mined for further revelation in light of new and hypothetical situations.71 Lastly, omens were put to writing specifically because both the initial act of transcription and the written state of an omen following transcription were avenues of divination. Transcription provided an occasion for fixing the omen’s words and graphemes and thus its interpretation; and once transcribed, omens were open to the hermeneutical possibilities inherent in the mechanics of reading and writing. In short, transcription allowed scribes to continue the divinatory enterprise by means of textual divination.72 To return to the definition provided above: textual divination is a textually focused and textually expressed form of divination. I will explain both descriptors. With the advent of textual divination, the focus of divinatory arts shifted to include not only the observation and interpretation of new empirical omens but also the study and interpretation of written collections of previously recorded divine revelation. Through sophisticated hermeneutical techniques, scribes discovered or generated new revelation out of these existing records. Thus, divination acquired a textual focus. New revelation, discovered or generated out of the earlier records, was then folded into existing records often becoming an indistinguishable constituent of that tradition. Thus, such divination was expressed textually. In this way, extensive omen compendia, collections of prophetic oracles, and eventually even the prophetic books of the Hebrew Bible came into existence. With the nascence of textual divination 71

In the Neo-Assyrian period, one sees examples of scribal scholars applying time-tested prophetic oracles to new situations; see: Nissinen, “Spoken, Written, Quoted, and Invented,” 262–3. On this subject, Robert R. Wilson, “Current Issues in the Study of Old Testament Prophecy,” in Inspired Speech: Prophecy in the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of Herbert B. Huffmon, ed. John Kaltner and Louis Stulman, JSOTSup 378 (New York: T & T Clark, 2004), 43, writes that the “fulfillment” of prophetic oracles would demonstrate “that they were truly of divine origin, and they were therefore thought to be an endless reservoir of revelation.” 72 See, Winitzer, “Writing and Mesopotamian Divination”; Ann K. Guinan, “A Severed Head Laughed: Stories of Divinatory Interpretation,” in Magic and Divination in the Ancient World, ed. Leda Jean Ciraolo and Jonathan Lee Seidel, AMD 2 (Leiden: Brill, 2002), 9, writes: “Once the systematic recording of omens began, divination became a complex, literate discipline … scribes … not only recopied, but also revised, edited, and systematically expanded the texts they inherited.” For an overview of the development of omen collections on the basis of textual divination, see: Amar Annus, “On the Beginnings and Continuities of Omen Sciences in the Ancient World,” in Divination and Interpretation of Signs in the Ancient World, ed. Amar Annus, OIS 6, (Chicago: Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 2010), 1–18.

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came the need for a new class of professional diviner—conversant in the literary traditions of divination and skilled in the art of hermeneutics and the science of writing. It required the expertise of the scribal scholar. In the following chapter, I will analyze a sampling of examples of textual divination from the ancient Near East, namely, examples from the Old Babylonian omen compendia, oracle-reporting letters from Mari, and oracles collections from the Assyrian State Archives. These analyses will flesh out the profile of scribal scholars (and other divining scribes) and their practice of textual divination. This fuller profile of divining scribes and their practice will set the stage for my discussion of Jeremiah’s doublets in chap. 5.

chapter 3

Examples of Textual Divination in Ancient Near Eastern Texts In the previous chapter, I defined the terms scribal scholar and textual divination and situated these terms within the larger contexts of ancient Near Eastern scribal education and divination. In this chapter I discuss and classify examples of textual divination from the ancient Near East. Doing so will prepare my readers to detect and appreciate the presence of similar modes of textual divination preserved in the manuscripts of Jeremiah. The examples of textual divination featured in this chapter come from three major corpora of divinatory literature from the ancient Near East: (1) the Old Babylonian omen compendia, (2) the written records of prophecy found in the letters of Mari (18th century BCE), and (3) the oracle collections from the Assyrian State Archives of Nineveh (7th century BCE). There are good reasons for considering examples from these three corpora. The first—omen compendia—represents the vast majority of extant divinatory texts from Mesopotamia; omen compendia originated in the Old Babylonian period and continued to develop through the Neo-Assyrian period surviving as late as the Seleucid period. The pervasiveness and longevity of omen compendia make this divinatory tradition essential subject matter for any discussion of textual divination. In spite of the temporal distance between these compendia and Hebrew prophetic literature—not to mention the substantial generic differences between them—the techniques of textual divination evinced by these compendia are illuminative of what one encounters in the Jeremiah scroll.1 As to the second and third corpora of divinatory literature—records of prophecy from Mari and Neo-Assyria—these are essential to my argument: they represent close Near Eastern literary parallels to Hebrew prophetic literature.2 While the latter is clearly much more developed than the former, it 1 While the Old Babylonian omen compendia are significantly older than biblical prophetic texts, the first-millennium Standard Babylonian compendia are no older than Jeremiah. 2 Here one must exercise caution since Hebrew prophetic literature, the oracle-reporting Mari letters, and oracle collections are formally distinct. Moreover, these corpora originate from worlds that are significantly different from each other in terms of time period, geography, and culture. Throughout this study, I attempt to keep these differences in mind. One could also mention the Balaam Text from Deir ʿAlla, which in combining oracles with narrative is perhaps an even closer Near Eastern parallel to the biblical prophetic Book.

© Justus Theodore Ghormley, 2022 | doi:10.1163/97890

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is highly likely that the latter evolved out of quotidian records of oracles—such as those found in the Mari letters—and early compilations of oracles—like those preserved in Nineveh.3 For this reason, techniques of textual divination detected in these two collections potentially anticipate the techniques of textual divination that contributed to the growth of biblical texts like Jeremiah. Since the omen compendium, the letter (from Mari), and the oracle collection are all distinct genres with different functions, it would not be surprising to find that each displays its own techniques of textual divination, thus making direct comparison of techniques across these texts more difficult. This qualification, however, should not bar one from attempting to uncover commonalities of these disparate techniques and thereafter proposing larger umbrella categories of textual divination useful for comparative purposes. Based on my analysis, the various techniques of textual divination in ancient Near Eastern texts may be grouped together into two umbrella categories or modes of divination that facilitate comparison: (1) literary generation and (2) secondary application. 1

Literary Generation

The first mode, literary generation, identifies the scholarly creation or discovery of new revelation that results when existing revelatory data are placed in a (new) literary context, i.e., when scribal scholars either transcribe revelation into written form for the first time (transcription) or introduce alreadytranscribed revelation into a secondary literary context (re-contextualization). In either case, the new context generates fresh revelation in two ways: (1) the new context shapes and even determines the meaning of the revelatory data. Unfortunately, there is not space to discuss the Balaam Text in this study. For a translation of the Balaam Text, see: Baruch A. Levine, “The Deir ʿAlla Plaster Inscriptions,” in The Context of Scripture: Monumental Inscriptions from the Biblical World, Vol. 2, ed. William W. Hallo (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 140–5; for an earlier translation, see: Jacob Hoftijzer, Gerrit van der Kooij, and Hendricus J. Franken, Aramaic Texts from Deir ʿAlla, DMOA 19 (Leiden: Brill, 1976); and for further discussion, see: Baruch A. Levine, “The Balaam Inscriptions from Deir ʿAlla / ‫עלא‬-‫כחובות בלעם מדיר‬,” Qad 110 (1995): 90–96; the chapters found in Jacob Hoftijzer and Gerrit van der Kooij, eds., The Balaam Text from Deir ʿAlla Re-Evaluated: Proceedings of the International Symposium Held at Leiden, 21–24 August 1989 (Leiden: Brill, 1991); and, Jo Ann Hackett, The Balaam Text from Deir ʿAllā, HSM 31 (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1980). 3 Cf. Matthijs J. de Jong, Isaiah Among the Ancient Near Eastern Prophets: A Comparative Study of the Earliest Stages of the Isaiah Tradition and the Neo-Assyrian Prophecies, VTSup 117 (Leiden: Brill, 2007), for a reconstruction of the original layers of the Isaiah tradition on the basis of a comparison with the Neo-Assyrian oracles.

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For example, when placed into larger collections, omens (including oracles) are subjected to vertical reading—i.e., each omen is read in light of the other omens of the collection. Details from one omen are assumed by the reader/ hearer to apply to the others. New revelation is thus generated as originally distinct omens are experienced as a unified text with a composite meaning that is greater than the meaning of each omen on its own. Related to vertical reading is the more active practice of intra-textual harmonization. With intra-textual harmonization, scribes rewrite one (or more) omen(s) in light of another found in the same collection. Intra-textual harmonization is conceptually related to vertical reading. With vertical reading two or more omens are already—to a certain extent—tacitly harmonized with each other as these omens are read in light of each other. Actual intra-textual harmonization takes this consequence and intensifies it, making it explicit. It is not uncommon for scribal scholars to utilize both intra-textual harmonization and vertical reading in the same text. Both practices generate new, composite meaning out of once separate revelation. Examples of both practices are discussed in this chapter below and in the chapter on Jeremiah’s doublets (chap. 5). Introducing revelatory data into a new literary context may generate revelation in a second way: (2) new revelation is created as existing revelation is modified and expanded to fit the generic expectations of the new context. Stated differently, the literary form places demands upon the revelatory data being introduced; if the data cannot meet these demands in its present state, the data must be modified and amended accordingly. Imagine, for example, how someone today might convert a short essay into a letter: to be recognizable as a letter, the essay would need at minimum a salutation and signature. In the same way, omens converted to omen compendia (e.g., the Old Babylonian omen compendia) or to letters (e.g., the Mari Letters) are squeezed into the mold of the conventions of the given literary genre. Anything that does not fit the mold would be trimmed. Any gaps left over would need filling; the scribe would be obligated to create whatever was missing. To put it another way, the literary form fixes but also generates new revelation, compelling the scribe to fill any lacuna. Examples are of such gap-filling are discussed below. To recap, textual divination of various forms and origins utilizes the technique of literary generation, a mode of divination whereby new meaning is generated by the possibilities and conventions of the given literary form through which the revelatory data is expressed. Neither transcription nor re-contextualization are neutral; they are acts of interpretation and tools of textual divination which generate fresh revelation. Furthermore, scribes were not oblivious to the consequences of transcription and re-contextualization.

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As the exampled discussed below and in chap. 5 (on Jeremiah’s doublets) illustrate, scribes made intentional use of both to create new divinatory meaning. 2

Secondary Application

The second umbrella category or mode of textual divination, secondary application, refers to the creation or discovery of a secondary (or additional) interpretation of an omen that is an extension of the first (or previous) interpretation(s) of that omen.4 Omens—whether they be cryptic prophetic utterances or astronomical wonders—must be decoded, distilled into a digestible message. That digestible message then, in turn, can become a source for divinatory reflection that spawns additional, secondary messages. Not all such secondary messages or interpretations are secondary applications. Secondary interpretations do not all arise for the same reason.5 A secondary interpretation could originate empirically: an omen could occur twice, with each occurrence corresponding to a different phenomenon; or a single omen may correlate with multiple phenomena. Alternatively, a secondary interpretation may be derived from a textual variant. Or as is the case with literary generation, a second interpretation may be the product of generic pressures: the given literary form may require, for example, interpretations to come in pairs (see the discussion of gradation paradigms below). One interpretation would thus necessitate a second. Lastly, secondary interpretations may arise from ancient scholarship: scribal scholars created secondary interpretations through extrapolation on the basis of hermeneutical principles. Such principles allow the initial interpretation to be reapplied. Thus, the secondary interpretation is derived from the first. This final grouping of secondary interpretations is what I am describing as secondary applications. To put it concisely, when a secondary interpretation is derived from a primary interpretation, one can say the former is a secondary application of the latter. Secondary application reflects the hermeneutical assumption that a true interpretation of revelation is itself revelatory and can be mined for further meaning. The particular wording or formulation of the initial interpretation may invite or even imply a secondary and analogous interpretation perceived 4 Occasions of secondary reapplication may in some instances coincide with moments of literary generation. Whereas literary generation always involves placing revelatory data into a new literary context, secondary reapplication may involve only the expansion of a given omen within the omen’s original literary context. 5 See discussion in Abraham Winitzer, “Writing and Mesopotamian Divination: The Case of Alternative Interpretation,” JCS 63 (2011), 77–94, esp. summary: 92–93.

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to be nested within the original. The principles guiding the extrapolation of secondary application are often discernable.6 In the examples consider in this chapter and the chapter on Jeremiah’s doublets (chap. 5), I offer descriptions of the principles likely lying behind the given scribe’s impulse to formulate a secondary application. With these two umbrella categories of textual divination in mind, I will now present specific examples of textual divination from the ancient Near East that illustrate these umbrella categories. These examples anticipate the kinds of textual divination that one encounters in the book of Jeremiah. 3

Textual Divination in Omen Compendia

Omen compendia offer plentiful examples of both literary generation and secondary application. In fact, the vast majority of entries found in the compendia are explainable as products these two modes of divination: this is to say, the lion’s share of recorded omens has no empirical basis but is a creation of scribal scholarship and the fruit of textual divination.7 I discuss examples of both modes of divination in the following sections. 3.1 Secondary Application of Omen Apodoses In the compendia, each omen consists of a textual representation of a revelatory sign (the protasis) and an interpretation of that sign (the apodosis). Ancient scholars considered both the textual representation of a sign and the interpretation of that sign to be revelatory. A given apodosis could inspire a secondary apodosis. In the process of transmitting omen compendia, scribal scholars frequently inserted such secondary apodoses alongside existing protasis-apodosis pairs. These secondary apodoses were derived from the primary apodoses on the basis of hermeneutical principles. An illuminative example is the principle of pars familiaris/pars hostilis: an omen thought to be favorable for oneself could be reapplied secondarily to predict disfavor on one’s enemies, and vice versa: an unfavorable omen secondarily meant favor for the enemy. In the same vein, from an unfavorable omen for one’s enemy, 6 For a discussion of the hermeneutical principles that guided the discovery of secondary meaning of already-interpreted omens, see: Jean Bottéro, “Symptômes, signes, écritures, en Mésopotamie ancienne,” in Divination et rationalité, ed. Jean P. Vernant, SO 2 (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1974), 179–83; Abraham Winitzer, Early Mesopotamian Divination Literature, AMD 12 (Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2017), 28–150. 7 Ibid., 9–16.

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a scribe could extrapolate favor for oneself; and from a favorable omen for an enemy, disfavor for oneself. The following omen illustrates this principle: You will consume the harvest of your enemy; its second interpretation: the harvest of the land will thrive. TIM 9 80:38

The phrase “its second interpretation” (šanû šumšu) used in this omen is a technical term marking a secondary interpretation. The secondary interpretation that follows this term—a positive omen foretelling a successful harvest—is derived out of the first, a negative message regarding the enemy’s harvest.9 The logic of pars familiaris/pars hostilis produces the secondary interpretation: a pronouncement of misfortune on the enemy’s harvest implies its antithesis, namely, the abundance of one’s own harvest. Another common principle allows the scribe to extrapolate a secondary application on the basis of an established metaphor. Consider the following example: [If a Hole is si]tuated [in the … of the Presence]: the full(y loaded) boat will sink or: a pregnant woman will die in her labour. OBE 1 ob. 610

This omen begins with an observation: a section of a liver, known as the “Presence,” contains a deformity called a “Hole.” The primary interpretation of this deformity follows: a boat, loaded with cargo, will sink. This first interpretation is then followed by a second involving the death of a pregnant woman. The second interpretation, however, is not arbitrary, but is derived out of the first on the basis of an established metaphor: a loaded boat serves as a metaphor for a childbearing woman. Both carry, as it were, valuable cargo. Guided by such interpretive principles, scribal scholars discerned new revelation within existing records of omens. As I will show, comparable principles played a similar guiding role in the creation of secondary interpretations of prophetic oracles in literary prophecy. 8 9

10

See discussion of this omen in Winitzer, “Writing and Mesopotamian Divination,” 83. As noted by Winitzer, ibid., 85, since either interpretation could, by the principle of pars familiaris/pars hostilis be derived from the other, one cannot determine which one came first historically; so, by “first,” I merely indicate the interpretation that literarily precedes the other. Discussed in Ulla Jeyes, Old Babylonian Extispicy: Omen Texts in the British Museum (Istanbul: Nederlands Historisch-Archaeologisch Instituut te İstanbul, 1989), 103; Winitzer, “Writing and Mesopotamian Divination,” 80.

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3.2 Literary Generation of Omen Compendia Omen compendia also attest to literary generation as a mode of divination. In the production of these compendia, scribal scholars composed new omens in response to the literary pressures inherent in the literary form omen compendium.11 Some explanation is in order: omen compendia consist of omens (protases and corresponding apodoses) arranged into series according to certain formal patterns. As scribal scholars collated omens, they organized them by type. For instance, liver omens with marks on a certain zone of the liver were grouped together. These were then arranged into patterns based on “gradation paradigms”12 such as the well-studied “right-left” paradigm:13 e.g., a liver with a spot on the left side of a zone (of the liver) would be paired with a liver with a spot on the right side of the same zone. Such gradation paradigms provided compendia their organizational structure. Importantly, after the omens were arranged in order, not all of the paradigms were complete. Some contained gaps. To return to the “right-left” paradigm, not every series contained both an omen with a spot on the right side of a given zone and one with a spot on the left side of the same zone. These gaps were a problem. The formal conventions of the omen compendia as a genre— which in essence consists of series of gradation paradigms—did not allow gaps in the paradigms. The formal conventions, in a sense, pressured the scribe to complete the paradigm. In such cases, the scribal scholar was constrained or at least prompted to create new hypothetical omens (hypotheticals) and their respective interpretations in order to fill such perceived gaps.14 Along with the right-left paradigm, many more could be mentioned, some simple15—such as the presence-absence (of a zone)—others more complex16— e.g., top-middle-bottom—all of which exerted creative pressure on scribal 11 12 13 14

15 16

For the literary pressures and conventions that generated new omens, see: Winitzer, “Writing and Mesopotamian Divination”; idem, Early Mesopotamian Divination Literature, 151–449. This terminology is borrowed from Winitzer, ibid., 14–16. Studied, for example, by Starr, The Rituals of the Diviner, BM 12 (Malibu: Undena Publications, 1983), 15–25. Cf. Hermann Hunger and David Edwin Pingree, Astral Sciences in Mesopotamia (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 6; Francesca Rochberg, “Empiricism in Babylonian Omen Texts and the Classification of Mesopotamian Divination as Science,” JAOS 119 (1999): 568–69; Winitzer, “The Generative Paradigm in Old Babylonian Divination,” 17, writes, “… the diviner-scholar set out to construct new hypotheticals along with their respective interpretations on the basis of recorded omens and by way of a variety of implicit ideas of hermeneutics”; idem, Early Mesopotamian Divination Literature, 10, notes that earlier studies perceived such gap filling as exceptional rather than as the rule. Defined by Winitzer, ibid., 172–3, as “oppositional.” Defined as “pointillism” ibid., 233.

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scholars in their production of compendia. According to A. Winitzer, the paradigms themselves generated the new lacuna-filling omens. This is to say, the literary generation of new revelation is a direct consequence of re-contextualization, as omen records are placed into a new literary form and arranged according to the conventions of that form. The very act of introducing traditional divinatory material into this new literary form fostered the discovery of new revelation. In addition to pressuring the creation of new hypothetical omens, transcribing and/or re-contextualizing omens into compendia generated revelation in a second way. Arranging omens into compendia—according to gradation paradigms—did not leave omens unaltered. To fit them into these paradigms, scribal scholars actively shaped such omens, emending them where needed.17 In summary, omen compendia illustrate how transcription and recontextualization are not neutral but tools intentionally employed by scribal scholars to generate new revelation. The same conclusion may be drawn from an analysis of literary prophecy, the subject of the following section. 4

Textual Divination in the Mari Letters

As mentioned above, the two major sources of literary prophecy from ancient Mesopotamia are the oracles reported in the Mari letters and the Neo-Assyrian oracle reports and collections. When these sources are studied, one encounters divinatory phenomena comparable to what one finds in an analysis of omen compendia: divine revelation is interpreted, shaped, and expanded through literary generation and secondary application. This section considers examples of literary generation found in oracle-reporting Mari Letters. The following section presents examples of literary generation and secondary application observed in literary prophecy from Nineveh. Of the thousands of letters excavated at Mari, about fifty report the activities and oracles of prophets from the region of Mari.18 While these documents, 17

18

Winitzer (ibid., 152), writes that organizing omens into gradation paradigms “was not a passive activity” but was “a dynamic undertaking which invariably affected previously unaffiliated entries in their new settings. This process frequently inspired actual changes in the composition of pre-existing omens and even generated new omens according to the order imposed by the gradation paradigm. In short, inter-omen organization was a creative and generative process.” The oracle reports from Mari are collected and edited in Martti Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, ed. Peter Machinist, SBLWAW 12 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003); see also: Hans M. Barstad, “Sic dicit dominus: Mari Prophetic Texts and the Hebrew Bible,” in Essays on Ancient Israel in Its Near Eastern Context: A Tribute to Nadav Na’aman (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006), 21–52; idem, “Mari and the Hebrew Bible: Some Parallels,” SEÅ 70 (2005): 21–32; Herbert B. Huffmon, “A

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37

formally speaking, are letters and not oracle reports such as those found in Neo-Assyria, these letters still provide an opportunity to examine the role transcription and re-contextualization play in the formation of divinatory meaning. These letters showcase techniques of textual divination comparable to what is encountered in other forms of divinatory literature. The scribes—or at least the deputies who commissioned these scribes—did not simply communicate these prophetic oracles passively; they played an active role in the interpretation and shaping of these oracles.19 Their creativity anticipates the influence that scribal scholars of the Neo-Assyrian court would exert on divinatory literature. The clearest example of such creativity involves an oracle of a qammatum, or prophetess of Dagan to king Zimri-Lim, an oracle that is reported three times by three different writers.20 These reports allow one to compare how

19

20

Company of Prophets: Mari, Assyria, Israel,” in Prophecy in Its Ancient Near Eastern Context: Mesopotamian, Biblical, and Arabian Perspectives, ed. Martti Nissinen, SBLSym 13 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000), 47–70; Aaron Schart, “Combining Prophetic Oracles in Mari Letters and Jeremiah 36,” JANES 23 (1995): 75–93; Jack M. Sasson, “Water beneath Straw: Adventures of a Prophetic Phrase in the Mari Archives,” in Solving Riddles and Untying Knots: Biblical, Epigraphic, and Semitic Studies in Honor of Jonas C. Greenfield, ed. Ziony Zevit, Seymour Gitin, and Michael Sokoloff (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1995), 599–608; Simon B. Parker, “Official Attitudes Toward Prophecy at Mari and in Israel,” VT 43 (1993): 50–68; Dominique Charpin, “Le contexte historique et géographique des prophéties dans les texts retrouvés à Mari,” BCSMS 23 (1992): 21–31; Abraham Malamat, “A Forerunner of Biblical Prophecy: The Mari Documents,” in Ancient Israelite Religion: Essays in Honor of Frank Moore Cross, ed. Patrick D. Miller, Paul D. Hanson, and S. Dean McBride (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1987), 33–52; William L. Moran, “New Evidence from Mari on the History of Prophecy,” Bib 50 (1969): 15–56. Jack M. Sasson, “The Posting of Letters with Divine Messages,” in Florilegium marianum II: Recueil d’études à la mémoire d’Maurice Birot, ed. Dominique Charpin and Jean-Marie Durand, MNABU 3 (Paris: SEPOA, 1994), 305, demonstrates that when multiple letters of a single scribal official in Mari can be compared, that official’s particular bias becomes apparent: “Thus, no matter which divinity is at stake, no matter what prophecy is being communicated, no matter which prophet is chosen as conduit, when transmitted through Aunt Addū-duri, the message will caution the king about treachery or danger (XXVI: 195, 238); via Sister Inibšina, it will warn him about letting down his guard (XXVI: 197, 204); through the Wife Šiptu, it will comfort and cheer him (XXVI: 211, 213, 236).” The third report, that of Kanisan (ARM 26 202), attributes the oracle to a certain muḫḫûm rather than to a qammatum of Dagan (cf. ARM 26 197, 199); Parker, “Official Attitudes Toward Prophecy at Mari and in Israel,” 57, concludes that Kanisan’s letter reports a similar oracle by a different prophet; cf. Martti 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. Ehud Ben Zvi and Michael H. Floyd, SBLSym 10 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000), 257; even if this were the case, which cannot be known for certain, the following discussion on the creativity of scribal scholars would not change substantially. Given the fact that Kanisan’s report, like that of Inibshina (ARM 26 197), uses the identical phrase “beneath straw water runs” and concludes with a comparable promise of victory, it could be argued alternatively, that

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these letter writers—Inibshina, Sammetar, and Kanisan—represented the prophetess’s utterance in written form. Importantly, the three reports do not agree with each other; each scribe reproduced a different version of the prophetess’s words. A synopsis of the three accounts is presented below. In each account, the voice of the prophetess is clearly demarcated from the voice of the letter writer through introductory and concluding formula and/or through the disruption and resumption of the letter’s primary narrative in which the prophetess is referred to in the third person.21 Inibshina

Sammetar

Kanisan, quoting his father, Kibri-Dagan Kibri-D[agan], my father, [wrote to me] in Mari. [This is what] he wrote: Now, a qammatum of … a qammatum of Dagan [I heard] the words [that] Dagan of Terqa came and of T[erqa] came and spoke were uttered [in the temspoke to me. She said: [to me]: ple of Dagan. Th]is is what [they] sp[oke to me]: The peacemaking of Beneath straw water Be[neath straw] water the man of Ešn[unna] ru[ns]. They keep on ru[ns]. The god of my is false: beneath straw send[ing to you] meslord has come! He has water runs! I will sages of friendship, delivered his enemies gather him into the they even send their in his hands. net that I knot. I will gods [to you], but in Now, as before, the destroy his city and I their hearts they are prophet broke out into will ruin his wealth, planning something constant declamation. which comes from else. The king should time immemorial. not take an oath without consulting god. This is what she said to me. She demanded … This is what Kib[ri-Dag]an wrote [to me]. ARM 26 197 ARM 26 199 ARM 26 202

21

Kanisan, reporting this oracle second-hand, mistakenly assumed the speaker was a muḫḫûm and that Kanisan’s oracle is in fact derived from the qammatum of Dagan. The translation of the following is from Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East. For discussion of these three reports see: Parker, “Official Attitudes Toward Prophecy at Mari and in Israel,” 57–60; Sasson, “Water beneath Straw”; Karel van der Toorn, “Old Babylonian Prophecy Between the Oral and the Written,” JNSL 24 (1998): 230–3.

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As this synopsis makes clear, these three reports are far from identical. Besides the thrice-repeated phrase “beneath straw water runs” (printed in bold), which seems to be a warning of trickery,22 the three accounts of the oracle have little in common verbally. In the letters of Inibshina and Sammetar, the phrase is accompanied by an explanation: both explicitly warn of the deceitful intentions of a certain purported ally; yet they do so with very different words. With the third report, that of Kanisan, the oracle contains the opaque phrase by itself without explanation.23 Moreover, the details of the reports do not agree with each other.24 By Inibshina’s accounting, the oracle specifies the deceitful party as “the man of Ešnunna”; but for Sammetar and Kanisan, the prophetess’s oracle does not indicate the suspect’s identity. Additionally, the oracle in both Inibshina’s and Kanisan’s recounting concludes with a guarantee of victory, albeit in different words. That of Sammetar, however, ends with an imperative and a tacit threat: “The king should not take an oath without consulting god.” To wit, victory is not guaranteed but contingent on King Zimri-Lim’s choices. It appears, therefore, that the scribal officials who reported these oracles felt at liberty to restate the prophetess’s message in their own words even to the point of changing the oracle’s meaning.25 In this capacity, these officials show themselves to be comparable to the textual-divining scribal scholars of the Neo-Assyrian court, not simply relaying raw revelatory data to the king but fixing and expanding the meaning of these data. The three accounts of the words of the prophetess from Terqa also illustrate examples of literary generation. The letter as a literary genre—like omen compendia—offers the possibility of presenting more than one oracle at a time and arranging them in a single text in a meaningful, or even meaninggenerating way. When two or more oracles are so arranged in a single letter, 22 23 24 25

Cf. Parker, “Official Attitudes Towards Prophecy at Mari and in Israel,” 58; and Sasson, “Water beneath Straw,” 606–7. That is unless Kanisan’s interpretation of the phrase (or that of his father, Kibri-Dagan), consists of the promise of deliverance that follows the phrase, i.e.: “The god of my lord has come! He has delivered his enemies in his hands.” Compare the following with the observations of Parker, “Official Attitudes Towards Prophecy at Mari and in Israel,” 57–60; and Sasson, “Water beneath Straw.” The disparity between the three might suggest that what we have here is just three different oracles by the same prophetess rather than three versions of the same oracle. However, Sammetar’s report mentions that the same prophetess also delivered this very message to Inibshina, the author of the first report; additionally, the sense of Kanisan’s report and that of Inibshina’s are synonymous—a warning of treachery followed by a promise of victory—and thus are reasonably viewed as witnesses to the same oracle. The alternative explanation would have the prophetess herself interpreting her own words in contradictory ways. It seems more convincing that the variations in the interpretation of the phrase “beneath straw water runs” originate in the imaginations of distinct intellects. Cf. the comments of Parker, “Official Attitudes Toward Prophecy at Mari and in Israel,” 58.

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vertical reading naturally takes place. In the case of the letters from Mari, scribes relied on vertical reading to clarify the meaning of oracles. Details from one oracle help establish the meaning of the others found in the same letter and vice versa. The scribes reinforced the unity of combined oracles through intra-textual harmonization, rewriting oracles in light of each other so that they share words and phrases. Through these two means of textual divination— vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization—the scribes capitalized on the divinatory potential of the letter, as a genre, to generate new revelation. Examples of both techniques can be found in the letter of Sammetar. The following provides the larger literary context in which Sammetar situates the prophetess’s oracle:26 Sammetar to Zimri-Lim Speak to my lord: Thus Sammetar, your servant: Lupaḫum, prophet of Dagan, arrived here from Tuttul. The message that my lord entrusted him in Saggaratum: … Wherever you go, joy will always find you! Battering ram and siege tower will be given to you, and they will travel by your side; they will be your companions … … to me he [Lupaḫum] spoke: Wh[at] if the king, without consulting god, will engage himself with the man of [Eš]nunna! As before, when the Yamin[ite]s came to me and settled in Saggaratum, I was the one who spoke to the king: ‘Do not make a treaty with the Yaminites! I shall drive the shepherds of their clans away to Ḫubur and the river will finish them off for you,’ Now then, he should not take an oath without consulting god. This is the message Lupaḫum spoke to me. Afterwards, on the following [da]y, a qammatum of Dagan of T[erqa] came and spoke [to me]: Beneath straw water ru[ns]. They keep on send[ing to you] messages of friendship, they even send their gods [to you], but in their hearts they are planning something else. The king should not take an oath without consulting god…. ARM 26 199

As this quotation illustrates, in Sammetar’s letter, the prophetess’s oracle is only one of several oracles reported; her oracle sits after a few oracles from 26

Translation (slightly emended) from Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 30–31.

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the prophet Lupaḫum. This arrangement is deliberate; it enables vertical reading. As noted above, Sammetar omits the identity of the deceitful party with whom Zimri-Lim should exercise caution in his reporting of the prophetess’s oracle. The reader of his letter, however, could infer this person’s identity through vertical reading. The deceitful person is identified by name in the oracle of Lupaḫum which immediately precedes the prophetess’s oracle.27 The oracle of Lupaḫum cautions the king about trusting the man of Ešnunna (printed in bold in the previous quotation) and urges Zimri-Lim not to make a treaty with this man without first consulting the deity. Since this oracle is immediately followed by the words of the prophetess of Dagan, Zimri-Lim (and any other audience) would hear the prophetess’s message as a continuation of Lupaḫum’s warnings not to trust the man of Ešnunna. In this regard, the Sammetar’s interpretation of the prophetess’s oracle agrees with that of Inibshina; Inibshina names the man of Ešnunna explicitly within her quotation of the prophetess (see the synopsis of the oracle of a qammatum above, p. 38). If the other two versions of the prophetess’s message had not survived, one could not know for certain whether Sammetar intended this vertical reading, i.e., if he intended his audience to read the prophetess’s words in light of those of Lupaḫum; but with Inibshina’s version in hand, a version that does explicitly mention the identity of the untrustworthy man, one can reasonably surmise that Sammetar agreed with Inibshina on this count but chose to identify the figure in a slightly less explicit way. That this vertical reading was intended by Sammetar is also confirmed by the fact that Sammetar intratextually harmonizes the end of the prophetess’s message with the end of Lupaḫum’s oracle so that both conclude with the identical warning (italicized in the quotation from the letter of Sammetar, p. 40): “He [the king] should not take an oath without consulting god.” This intra-textual harmonization demonstrates that Sammetar did in fact intend the oracles of his letter to be read in light of each other.28

27 28

Noted also in Sasson, “Water beneath Straw,” 604–5. The repetition of these lines is discussed in Schart, “Combining Prophetic Oracles in Mari Letters and Jeremiah 36,” 88; and Parker, “Official Attitudes Toward Prophecy at Mari and in Israel,” 57–60; Parker attributes the phrase in both oracles to Sammetar. However, this is not certain. Sammetar could have duplicated it from Lupaḫum’s words. If so it would anticipate the technique of duplication utilized by the composers of Jeremiah (see chap. 5 below).

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As a consequence of this intra-textual harmonization, however, the prophetess’s oracle in Sammetar’s report ends on a different note than the other two versions of the oracle, which, as mentioned, finish with a guarantee of victory. Here one encounters another instance where vertical reading may have been intended:29 while it is true that Sammetar’s citation of the prophetess’s oracle lacks words of victory, his letter as a whole does not. As may be seen in the quotation from ARM 26 199 (p. 40), Sammetar begins his report with another oracle of Lupaḫum that gives comparable assurance: Wherever you go, joy will always find you! Battering ram and siege tower will be given to you, and they will travel by your side; they will be your companions. ARM 26 199, 11–1430

It seems likely that Sammetar intended the prophetess’s oracle to be read in light of these words of assurance. If so, two details missing from Sammetar’s version of the oracle vis-à-vis those of Inibshina and Kanisan—(1) the identity of the deceiver as the man of Ešnunna (found in Inibshina’s version) and (2) the reassurance of victory (found in both Inibshina’s version and that of Kanisan)—are not missing from Sammetar’s report as a whole but are supplied by other oracles included within his letter. Ending on a different note, however, Sammetar’s letter conveys a different meaning than the letters of Inibshina and Kanisan: Zimri-Lim is left not with an assurance of victory, but a moral imperative to consult the deity.31 In short through the careful arrangement and intra-textual harmonization of oracles, Sammetar effectively changes the meaning of the prophetess’s message. To summarize, Sammetar’s letter displays the intentional employment of vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization. By these divinatory techniques, Sammetar generates new meaning. In doing so, the scribal official demonstrates the hermeneutical possibilities inherent in many forms of literary prophecy—including biblical prophetic books—wherever multiple oracles are juxtaposed in a single text.

29

30 31

Besides this example, I could mention another: on its own, Lupaḫum’s initial oracle of assurance lacks a concrete, definite referent. Followed by several warnings with more specific content, however, the initial oracle appears to address the situation involving the conniving man of Ešnunna. Thus, vertical reading goes both directions, i.e., up as well as down. Translation from Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 30. Noted, as well, by Parker, “Official Attitudes Toward Prophecy at Mari and in Israel,” 59.

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Several other oracle-reporting letters from Mari witness to these divinatory techniques, as well.32 For instance in another letter (ARM 26 237), the adviser Addū-duri33 informs King Zimri-Lim about an enigmatic dream and immediately afterwards reports a prophetic oracle.34 In the dream Addū-duri enters the temple of the goddess Bēlēt-ekallim (“Lady of the Palace”) and after realizing that the goddess is nowhere to be found begins to weep. Then she hears a priest repeatedly calling out, “Come back, O Dagan.” Importantly, the letter does not provide an explicit interpretation of this mysterious dream; neither does the dream offer clear advice for how the king should respond. These lacunae are tacitly filled by the immediately following oracle which plainly orders the king to remain home. That is to say, when read with the dream as a part of a single letter, the oracle functions as an interpretation of that dream. In the following quotation, note the juxtaposition of the dream and the oracle in the letter:35 In my dream I entered the temple of Bēlēt-ekallim, but Bēlēt-ekallim was not present (ul wašbat) nor were there images in front of her. When I saw this, I began to weep. This dream of mine took place during the evening watch. When I returned, Dadâ, the priest of Ištar of Bišra, was standing at the gate of Bēlēt-ekallim, and an eerie voiced kept calling out: 32

33

34 35

See, for instance, the discussion of letters containing multiple oracles in Schart, “Combining Prophetic Oracles in Mari Letters and Jeremiah 36.” Wherever two or more oracles are combined into a single letter the opportunity for vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization arises. Besides the examples discussed in Schart (i.e., ARM 26 237; A.1121 + A.2731; and ARM 26 199), many other letters contain multiple oracles and thus could be investigated for evidence of vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization; these include: ARM 26 194, 196, 200, 207, 208, 209, 212, 216, 219, 221bis, 234, and 239. On the identify of Addū-duri, see: Jack M. Sasson, “Mari Dreams,” JAOS 103 (1983): 283–4, who see her as a “highly placed lady,” who “did move easily among Mari’s top administrators”; Schart, “Combining Prophetic Oracles,” 79, identifies Addū-duri as a “lay person,” as opposed to a “professional.” Whatever Sasson and Schart might mean by these descriptions, there does not seem to be a substantial distinction between Addū-duri’s function as a scribal advisor and the role played by the other officials involved in the reporting and interpretation of divination. Note for example, she sends her hair and hem along with her letter for confirmation. Regardless of her status, Addū-duri (or whoever composed this letter in her name) must be appreciated as a textual diviner who deliberately utilized the letter form to shape the content and meaning of divine revelation according to her interpretation of that revelation. This letter is discussed by Sasson, “Mari Dreams”; Schart, “Combining Prophetic Oracles in Mari Letters and Jeremiah 36,” 78–80. The following translation and normalization (slightly emended) are from Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 68.

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Co[me ba]ck, O Dagan! Come back, O Dagan! (t[ūr]a D[ag]an, tūra Dagan) This is what it kept calling out over and over. Another matter: a prophetess arose in the temple of Annunītum and spoke: Zimri-Lim, do not go on campaign! Stay (šib) in Mari, and I shall continue to answer. ARM 26 237, 8–26

A. Schart observes that the oracle—which cautions the king to stay home and not to go on campaign—seems linked to specific details of the dream, namely the intense emotion associated with the departure of the goddess from her home.36 Through vertical reading, the image of the absent goddess, which so disturbs Addū-duri, serves to intensify the oracle’s warning. That this intensifying vertical reading was intended is perhaps confirmed by the shared language and imagery between the two: in the dream the goddess was “not seated” (ul wašbat) in the temple; in the oracle, the king is told to “stay” (šib) in Mari.37 Also the dream ends with the tolling cry, tūra Dagan, tūra Dagan (“Come back Dagan! Come back Dagan!”), which could be read as an allusion to a previous ruler of Mari, “Tura-Dagan,” and thus hints that the dream concerns the king.38 In brief, ARM 26 237 presents another example where a letter writer, employs the hermeneutical technique of vertical reading to generate new meaning out of a given revelation. In conclusion to this section, the oracles found transcribed in the Mari letters illustrates how letter writers—when reporting oracles—functioned like the scribal scholars of the Neo-Assyrian court, employing textual divination to establish and interpret the meaning of those oracles. It makes little difference whether these instances of textual divination arose from the creativity of Zimri-Lim’s officials or from the liberties taken by their anonymous scribes, if the officials did not write their own letters. In either case, the authors of these letters clearly played an active role in the discernment of the divine will and in the production of revelatory texts. Moreover, the literary generation of divine revelation through vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization utilized in 36 37 38

Schart, “Combining Prophetic Oracles in Mari Letters and Jeremiah 36,” 78–80. Normalization and translation from ibid., 77–78. Cf. Sasson, “Mari Dreams,” 289; idem, “Thoughts of Zimri-Lim,” BA 47 (1984): 111; William W. Hallo, The Book of the People (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1991), 162, n. 218; Schart, “Combining Prophetic Oracles in Mari Letters and Jeremiah 36,” 80.

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the records of prophecy from Mari finds some affinity with the literary generation of new omens in the Old Babylonian omen compendia. For both, it is the organizational aspect of the literary form that generated the new revelation. The organization of omens into gradation paradigms prompted the creation of lacunae-filling omens; the organization of oracles in letters enabled the possibility of reading neighboring oracles in light of each other and of intra-textual harmonization. In this regard, the production of omen compendia and the reporting of oracles in letters are not very different. The composition of both involves the creative adaptation, interpretation, and generation of divine revelation, operations that require the expertise of an educated and skilled divining scribe. While conclusions made about the identity of these scribes from Mari must remain tentative, it does not seem unwarranted to view these scribes as diviners akin to the scribal scholars active in the courts of Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal. To the textual prophecy of these latter scholars, I will now turn. 5

Textual Divination in Neo-Assyrian Literary Prophecy

Fast-forwarding one thousand years to the seventh century BCE, we come to the records of oracles found in the literary prophetic texts of the Neo-Assyrian court. The primary evidence for literary prophecy in this later period is the oracle reports (SAA 9 nos. 5–11) and oracle collections (SAA 9 nos. 1–4) from the reigns of Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal.39 In this study, I focus on one collection in particular: SAA 9 no. 1. Though removed from the Mari letters by a millennium, this Neo-Assyrian oracle collection displays similar techniques of textual divination as those witnessed in the oracle-reporting letters from Mari: the collection manifests the literary generation of new revelation via vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization. Furthermore, the collection is, in essence, a secondary application of earlier oracles redeployed to address a new historical context. In the following pages, I offer examples of both literary generation and secondary application.

39

These reports and collections can also be found edited in Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East. See Andrew Knapp, Royal Apologetic in the Ancient Near East, WAWSup 4 (Atlanta, Georgia: Society of Biblical Literature, 2015), 301–35, for historical background on the reign of Esarhaddon.

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5.1 Literary Generation in Neo-Assyrian Oracle Collections The oracle collection SAA 9 no. 1 consists of ten oracles stemming from at least eight different prophets.40 Stitched together, the ten are presented as unified narrative with a coherent message. They were selected for compilation partially on the basis of theme: most offer Esarhaddon (and, by extension, his son Ashurbanipal, as I will show below) assurance of the defeat of his enemies.41 The oracles individually contain many vague references. These references are clarified through vertical reading. For instance, in the opening oracle of the collection, no. 1.1, Ištar promises defeat over the king’s enemies three times; but the oracle never specifies who these adversaries are. Readers of the collection find similar ambiguity in nos. 1.4, 1.8 (and possibly no. 1.7, though this last oracle is broken): while each oracle refers to certain opponents of the king, none reveals who these opponents are. When read independently from the other oracles of the collection, these vague references could refer to any number of adversaries. In the literary setting of this oracle collection, however, they readily refer to Esarhaddon’s brothers and their supporters who challenged Esarhaddon’s claim to the throne. The other oracles in the collection supply this clarity: they explicitly refer to circumstances pertaining to Esarhaddon’s sibling rivalry over the kingship. Immediately following the references to the unspecified enemies in no. 1.1, the oracle no. 1.2 mentions Esarhaddon’s residency in the bēt rēdûtēka, “Palace of Succession” (i 33′); and a little later, the oracle no. 1.6 twice refers to Esarhaddon as the alpu kēnu, the “legitimate heir” (iv 5–6 and 20).42 These details locate their respective oracles in the context of Esarhaddon’s conflict with his fraternal rivals prior to his coronation. By association, through vertical reading, the reader/hearer of the collection as a whole would identify the unspecified enemies in the adjoining oracles as Esarhaddon’s brothers. Vertical reading is also required to make sense of other details: the terse reference to divine favor in no. 1.3, rīšāk issi Aššūr-aḫu-iddina šarrīya rīši Arbail “I rejoice over Esarhaddon, my king! Arbela rejoices!” (ii 11′–12′), taken on its own, does not have a clear reference. Positioned after no. 1.2, which alludes to Esarhaddon’s struggle for recognition as crown prince, this phrase becomes a religious explanation for Esarhaddon’s political triumph: he had the approval 40 41

42

For two oracles of the collection (SAA 9 nos. 1.6, 1.9), the name of the prophet did not survive. SAA 9 no. 1.1 i 8′, 13′, 18′; 1.2 i 31′, ii [3′], 6′; 1.4. ii 34′; 1.6 iv 9; 1.7 v 5 mentions conspirators (idabbabūni); 1.8 (v 15–16) alludes to enemies, in this case Esarhaddon’s revolting brothers; 1.10 (vi 19–21) mentions only the banishing of “fear and trembling” from the palace; 1.5 and 1.9 are too broken to confirm or deny a reference to the king’s enemies; the incredibly concise 1.3 is the only certain exception to this pattern. Normalization and translation in this and the following paragraphs are from Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 104.

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of the goddess Arbela (Ištar). To offer another example, the oracle no. 1.9 (v 28) describes Ištar as leaving for the steppe (ṣēri). As Nissinen explains, this description refers to Ištar’s occasional practice of sojourning in her shrine the Palace of the Steppe in Milqia during periods when the king was away on campaign.43 With the king’s victorious return from military conquest, Ištar, too, would come back to her primary residence.44 While Nissinen identifies the primary meaning of the description of Ištar’s movement to the steppe, the phrase—when positioned after oracle no. 1.8—carries a secondary connotation. In this oracle, Ištar recalls the queen mother’s accusation that the goddess has caused her son to wander the steppe (ṣēru) (v 20), an allusion to Esarhaddon’s flight from Nineveh in 681 BCE to escape his brothers’ conspiracy against him.45 When read immediately after no. 1.8, Ištar’s retreat to the steppe in no. 1.9 serves as a response to the queen mother’s complaint: Esarhaddon may have been driven out to the wilderness, but he was not alone; Ištar went out to the wilderness with him, and now has brought him back to the city in safety. As these examples demonstrate, the scribal scholar who formed this collection made use of vertical reading to generate a new, unified revelation out of originally disparate oracles. The scribal scholar’s profitable use of the oracle collection, as a literary genre, to generate revelation is seen in a second way. The first and last oracles of the collection are linked by common language probably created through intra-textual harmonization. Both oracles use nearly identical diction to refer to the reliability of the deity’s words. Consider the following:46 Ayyūte dibbīya ša aqqabakkanni ina muḫḫi lā tazzizūni

lûni dabābu pāniu ša aqqabakkanni ina muḫḫi lā tazzīzi ūmâ ina muḫḫi urkî tazzazma

Have I spoken to you any words that you could not rely upon?

You could rely upon the previous word I spoke to you, couldn’t you? Now you can rely upon the later words, too!

SAA 9 no. 1.1 i 15′–17′

SAA 9 no. 1.10 vi 6–12

43 44 45 46

Martti Nissinen, References to Prophecy in Neo-Assyrian Sources, SAAS 7 (Helsinki: NeoAssyrian Text Corpus Project, 1998), 23; idem, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 110, n. b. Ibid., 125, n. d. Nissinen, References to Prophecy, 22. The following normalization and translation are from Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 1. Nissinen, ibid., suggests the words of no. 1.10 (vi 6–12) might be an allusion to those of no. 1.1 (i 1′–1′).

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If the commonality between these two oracles does not reflect deliberate intra-textual harmonization, the compiling scribe has clearly positioned these two oracles at the beginning and end of the collection to form a thematic inclusio, which serves to unite the corpus as a whole. The collection of SAA 9 no. 1 illustrates a third way the oracle collection, as a literary genre, may be used to generate revelation. As Parpola observes, the compiling scribal scholar arranged the oracles of SAA 9 no. 1 in roughly chronological order so that as a whole the oracles trace several steps of Esarhaddon’s complicated journey to the throne following his father’s assassination.47 This chronological arrangement can be read as a narrative—the story of Esarhaddon’s struggle to become king. Here one encounters another hermeneutical possibility of literary prophecy: wherever multiple oracles are arranged into a single text, there is the potential to tell a story. The narrative arrangement of oracles is conceptually related to the techniques of vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization. A narrative arrangement of oracles assumes that separate oracles—when presented together—should be read in light of each other, that their composite meaning is greater than the meaning of each oracle on its own. Narrative arrangement thus illustrates a further example of literary generation: scribes could exploit the narrative potential of oracle compilation (or omen compilation, in general) to generate new revelation. Moreover, narrative arrangement marks a preliminary step toward the development of full-fledged prophetic books as seen in the Hebrew Bible. Next possible steps in this development might include situating compiled oracles in a historical/ narrative context through the insertion of historical headings or the inclusion of prose narratives.48 47 48

Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies, lxviii–lxix. For example, the Balaam Text from Deir ʿAlla consists of oracles combined with narrative. For a translation and discussion of the Balaam Text, see n. 2 above. Scholars debate the timing of the “historization” (i.e., the situating of an otherwise ahistorical text within a particular historical context) of the written records of oracular prophecy that became the prophetic books of the Bible. For his part, Philip R. Davies, “‘Pen of Iron, Point of Diamond’ (Jer 17:1): Prophecy as Writing,” in Writings and Speech in Israelite and Ancient Near Eastern Prophecy, ed. Ehud Ben Zvi and Michael H. Floyd, SBLSym 10 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000), imagines that such historization occurred much later than the initial compilation of given oracle collections. Yet the oracle collections of Neo-Assyria—which are roughly contemporaneous with the emergence of Hebrew divinatory literature—were historicized immediately, as soon as they were bound together by their intentional chronological arrangement. Cf. the criticism of Davies in John Van Seters, “Prophetic Orality in the Context of the Ancient Near East: A Response to Culley, Crenshaw, and Davies,” in Writings and Speech in Israelite and Ancient Near Eastern Prophecy, ed. Ehud Ben Zvi and Michael H. Floyd, SBLSym 10 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000), 86.

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In sum, the literary form oracle collection, similar to the oracle-reporting letters from Mari, provided scribal scholars with hermeneutical opportunities for generating new meaning: namely, through the divinatory techniques of vertical reading, narrative arrangement, and (in all likelihood) intra-textual harmonization. With such techniques in hand the scholar who compiled SAA 9 no. 1 spun a unified narrative with a clear message for Esarhaddon (and secondarily for Ashurbanipal) out of the threads of once separate and somewhat opaque oracles. 5.2 Secondary Application of Neo-Assyrian Oracles Collections In addition to generating new revelation, the narrative arrangement of the oracles of SAA 9 no. 1 illustrates the divinatory technique of secondary application. Although the oracles of SAA 9 no. 1 originally addressed Esarhaddon’s rise to power in 681–680 BCE, the compiling scribe seemingly wove this collection together—out of oracles from the time of Esarhaddon’s enthronement—to address the installment of Esarhaddon’s son, Ashurbanipal, as crown prince in 673 BCE. As such, this collection represents an example of secondary application akin to the scholarly creation of secondary interpretations in the omen compendia. Some elaboration is needed. The oracles of this collection share many points of commonality with a royal inscription composed for Ashurbanipal’s installment known as Nin A.49 This inscription, like SAA 9 no. 1, recounts the narrative of Esarhaddon’s journey to the throne. Yet, the recounting of the narrative in the inscription is not for Esarhaddon’s sake; it serves to legitimate Esarhaddon’s appointment of Ashurbanipal as crown prince and to warn potential challengers to the throne of the consequences of revolting.50 As Parpola convincingly argues, it is highly likely that SAA 9 no. 1 was formed on the same occasion and for the same purpose as the inscription Nin A, which would account for commonalities between the two.51 The two texts work together to reinforce the enthronement of Ashurbanipal. 49 50

51

Nissinen, References to Prophecy, 19–30; Simo Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies, SAAS 9 (Helsinki: Helsinki University Press, 1997), lxiii–lxxv; for a more recent text, translation, and commentary, see: Knapp, Royal Apologetic in the Ancient Near East, 307–35. Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies, lxiii–lxx; Hayim Tadmor, “Autobiographical Apology in the Royal Assyrian Literature,” in History, Historiography, and Interpretation: Studies in Biblical and Cuneiform Literatures, ed. Moshe Weinfeld and Haymin Tadmor (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, Hebrew University, 1983), 36–57, esp. 45. Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies, lxix; Nissinen, “References to Prophecy,” 15–16; On this note, Nissinen, ibid., 30, writes, “The affinities between the initial part of the Nin A … inscription and the extant prophetic oracles received by Esarhaddon during the described period turn out to be too many and too striking to be quite accidental.” The pairing of oracle

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That SAA 9 no. 1 was compiled for the same reason that Nin A was composed—namely, the installment of Ashurbanipal as successor—is confirmed by the last words of the final oracle of the collection (no. 1.10 vi 27–30) which extend the goddess’s favor and protection to Esarhaddon’s successor: mara’ka … šarrūtu … uppaš “your son … will exercise the kingship.”52 Moreover, the compiling scribe’s intentions to reuse older material for a new purpose are hinted at by the phrase discussed in the section above: ūmâ ina muḫḫi urkî tazzazma “Now you can rely upon the later words, too!” Positioned strategically in the last oracle of the collection, this phrase perhaps points to the continuing relevance of the compiled oracles for later situations. When oracles—or omens in general—are given a secondary application, the governing principle guiding the creation/discover of the secondary application is often discernable. This is the case for SAA 9 no. 1. The reapplication of oracles regarding Esarhaddon to Ashurbanipal is not arbitrary but follows the hermeneutical assumption that what applies to one situation would apply to an analogous situation. Oracles originally addressed to Esarhaddon can be reapplied to Ashurbanipal because the two monarchs came to power through analogous circumstances. Both were appointed crown prince by their respective fathers although neither was the eldest son. The appointment of a younger son as successor may have been irregular and thus both a source of suspicion as well as an opportunity for rivals to seize power.53 While the conventions of Sargonid succession are not certain, many scholars assume the default practice was primogeniture.54 In any case, Esarhaddon’s appointment was immediately challenged by his elder brothers who were passed over.55 Civil strife plagued Nineveh for months. As noted above, Esarhaddon was forced to flee the city. Worse, his father, Sennacherib, was

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collection (e.g., SAA 9 no. 1) and royal inscription (e.g., Nin A) is not unique. The inscription, Ass. A, and the oracle collection, SAA 9 no. 2, are similarly paired: they share theme, occasion, and purpose. On this, Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies, lxix, writes: “The existence of two thematic collections of oracles correlating with two separate sets of inscriptions strongly points to a mutual dependency between the two classes of texts; in other words, it seems that the oracle collections were compiled at about the same time as the respective inscriptions.” Normalization and translation from Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 111. The details surrounding the succession of Esarhaddon are discussed by Nissinen, References to Prophecy, 17–22; Knapp, Royal Apologetic in the Ancient Near East, 301–6. Knapp, Royal Apologetic in the Ancient Near East, 301 (especially, no. 1), draws attention to the fact that evidence for Sargonid rules of succession is scant, and thus Esarhaddon’s installment may not have been “irregular.” A summary of scholarship on Esarhaddon’s ascension is found in Knapp, ibid., 301–6.

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murdered by his fraternal rivals. A six-week war ensued. While Esarhaddon— with the support Ištar among other gods—was victorious, peace and security were not a given. Moreover, an analogous and potentially explosive situation arose less than ten years later: Esarhaddon tapped Ashurbanipal to succeed him, once more passing over older sons. Considering the civil strife that plagued Esarhaddon’s ascension, it would not be surprising if Esarhaddon made provisions to forestall resistance against his heir that could arise. Perhaps for this reason, Esarhaddon’s scribal scholars prepared a defense of his appointment of Ashurbanipal. Recognizing the similarity of Ashurbanipal’s circumstances with that of his father and believing in the applicability of earlier revelation to new analogous situations, the scholars compiled an apology for Ashurbanipal’s installment out of earlier oracles supporting Esarhaddon’s ascension. This is to say, the analogous circumstances of Esarhaddon’s installation as crown prince and that of Ashurbanipal allowed scribal scholars to recycle oracles pertaining to the former in their discernment of the divine will regarding the latter. Analogous historical circumstances can prompt the creation/discovery of secondary applications of earlier divine revelation just as primary apodoses of omens invite the creation/discovery of secondary interpretations of protases. In the chapter on Jeremiah’s doublets (chap. 5), I will discuss similar occasions when the text of a doublet was secondarily applied to a new context on the basis of analogous historical circumstances. In sum, SAA 9 no. 1 offers an example of scribal scholars taking a series of oracles from one setting and reapplying them to another historical context. Read in this later historical context, details from the original oracles take on new significance: the reference to the future rule of a son of Esarhaddon in no. 1.10—mara’ka … šarrūtu … uppaš—becomes a foretelling of Ashurbanipal’s reign; the allusions to Esarhaddon’s enemies now allude to potential challengers of his crown prince; and references to divine favor for Esarhaddon become assurances of divine favor for Ashurbanipal. In this way, the collection, SAA 9 no. 1, illustrates the divinatory technique of secondary application, through which scribal scholars extrapolate new revelation out of existing records of divination. 6

Conclusion: The Common Scribal Endeavor of Textual Divination

This chapter has offered an analysis of the divinatory practices of scholarly scribes (and letter writers) employed in the creation of various forms of divinatory texts: omen compendia, oracle-reporting letters, and oracle collections.

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While generically distinct from each other and composed by different kinds of scribes in different centuries, all of these texts attest to a common portfolio of divinatory practices. Whether omen compendia arranged and expanded by Old Babylonian diviners, oracle-reporting letters authored by officials in Mari, or oracle collections organized by Neo-Assyrian scholars, the examples considered in this chapter point to a common scholarly enterprise of discerning the divine will through textual divination. While the techniques of textual divination may differ from text to text or genre to genre, many of these techniques are readily classified as one of two major umbrella categories or modes of textual divination: literary generation and secondary application. Through these means, scholarly scribes interpreted and expanded earlier revelation, discerning the deities’ will anew, and thereby producing the vast corpora of divinatory literature known from the ancient Near East. I will argue in later chapters that a comparable process of textual divination in the hands of Jewish scribal scholars in part produced the literary prophecy found in the Hebrew Bible as exemplified by the doublets of the book of Jeremiah.

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The Incremental Formation of the Book of Jeremiah To advance my argument that Jeremiah’s doublets are an expression of ancient Jewish textual divination, I must first devote some space to defending my understanding of the textual formation of the book of Jeremiah. For my conclusions about Jeremiah’s doublets assume a particular understanding of the development of the book. I assume that Jeremiah’s doublets were composed gradually through incremental revision and ongoing textual divination. In other words, the doublets are not constituent of one or two monolithic revisions (or, “editions”) of the book; several, if not many, scholarly scribes created the doublets progressively. To defend this outlook, I present in this chapter a brief description of the formation of Jeremiah, focusing primarily on the final stages of the book’s growth when many of the doublets were birthed. The book of Jeremiah survives in two distinct forms: a shorter and presumably older version—witnessed mainly by the Old Greek translation of Jeremiah (G) and attested to a limited degree by Hebrew fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls (4Q71 and 4Q72a = 4QJerb,d)—and a longer and probably later version—evinced primarily by the medieval Masoretic Text (M) and other Dead Sea Scroll fragments (2Q13 = 2QJer; 4Q70, 4Q72, and 4Q72b = 4QJera,c,e).1 Following the lead of J. Janzen and H.-J. Stipp, this study understands these two version (the Vorlagen of G and M) to be parallel developments from a common textual ancestor, Jer+n (defined below).2 Moreover, the Vorlagen of G and M are 1 See John Gerald Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1973); Emanuel Tov, “The Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah in Light of its Textual History,” in The Greek and Hebrew Bible, VTSup 72 (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 363–4; George Brooke, “The Book of Jeremiah and Its Reception in the Qumran Scrolls,” in The Book of Jeremiah and its Reception: Le livre de Jérémie et sa reception, ed. A.H.W. Curtis and T. Römer; BETL 128 (Leuven: Peeters, 1997), 184–7. The fragments of cave four are published in Eugene C. Ulrich, ed., Qumran Cave 4.X: The Prophets (DJD 15; Oxford: Clarendon, 1997): 145–207. The cave two fragment (2Q13) is published in Maurice Baillet, Josef T. Milik, and Roland de Vaux, eds., Les ‘Petites Grottes’ de Qumran, DJD 3 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1962) 62–69. The textual character of 4Q72a (4QJerd) is mixed, agreeing more closely with the M against G in Jer 43:5; see, Brooke, “The Book of Jeremiah and Its Reception in the Qumran Scrolls,” 187. 2 Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah; Hermann-Josef Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches: Textgeschichtlicher Rang, Das masoretische Eigenarten, Triebkräfte, OBO 136 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994); idem, Deuterojeremianische

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best understood—not as monolithic “editions” of Jeremiah, but as snapshots of an ongoing process of large- and small-scale revision. The following diagram presents a 30,000-foot overview of Jeremiah’s formation. While the actual textual history of the book, in all probability, is too complicated to represent in a diagram—and more complicated than this diagram suggests—the diagram offers a helpful point of departure for the discussion that follows.

figure 1

The formation of the book of Jeremiah

Konkordanz, ATSAT 63 (St. Ottilien: Eos, 1998); idem, Studien zum Jeremiabuch: Text und Redaktion, FAT 96 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2015).

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The Divinatory and Scribal Origins of Jeremiah

As the two surviving forms of the book suggest, Jeremiah experienced a long and complicated textual development. In the hands of many generations of divining scribes, the book took shape out of written records of prophetic oracles spoken by a prophet named Jeremiah in the years leading up to the Babylonian deportations of 597 and 587 and afterwards. As oracle records and collections from Neo-Assyria attest, it was normal protocol for royal scribal scholars to keep written records of divine communication uttered by prophets. Scribes in the kingdom of Judah, a region controlled by Nineveh until the end of the seventh century, likely followed suit. During the ensuing Babylonian crisis, the figure Jeremiah—with his pro-Babylonian theology—achieved recognition as a prophet of Yhwh for correctly anticipating the unfolding of history. Recorded oracles associated with Jeremiah thus gained status as confirmed divine revelation and with time would become a treasured repository of Yhwh’s past communication and a reservoir of further revelation, rich with divinatory potential.3 This repository probably contained both poetic and prose oracles; there is no reason to suppose “authentic” words of the prophet are to be found in the poetic material of Jeremiah (which scholars call “A” material) alone.4 Over time, divining scribes tapped Jeremiah’s divinatory potential compiling his oracles, arranging them in meaningful ways, and reinterpreting them in light of new events. Scribes also combined these oracle collections with narrative traditions about the prophet (typically identified as “B” material)5 and other kinds of material (e.g., the first-person “confessions,” which reflect on the experience of being a prophet) thereby producing what might be called 3 Robert R. Wilson, “Current Issues in the Study of Old Testament Prophecy,” in Inspired Speech: Prophecy in the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of Herbert B. Huffmon, ed. John Kaltner and Louis Stulman, JSOTSup 378 (New York: T & T Clark, 2004), 43, writes that the “fulfillment” of prophetic oracles would demonstrate “that they were truly of divine origin, and they were therefore thought to be an endless reservoir of revelation.” A more negative conception of the text of Jeremiah as a reservoir for further elaboration is discussed by William McKane, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Jeremiah. Volume 1: Introduction and Commentary on Jeremiah I–XXV, ICC (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1986), lxi. 4 The practice of identifying authentic prophetic utterance on the basis of its poetic nature stems from the analysis of Bernhard Duhm, Das Buch Jeremia, KHC 11 (Tübingen and Leipzig: J.C.B. Mohr, 1901), who distinguished poetic and prose material in Jeremiah. Following Sigmund Mowinckel, Zur Komposition des Buches Jeremia (Kristiania: Dybwad, 1914), scholars typically refer to the poetic material of Jeremiah as “A,” the book’s biographical prose as “B,” and its non-biographical prose as “C.” For problems in distinguishing the sources of Jeremiah, see: Michael James Williams, “An Investigation of the Legitimacy of Source Distinctions for the Prose Material in Jeremiah,” JBL 112 (1993): 193–210. 5 See previous note.

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an early version of the book of Jeremiah, or Jer A+B; the siglum signals that this version of Jeremiah contains, at minimum, Jeremiah’s A and B material. The processes that produced Jer A+B are largely cloaked in darkness. We cannot confirm whether this version of the book took shape in a single compositional moment or formed gradually, passing through many generations of scribal hands. Most likely, Jer A+B is the result of some combination of both smaller, ongoing expansion and divination as well as larger-scale revision.6 2

The Book of Jeremiah and the Deuteronomistic Tradition

At some point—which may or may not be identical with the moment that generated Jer A+B—the Jeremiah tradition came under the influence of the Deuteronomistic tradition and accumulated a wealth of Deuteronomistic phrases and words—along with “Deutero-Jeremianic”7 phrases and words— and, to a lesser extent, assumed theological perspectives common to the Deuteronomistic History (DtrH) and Deut 4:44–29:1 (D). Scholars have offered a host of explanations to account for the exchange of diction and ideas that occurred between Jeremiah and DtrH/D.8 Proposals range from asserting that 6 This conclusion assumes a continuity of scribal practice throughout the formation of Jeremiah. Since the later forms of Jeremiah (V M and V G) developed through a combination of small- and large-scale revision, earlier forms of Jeremiah ( Jer A+B and Jer+n) probably also developed through such a combination (See Justus Theodore Ghormley, “Scribal Revision: A Post-Qumran Perspective on the Formation of Jeremiah,” Text 27 (2018): 161–86). 7 Deutero-Jeremianic language may be distinguished from Deuteronomistic language, as explained by Christl M. Maier, “The Nature of Deutero-Jeremianic Texts,” Jeremiah’s Scriptures: Production, Reception, Interaction, and Transformation, ed. Hindy Najman and Konrad Schmid, JSJSup 173 (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2017), 106–7, “… the label ‘Deutero-Jeremianic’ names the distinctive prose style in the book of Jeremiah elaborated by successive editors/redactors, whereas the label ‘Deuteronomistic’ should only be used for passages that share the ideology of the Deuteronomistic History.” The term Deutero-Jeremianic was first suggested by Stipp, Deuterojeremianische Konkordanz, 2; though Stipp uses the word as an umbrella term for formulaic language in both Deuteronomy and Jeremiah; see idem, “Formulaic Language and the Formation of the Book of Jeremiah,” Jeremiah’s Scriptures: Production, Reception, Interaction, and Transformation, ed. Hindy Najman and Konrad Schmid, JSJSup 173 (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2017), 145–65. See also discussion in Carolyn J. Sharp, Prophecy and Ideology in Jeremiah: Struggles for Authority in Deutero-Jeremianic Prose (London: T & T Clark, 2003). 8 The practice of finding Deuteronomistic material within Jeremiah goes back to Duhm, Das Buch Jeremia, x; cf. Mowinckel, Zur Komposition des Buches Jeremia, 33–34. Scholars have described this “C” material as “prose sermons” arising from Deuteronomistic preachers: e.g. Enno Janssen, Juda in der Exilszeit: Ein Beitrag zur Frage der Entstehung des Judentum, FRLANT 69 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1956), and Ernest W. Nicholson, Preaching to the

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Jeremiah was a supporter of Josiah’s Deuteronomistic reforms9 to suggesting that Jeremiah’s writings were co-opted by a Deuteronomistic “school.”10 In light of more contemporary understandings of scribal practice in the ancient Near East, however, it is much simpler to maintain that the Jeremiah tradition was treasured as scripture and shaped within an exilic and post-exilic scribal context that also treasured and shaped the traditions of DtrH and D and which aimed to create out of these disparate traditions a unified Jewish identity and religious tradition.11 Within such an environment, an exchange of language and ideas between the traditions is not only expected but necessary for forming out of these traditions a coherent body of scripture. While the book of Jeremiah—by virtue of its divinatory origins—never lacked special status as revelation and thus was always viewed as something akin to scripture, the book’s status as scripture was progressively reinforced through intra-scriptural traditioning—i.e. the writing or rewriting of a text (in this case, Jeremiah) in

9

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11

Exiles: A Study of the Prose Tradition in the Book of Jeremiah (New York: Schocken Books, 1970); others describe C material not as an independent source, but as the product of Deuteronomistic editing of Jeremiah’s own sermons: so, Wilhelm Rudolph, Jeremia, HAT 12 (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1947); or as a Deuteronomistic redactional layer: thus, J. Phillip Hyatt, “The Deuteronomic Edition of Jeremiah,” in A Prophet to the Nations: Essays in Jeremiah Studies, ed. Leo G. Perdue and Brian W. Kovacs (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1984), 247–67; thus also, T.R. Hobbs, “Some Remarks on the Structure and Composition of the Book of Jeremiah,” in A Prophet to the Nations: Essays in Jeremiah Studies, ed. Leo G. Perdue and Brian W. Kovacs (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1984), 175–91; and, Winfried Thiel, Die deuteronomistische Redaktion von Jeremia 1–25, WMANT 41 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1973); idem, Die deuteronomistische Redaktion von Jeremia 26–45: Mit einer Gesamtbeurteilung der deuteronomistischen Redaktion des Buches Jeremia, WMANT 52 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1981); see criticisms of this view in William McKane, “Relations Between Poetry and Prose in the Book of Jeremiah with Special Reference to Jeremiah 3:6–11 and 12:14–17,” in Congress Volume, Vienna 1980, ed. John A. Emerton, VTSup 32 (Leiden: Brill, 1981), 220–37; and an overview in Robert P. Carroll, Jeremiah: A Commentary, OTL (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986), 38–50. A succinct summary is found in Maier, “The Nature of Deutero-Jeremianic Texts,” 103–7. E.g., Henri Cazelles, “Jeremiah and Deuteronomy,” in A Prophet to the Nations: Essays in Jeremiah Studies, ed. Leo G. Perdue and Brian W. Kovacs, trans. Leo G. Perdue (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1984), 89–111. More recently, Mark Leuchter, The Polemics of Exile in Jeremiah 26–45 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008). Hyatt, “The Deuteronomic Edition of Jeremiah”; Winfried Thiel, Die deuteronomistische Redaktion von Jeremia 1–25; idem, Die deuteronomistische Redaktion von Jeremia 26–45. More recently, Carolyn J. Sharp, Prophecy and Ideology in Jeremiah, discerns the involvement of two competing “Deuteronomistic” schools. See, chap. 2, §1.

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light of the wider corpus of nascent Hebrew scripture.12 Here too, it is not entirely clear to what extent the interlinking of Jeremiah with DtrH/D reflects the work of a single (Deuteronomistic?) “editor,” or is the outcome of a longer and more gradual process of incremental revision and divination. Again, some combination of these two options probably best explains the data.13 Without solving this puzzle, note that the textual interlinking of Jeremiah and DtrH/D supports my larger thesis that ancient Jewish scribes underwent a training similar in breadth to that of ancient Near Eastern scribes. As the following chapter shows, in at least one occasion, the scribes at liberty to revise Jeremiah though duplication knew and employed material from the Deuteronomistic tradition in their duplications. 3

The Formation of Jer+n

The earliest text of Jeremiah that one can reconstruct with a reasonable degree of confidence is the common text lying behind both the Vorlage of the Septuagint (V G) and the Vorlage of the Masoretic Text (V M)—a text I identify with the siglum Jer+n.14 The superscript “+n” in the siglum indicates the indeterminably of the number of manuscript generations between Jer A+B and the common text of V G and V M. The text of Jer+n is highly self-referential, containing numerous repeated phrases including twenty-nine intra-Jeremianic doublets. Unless one is to assume that all these repetitions were penned by the same hand, the repetitious texture of Jer+n suggests that this version of Jeremiah developed in stages.15 12 13 14

15

See, chap. 2, §1. Cf. n. 6 above. I considered describing the common text lying behind the V M and V G as the “archetype” of Jeremiah, following Ronald Hendel, Steps to a New Edition of the Hebrew Bible, TCS 10 (Atlanta: SBL Press, 2016), 22–23. Borrowing terminology from Michael D. Reeve, Manuscripts and Methods: Essays on Editing and Transmission (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 2011), 118 (See: Hendel, Steps to a New Edition, 22), Jer+n could be described as the “latest common ancestor” of V M and V G and in this narrow sense would be an “archetype”; however, Jer+n could not be described as the “earliest inferable state of the text” (so, E.J. Kenney, “Textual Criticism,” The New Encyclopædia Britannica, 15th ed. 18:192; quoted in Hendel, Steps to a New Edition, 22), and thus Jer+n is to be distinguished from an “archetype” as understood by Kenney and Hendel. It is possible, but improbable, that Jer+n equals Jer A+B. Emanuel Tov, “L’Incidence de la critique textuelle sur la critique littéraire dans le livre de Jérémie,” RB 79 (1972): 189–99, for example, attributes Jer+n wholesale to a single Deuteronomistic “editor” who both combined Jeremiah’s A and B material and contributed a “redactional” layer of C material.

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The text of Jer+n can be tentatively reconstructed through a comparison of the texts of V G and V M.16 When these two versions of Jeremiah agree, one can be fairly confident that their agreement attests to the text of their common ancestor, Jer+n.17 When either V G or V M contains a plus vis-à-vis the other, it is often still possible—albeit more difficult—to discern the text of Jer+n. Many pluses, for example, only make sense as insertions.18 More difficult still, if not impossible, is evaluating qualitative variants.19 In every case, a variety of explanations must be considered: e.g., copying error in either G or M, isolated variants, incremental revision, or systematic revision.20 16

Manuscript evidence for the textual development of Jeremiah between Jer A+B and Jer+n is nonexistence. In the absence of such empirical evidence, scholarly conjecture into the formation of Jeremiah is often based on observations of literary features alone and thus is unverifiable. Contradicting interpretations of the same literary features frequently result. For instance, the repetition in A material of phrases found in C material was for one scholar sure evidence that Jeremiah’s poetry had been reinterpreted by the Deuteronomists: e.g., Winfried Thiel, Die deuteronomistische Redaktion von Jeremia 1–25; idem, Die deuteronomistische Redaktion von Jeremia 26–45. For another, it demonstrated that the man Jeremiah composed both poetry and prose: William L. Holladay, “Prototype and Copies: A New Approach to the Poetry-Prose Problem in the Book of Jeremiah,” JBL 79 (1960): 351–67; ibid., “A Fresh Look at ‘Source B’ and ‘Source C’ in Jeremiah,” VT 25 (1975): 394–412; Helga Weippert, Die Prosareden Des Jeremiabuches, BZAW 132 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1973). Cf. the somewhat-mediating position of John Bright, “The Date of the Prose Sermons of Jeremiah,” in A Prophet to the Nations: Essays in Jeremiah Studies, ed. Leo G. Perdue and Brian W. Kovacs (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1984), 205–11. For this reason, reconstructions of the formation of Jer+n should be based on known scribal practices, i.e., practices attested by an analysis of extant forms of Jeremiah, namely G and M. This is to say, one should understand the scribal processes that created the extant forms of Jeremiah before speculating about how Jer+n formed. For example, an analysis of the variant manuscripts of Jeremiah indicates that in its final stages, Jeremiah was enlarged through duplication. On the basis of this empirical observation, it is reasonable to assume that any doublet already found at the earlier stage of Jer+n was formed through a similar process of duplication; cf. Ghormley, “Scribal Revision,” 186. 17 For the purposes of this study, I assume that the critical text of Joseph Ziegler, ed., Jeremias, Baruch, Threni, Epistula Jeremiae, vol. 15 of Septuaginta (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2013) represents—to an adequate degree—the Old Greek of Jeremiah free of post-translation revision of the Greek text toward the proto-MT. Ziegler’s results are accepted by most; e.g., Sven Soderlund, The Greek Text of Jeremiah: A Revised Hypothesis (Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1985). 18 For instance, see chap. 4, §§4.3–4 below. 19 See discussion in Shead, The Open Book and the Sealed Book, 18–20. 20 Discriminating between possible explanations is often left to the judgment of the critic, and thus humility is imperative. When variant readings of a single word, phrase, or verse are synonymous it is usually impossible, and unnecessary, to determine which is more original; cf. Talmon, “Synonymous Readings in the Textual Traditions of the Old Testament.” For distinguishing categories of textual variants, see: Justus Theodore

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For the purposes of this study, it is not necessary to reconstruct the entire text of Jer+n. Simply adopting the conceptual framework of a textual genealogy consisting of an earlier common ancestor ( Jer+n) and two distinct lines (V G and V M) is sufficient. It allows one to distinguish later doublets—those found in V M only—from earlier doublets—those found in V M and V G and thus constituent of Jer+n. Secondarily, this conceptual framework aids in the reconstruction of the text of a given doublet at the moment of duplication. As discussed in the following chapter, a doublet’s text is not necessarily fixed but may evolve after the moment of duplication, acquiring post-duplication alternations via scribal error or creative license. Prior to analyzing a given doublet, then, one must reconstruct the text of both doublet twins at the moment of duplication. The textual genealogy described in this section assists in this task. Through cross examining the text of each doublet twin in both M and G (and other witnesses where available) and comparing all witness of each twin to each other, patterns of agreement and disagreement emerge that help enable the recovery of the doublet’s original wording. 4

Describing the Final Literary Stages of Book of Jeremiah

Analysis of the final literary stages of Jeremiah after Jer+n is facilitated by the survival of two distinct forms of the book, M and G.21 These forms differ in at least four significant ways: (1) The form of Jeremiah found in M is 16.6% longer than the form represented by G;22 (2) a substantial section of Jeremiah—the Oracles against the Nations (OAN)—found in the middle of G, stands near the end of M; (3) the individual oracles of the OAN also come in a different order in G and M; (4) both forms of Jeremiah contain similar kinds of smallscale pluses.23 The number of such pluses in each form varies significantly: M

21

22 23

Ghormley, “Scribal Revision,” 161–86; cf. Eugene C. Ulrich, The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Developmental Composition of the Bible, VTSup 169 (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 40. For a brief history of scholarship on the two forms of Jeremiah, see Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 1–9; Young-Jin Min, “The Minuses and Pluses of the LXX Translation of Jeremiah as Compared with the Massoretic Text: Their Classification and Possible Origins,” (Ph.D. diss., Hebrew University, 1977), 2–15; more recently see, Richard D. Weis, “7.1 Textual History of Jeremiah.” Pages 495–513 in Textual History of the Bible, Volume 1B: Pentateuch, Former and Latter Prophets. Edited by Armin Lange and Emanuel Tov. Leiden: Brill, 2016. Min, “The Minuses and Pluses of the LXX Translation of Jeremiah,” 1. I use the words “plus” and “minus” neutrally to refer to quantitative variants and do not intend by them to imply which is more original.

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contains a much higher quantity of pluses than G. The significance of these small-scale pluses is discussed below (chap. 4, §§3–4). The differences between M and G can be explained in multiple ways: (#1) the Vorlage of M (V M) could represent an expanded and reordered form of a more original and shorter Hebrew text lying behind G (V G); Conversely, (#2) V M could be more original, while G could represent an abbreviated and rearranged version of V M. If (#2), then either (a) the translators of Jeremiah abbreviated and restructured Jeremiah in the process of making their translation,24 or (b) they used a previously abbreviated and reordered form of the Hebrew text of Jeremiah as the basis of their translation. A fourth possibility—involving a large-scale copying error—could be considered, but this possibility is not a viable explanation. For instance, one could attempt to explain all of the minuses of G as occasions of haplography either by a Hebrew scribe or by the Septuagint translators.25 This strategy is showcased by J. Lundbom, who operates with the assumption that simply demonstrating the possibility of haplography proves the fact of haplography.26 While 24

25 26

This view was first espoused by Gottlieb L. Spohn, Ieremias Vates e versione Iudaeorum, Alexandrinorum ac reliquorum interpretum graecorum emendatus notisque criticis illustratus, 2 vols. (Leipzig: Breitkopf, 1794); and first challenged by Movers, De utriusque recensionis vaticiniorum Ieremiae: Graecae Alexandrinae et Hebraicae Masorethicae, indole et origine commentatio critica (Hamburg: F. Perthes, 1837), who defended the primacy of G. In the second half of the nineteenth century, the idea of an abridging translator was defended by Karl H. Graf, Der Prophet Jeremia (Leipzig: T.O. Weigel, 1862) and Friedrich Giesebrecht, Das Buch Jeremia (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1894); see discussion in Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 1–9. In recent years, the main champion for considering the short form of Jeremiah in G as the product of an abridging translator is Georg Fischer; e.g. idem, “Jer 25 und die Fremdvölkersprüche: Unterschiede zwischen hebräischem und griechischem Text,” Bib 72 (1991): 474–99; idem, “Zum Text des Jeremiabuches,” Bib 78 (1997): 305–28; idem, Jeremia 1–25, HTKAT (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 2005); cf. Arie van der Kooij, “Jeremiah 27:5–15: How Do MT and LXX Relate to Each Other?” JNSL 20 (1994): 59–78; Georg Fischer and Andreas Vonach, “Tendencies in the LXX version of Jeremiah,” in Der Prophet wie Mose: Studien zum Jeremiabuch (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2011), 64–72; and Konrad Schmid, Buchgestalten des Jeremiabuches: Untersuchungen zur Redaktions- und Rezeptionsgeschichte von Jer 30–33 im Kontext des Buches, WMANT 72 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1996). Note, the evaluation of Fischer’s argument in Hermann-Josef Stipp, Studien zum Jeremiabuch, 67–82. Discussed by Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 117–20. David N. Freedman and Jack R. Lundbom, “Haplography in Jeremiah 1–20,” in Frank Moore Cross Volume, ed. Baruch A. Levine et al., ErIsr 26 (Jerusalem: The Israel Exploration Society, 1999), 28–38; Jack R. Lundbom, Jeremiah 1–20: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, AB 21a (New York: Doubleday, 1999), 885–7; idem, Jeremiah 37–52: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, AB 21c (New York: Doubleday, 2004),

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few doubt that at least some of these minuses did result from haplography, the sheer number of minuses found in G far exceeds the amount which could be reasonably explained as stemming from copying error. In a majority of cases, it is impossible to establish with certainty that haplography in fact occurred. In my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets in the next chapter, I consider possible instances of haplography on a case-by-case basis. When adjudicating between the three remaining possible solutions, it should be noted that for scribal practice, preservation and expansion—rather than abridgment—is the rule.27 This is not to say that scribes never shorten their texts, but that by default texts tend to grow in the hands of scribes and are abridged only on exceptional occasions. Textual expansion, in contrast, may occur either gradually or rapidly depending on the scribe and the circumstance at hand. With regard to Jeremiah, if the pluses of V M are due to expansion (explanation #1 above), such expansion may have arisen all at once through large-scale revision, gradually through incremental revision, or through some combination of both large-scale revision and smaller-scale, incremental revision. In contrast, if the pluses of V M attest to an older Hebrew form of Jeremiah that has been intentionally abridged in V G (explanation #2b), the only likely explanation is that this abridgement is entirely the result of a single moment of revision. This is to say, given the default tendency of scribes to expand their texts, it is extremely unlikely that such abridgement would have resulted gradually over many generations of manuscripts. In what follows, I weigh the three possible explanations described above, considering four kinds of evidence: first, the translation quality of G; second, the witness of the Dead Sea Scrolls; third, the secondary nature of the pluses in

27

549–63; idem, “Haplography in the Hebrew Vorlage of LXX Jeremiah,” HS 46 (2005): 301–20. Cf. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 9, 191 n. 35; David M. Carr, The Formation of the Hebrew Bible: A New Reconstruction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011). Carr discusses many examples from the ancient Near East of the tendency of scribes to preserve texts even as they expand them; for example, the tendency towards expansion is seen in the development of the Gilgamesh Epic, ibid., 40–48. Here Carr summarizes and builds on the research of many earlier studies including, Jerrold S. Cooper, “Gilgamesh Dreams of Enkidu: The Evolution and Dilution of Narrative,” in Essays in the Ancient Near East in Memory of Jacob Joel Finkelstein, ed. Maria deJong Ellis (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1977), 39–44; Jeffrey H. Tigay, Evolution of the Gilgamesh Epic (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982); Andrew R. George, The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts, 2 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003). Carr, The Formation of the Hebrew Bible, 48–56, also discusses the scribal preservation and expansion of biblical law texts in the Temple Scroll.

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V M; and fourth, the character of what Hermann-Josef Stipp calls the “prämasoretischen Idiolekt.” 4.1 First Consideration: Translation Quality of G To begin, good reasons exist for doubting the possibility of #2a—that the translators of G intentionally abbreviated their Hebrew text. Such doubt arises from an appreciation of the literal and largely consistent character of the translators’ translation technique. Measuring the translation technique of the books of the Septuagint—Jeremiah included—is relatively straight forward. As Tov explains, translations in the Septuagint range from highly “literal” to highly “free.”28 A highly literal Greek translation of a Hebrew text is marked by the following criteria:29 (1) internal consistency—a rendering of “all occurrences of a given Hebrew word, element (e.g. preposition), root or construction as far as possible by the same Greek equivalent” resulting in a text full of stereotyped language and Hebraisms;30 (2) an attempt to represent each constituent part of a Hebrew word by individual Greek equivalents; (3) an adherence to Hebrew word order against Greek convention; and, (4) the matching of each Hebrew element with one corresponding Greek element, so that the translation has a one-to-one relationship with its Vorlage.31 When applied to G, the criteria demonstrate that this translation is decidedly literal and consistent.32 Tov evaluates, “With the exception of passages in which the translator encountered linguistic difficulties, [Jeremiah] was rendered quite faithfully, and the prose sections of the translation may even be regarded as literal.”33 Numerous scholars concur with Tov’s evaluation.34 28 29 30 31 32

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Emanuel Tov, The Text-Critical Use of the Septuagint in Biblical Research, 2nd ed., rev. and enl. (Jerusalem: Simor, 1997), 17–20. Ibid., 20–24. Stipp Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 20–27, offers an extensive discussion of Hebraisms in G that confirm the translation’s literal character. Tov, The Text-Critical Use of the Septuagint in Biblical Research, also mentions a fifth criterion—“linguistic adequacy of lexical choices”—but this criterion is more subjective and so is not considered here. Albert Pietersma and Marc Saunders, “To the Reader of Ieremias,” in A New English Translation of the Septuagint and the Other Greek Translations Traditionally Included under that Title, ed. Albert Pietersma and Benjamin G. Wright (New York; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 876–81, 876, describe the norm of G’s translator as “isomorphism.” Emanuel Tov, “Exegetical Notes on the Hebrew Vorlage of the LXX of Jeremiah 27 (34),” ZAW 91 (1979): 75; cf. idem, “Some Aspects of the Textual and Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah,” in Le livre de Jérémie. Le prophète et son milieu. Les oracles et leur transmission, ed. Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, BETL 54 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1981), 148. E.g., Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 5–9, 87–115; idem, “A Critique of Sven Soderlund’s the Greek Text of Jeremiah: A Revised Hypothesis,” BIOSCS 22 (1989): 31–32;

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Given the translators’ commitment to producing a highly literal and consistent translation of their Hebrew text, the suggestion that the differences between G and M are due to deliberate alteration by the translators is not convincing.35 Tov writes: If a certain section was rendered in a free fashion, translational omissions and additions may be expected. On the other hand, if a certain translation unit was rendered faithfully, such omissions and additions are not to be expected. Consequently, if a faithfully rendered translation unit is nevertheless shorter than [M], its Vorlage was probably also shorter…. We should thus not expect that the translator of [Jeremiah], who adhered in general to the Hebrew, shortened his Vorlage substantially.36 Moreover, as J. Janzen explains, the translators clearly exerted much effort to represent the Hebrew text of Jeremiah as faithfully as possible even in places where that text was broken or awkward and would not make sense in Greek or where it contained unknown words that could only be transliterated.37 That the translators did not omit even these difficult passages seems to undermine the claim that they were at liberty to omit words and phrases of Jeremiah. In the same vein, it is highly unlikely that the translators used the moment of translation as an occasion for producing a better arrangement of the book’s chapters—e.g., relocating the OAN from the end of the book to the middle of chap. 25. Improving the major structural problems of the book was clearly not a concern for them: they faithfully reproduced their Hebrew Vorlage even with

35 36 37

Louis Stulman, The Other Text of Jeremiah: A Reconstruction of the Hebrew Text Underlying the Greek Version of the Prose Sections of Jeremiah, with English Translation (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1985), 8. Before Tov, the translation technique of G was defended by Movers, De utriusque recensionis vaticiniorum Ieremiae; Anton Scholz, Der masorethische Text und die LXX-Übersetzung des Buches Jeremias (Regensburg: G.J. Manz, 1875); George C. Workman, The Text of Jeremiah; Or, a Critical Investigation of the Greek and Hebrew, with the Variations in the LXX. Retranslated into the Original and Explained (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1889); Annesley W. Streane, The Double Text of Jeremiah (Massoretic and Alexandrian) Compared Together with an Appendix on the Old Latin Evidence (Cambridge: Deighton Bell, 1896). Shead, The Open Book and the Sealed Book, 18–20, offers an insightful discussion about the problems of assessing the translation quality of G. This argument was first put forward by Scholz, Der masorethische Text und die LXXÜbersetzung bersetzung des Buches Jeremias; see discussion in Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 5–6. Tov, “Exegetical Notes,” 75. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 6; cf. Scholz, Der masorethische Text und die LXXÜbersetzung des Buches Jeremias.

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its striking chronological discrepancies and largely incoherent structure.38 All this to say, the major differences in length and order must have already existed in the Vorlage of G (V G). 4.2 Second Consideration: Evidence from the Dead Sea Scrolls This deduction—that a shorter Hebrew text of Jeremiah stands behind G—is partially corroborated by the discovery of Hebrew manuscripts of Jeremiah among the Dead Sea Scrolls, namely 4Q71 (= 4QJerb) and, to a more limited degree, 4Q72a (= 4QJerd). Although fragmentary, 4Q71 and 4Q72a present a Hebrew text that agrees in some details with the shorter form of Jeremiah found in the Septuagint.39 This discovery—along with an appreciation of G’s consistent and literal translation quality—convinced many that a shorter Hebrew text does in fact stand behind G, and thus laid to rest the possibility that the translators abbreviated the text themselves.40 Renewed appreciation 38 39

40

John Bright, Jeremiah: Introduction, Translation, and Notes, AB 21 (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1965), lvi, describes the structure of Jeremiah as “a hopeless hodgepodge thrown together without any discernible principle at all.” Most significantly, the fragment 4Q71 appears to preserve an older, shorter version of the beginning of Jeremiah 10 that seems to agree with G’s verse order against M. See William McKane, “The History of the Text of Jeremiah 10,1–16,” in Mélanges bibliques et orientaux en l’honneur de M Mathias Delcor, ed. A. Caquot, S. Légasse, and M. Tardieu, AOAT 215 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1985), 297–304. Both fragments, 4Q71 and 4Q72a, offer at best a complicated corroboration of the Hebrew Vorlage of G. See summary in Tov, “The Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah in Light of Its Textual History,” 363–4: “4QJerb,d [4Q71, 72a] share seven minuses with [G], two of which are long (10:6–8, 10), and five short (mainly names) … two minuses of [G] are not shared with 4QJerb,d…. At the same time, 4QJerb,d are not identical to the reconstructed Vorlage of [G]. In addition to the three minuses of [G] which are not shared with 4QJerb,d, the scrolls agree with MT against [G] in five details, and they also contain some unique readings found in neither [G] nor MT. While 4QJerb,d are thus not identical to the Vorlage of [G], the existence of such a short and differently ordered Hebrew version of Jeremiah, coupled with the fact that the translator of Jeremiah was relatively literal and not likely to have made such changes himself, confirms the assumption that [G] of Jeremiah was based on a short Hebrew Vorlage, similar to 4QJerb,d.” I would add that all five of the agreements with M against G are insignificant or synonymous variants of exactly the sort that one would expect to find if scribes were relying (at least in part) on a mental text of Jeremiah when producing a new copy. These fragments are also discussed in: Emanuel Tov, “The Jeremiah Scrolls from Qumran,” RevQ 14 (1989): 189–206; idem, “Three Fragments of Jeremiah from Qumran Cave 4,” RevQ 15 (1992): 531–41; idem, “Some Aspects of the Textual and Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah,” 146–8; idem, “The Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah in Light of Its Textual History,” 363–4; George Brooke, “The Book of Jeremiah and Its Reception in the Qumran Scrolls,” 184–7; the critical texts of 4Q71 and 4Q72a are found in Ulrich, DJD 15. This conclusion is shared by many of Jeremiah’s commentators, e.g., Carroll, The Book of Jeremiah, 51; Jan de Waard, A Handbook on Jeremiah, TCT 2 (Winona Lake, IN:

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for the agreement between 2 Kgs 25 and the short text of Jer 52 in G added confidence to this conclusion.41 For a minority, however, the fragmentary quality of the Qumran witness leaves the question open. These fragments could be anything, from a loose citation or some form of excerpted text, and do not necessarily indicate the existence of an entire scroll of Jeremiah containing a shorter text roughly equivalent to G.42 Moreover, other fragments from Qumran, 2Q13 (=2QJer), 4Q70 (= 4QJera), and 4Q72 (= 4QJerc), attest to the antiquity of the text lying behind M, i.e., V M.43 Could not 4Q71 and 4Q72a be aberrations whose similarity with the Septuagint is merely coincidental? One reason many scholars are inclined to give weight to 4Q71 and 4Q72a as evidence for a short form of Jeremiah is their growing appreciation of the existence of what E. Ulrich describes as “variant-literary editions” for many of the books of Hebrew scripture.44 It appears that multiple forms of these books were simultaneously in circulation—as authoritative scripture—among

41

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43 44

Eisenbrauns, 2003), xxii; Leslie C. Allen, Jeremiah: A Commentary, 1st ed., OTL (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 7–8. E.g., Movers, De utriusque recensionis vaticiniorum Ieremiae; Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 3, 69, 109–11; Tov, “Exegetical Notes,” 75–76; Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 69, also notes striking agreement in the presentation of names not only between Jer 52 and 2 Kgs 25, but also between the latter and Jer 40:7–9 and 41:1–4; cf. Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 89–90. Brent A. Strawn, “Excerpted Manuscripts at Qumran: Their Significance for the Textual History of the Hebrew Bible and the Socio-Religious History of the Qumran Community and Its Literature,” in The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls, Vol. 2: Dead Sea Scrolls and the Qumran Community, ed. James H. Charlesworth, PSJCO 2 (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2006), 141–2, writes, “If, due to the state of preservation, we cannot be sure a smallsized scroll is truly excerpted, then we also cannot be sure, given the existence of the excerpted documents (as both manuscripts and genre), that it is not excerpted” (emphasis in original); and if excerpted, the text-critical value of the biblical text therein is uncertain. A fifth fragment, 4Q72b (=4QJere), is too small to be analyzed. The critical texts of these manuscripts are found in Ulrich, DJD 15. Among his many publications on the subject, see Eugene C. Ulrich, “Double Literary Editions of Biblical Narratives and Reflections on Determining the Form to Be Translated,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Origins of the Bible, SDSS (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1999), 34–50; idem, “The Community of Israel and the Composition of the Scriptures,” in The Quest for Context and Meaning: Studies in Biblical Intertextuality in Honor of James A. Sanders, ed. Craig A. Evans and Shemaryahu Talmon (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 334; idem, “Our Sharper Focus on the Bible and Theology Thanks to the Dead Sea Scrolls,” CBQ 66 (2004): 1–24; Frank Moore Cross, The Ancient Library of Qumran and Modern Biblical Studies, rev. ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1980), 138–42, first suggested the existences of three early “recensions of the Old Testament.” Cf. the list of double editions in Julio

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ancient Jewish communities. In other words, the reception of a religious text as authoritative scripture did not necessitate the fixing of that book’s structure or content. Both continued to be in flux—to different degrees for different books—as scriptural books were preserved and handed down by believing communities even into the late Second Temple period. In what has been called the post-Qumran paradigm of textual criticism,45 scholars no longer find it surprising or improbable that books such as Jeremiah would exist in two markedly different forms. Furthermore, this paradigm has “resurrected” the value of the Septuagint as a “primary tool” for textual criticism (for books whose Septuagint translation is highly literal).46 On this point, Janzen writes: Current studies based on the biblical manuscripts from Qumrân are presenting a new picture of the history of the biblical text in its broad outlines and are vindicating the method which seeks to use the Septuagint as a witness to a text tradition at times divergent from [M]. As a result the whole approach which minimizes the divergence between [G and M], and seeks to explain divergent Greek readings as resulting from transmission technique or Tendenz, is seriously called into question.47

Trebolle Barrera, The Jewish Bible and the Christian Bible an Introduction to the History of the Bible (Leiden: Brill, 1998), 393–404. In light of the concerns raised by John Van Seters, The Edited Bible: The Curious History of the “Editor” in Biblical Criticism (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2006), it may be preferable to refer to these variant version not as “editions” but perhaps as variant-literary “textforms,” or simply variant-literary “versions.” 45 Cf. Eugene C. Ulrich, The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Developmental Composition of the Bible, 15–27; idem, “The Evolutionary Composition of the Hebrew Bible,” in Editing the Bible Assessing the Task Past and Present, ed. John S. Kloppenborg and Judith H. Newman (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 23; for an early reflection on this shift see, Shemaryahu Talmon, “Aspects of the Textual Transmission of the Bible in the Light of Qumran Manuscripts,” Text 4 (1964): 95–99. 46 Thus, Cross, The Ancient Library of Qumran and Modern Biblical Studies, 132, in reference to the “historical books,” though equally applicable to the book of Jeremiah. Emanuel Tov, “The Nature of the Large-Scale Differences Between the LXX and MT S T V, Compared with Similar Evidence in Other Sources,” in The Earliest Text of the Hebrew Bible: The Relationship between the Masoretic Text and the Hebrew Base of the Septuagint Reconsidered, ed. Adrian Schenker, SBLSCS 52 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 2003), 121–44, also argues for the value of the LXX as a witness to the early formation of the texts of the Hebrew Bible. 47 Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 7.

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Thus, while the evidence for a shorter Hebrew Vorlage of G is limited to a few fragments from the Dead Sea Scrolls (and the common readings found in 2 Kgs 25), the existence of variant literary editions for a sizeable number of Jewish scriptural books in antiquity has convinced most that these fragments do in fact represent a variant text of Jeremiah very similar to the Hebrew Vorlage standing behind G. 4.3 Third Consideration: The Secondary Nature of Pluses in V M Even if one is confident that G attests to a shorter Hebrew text of Jeremiah (V G), one must still determine whether this Vorlage is (#1) an earlier form of Jeremiah (when compared to V M), or (#2b) a later and abridged form of the book. Two kinds of evidence suggest the first possibility: the secondary nature of the pluses in V M (considered in this section) and the character of the prämasoretischen Idiolekt (considered in the next section). Noted above, both V M and V G contain many small-scale pluses. Janzen, in his seminal study on the text of Jeremiah, made two significant observations about these pluses.48 First, many of these pluses can be understood as textual expansions only. Most of these expansions fall into three categories of pluses: double readings, intra-Jeremianic harmonization (i.e., traditioning), and filledin names and titles. I will briefly discuss the first two here:49 (1) Janzen observed that a large number of the pluses of V M (between fortyfive and sixty-five) may be explained as double readings:50 i.e., readings that combine or conflate alternate wordings of the same bit of text from two or more manuscripts—or, from the scribe’s mental text, as I would emphasize.51 By definition, double readings are occasions of textual expansion.

48 49

50

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Ibid. Stipp’s, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, sorts examples of the third category—expanded names and titles—under the category of “abhängigen Sonderlesarten”; see discussion in the following pages of this section below. Janzen catalogues such expanded names and titles in, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 69–86 and Appendix A, 139–55. See also, Ghormley, “Scribal Revision,” 177–82. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 10–33; idem, “Double Readings in the Text of Jeremiah,” HTR 60 (1967): 433–47. For a discussion of double readings in the MT see Shemaryahu Talmon, “Double Readings in the Massoretic Text,” Text 1 (1960): 144–84; idem, “Synonymous Readings in the Textual Traditions of the Old Testament”; In idem, “Aspects of the Textual Transmission of the Bible in the Light of Qumran Manuscripts,” Talmon discusses double readings attested by the Dead Sea Scrolls. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 10, similarly notes the possibility of double readings being based upon the “memory of another reading.”

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(2) Janzen identified two hundred and twenty-five52 unique cases of intraJeremianic traditioning in the pluses of V M,53 where one passage is amplified or rewritten in light of the particular wording of a similar passage found within Jeremiah.54 I add that such rewriting may be intentional or accidental, caused by interference of the scribe’s mental text. In either case, as instances of traditioning, these pluses are once more, by definition, textual expansions. Second, Janzen observed that such expansions—double readings and traditioning, as well as filled-in names and titles—are found in both forms of Jeremiah, V M and V G.55 That both forms contain examples of the same kinds of expansions suggests that both developed independently from a common source, namely Jer+n.56 The higher frequency of these smaller expansions in V M when compared to that of V G invites the conclusion that V M is removed from Jer+n by many more generations of manuscripts than V G. Importantly, by recognizing the secondary nature of these kinds of pluses in the two Vorlagen, Janzen makes it possible to distinguish both Vorlagen from Jer+n. Whenever either V G or V M lacks a given expansion of this sort vis-à-vis the other, one may deduce that the shorter reading represents the wording of Jer+n. Stipp’s analysis of the pluses of V M provides further clarification to Janzen’s observations. Stipp subsumes instances of intra-Jeremianic traditioning under the larger category of abhängigen Sonderlesarten. By his analysis, most of the pluses of V M consist of such “dependent special readings” and fall into three kinds:57 (i) borrowings from nearby contexts, including the replacement of pronouns with antecedents and the expansions of names and titles;58 (ii) links 52 53 54 55 56

57 58

Ibid., 211 n. 83. Janzen, ibid., uses the language of “additions” or “expansions” taken from “parallel or related contexts,” rather than the language of “intra-Jeremianic harmonization” or “traditioning.” Ibid., 34–68. Ibid. Cf. the observations of Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 145. The presence of identical and similar filled-in names and titles in the two forms of Jeremiah is discussed in Ghormley, “Scribal Revision,” 177–82. This view was first considered by Franz Karl Movers, De utriusque recensionis vaticiniorum Ieremiae; cf. Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 59, who writes, “Er [V G] verkörpert im allgemeinen ein älteres Stadium der Textentwicklung, ist aber kein unmittelbarer Vorläufer des masoretischen Typs, sondern hat seit der Aufspaltung der Textüberlieferungsstränge ein geringes Maß an Umgestaltung erfahren, das bei der Rekonstruktion des gemeinsamen Ahnen ausgesondert werden muß.” Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 97–98. For his part, Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, devotes an entire chapter (69–86) and Appendix A (139–55) to expanded names and titles in V M. If these expansions consisted of a few examples only, then one could possibly explain these differences as accidental scribal omissions (69). Yet, because the number of expanded names in V M is quite

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to more distant parallel passages, consisting especially of formulaic language; and (iii) idiosyncratic elements, such as: Botenformeln, Gottesspruchformeln, substantial, only two explanations are plausible: (a) the fuller names of V M are evidence of extensive scribal growth—either due to limited, but ongoing, scribal expansion or to one moment of revision—or (b), the short names arose from a single, isolated moment of abridgment. Janzen offers a series of arguments in support of (a). He points to evidence from 2 Kings 25 and 4Q72a (4QJerd) of Hebrew texts that agree with G’s shorter name renderings against the long forms found in V M (69–70). This evidence, however, demonstrates only that the shorter Greek text of Jeremiah reflects a shorter Hebrew text. On its own, it does not settle the question of whether V M is expanded or V G abridged (For example, the shortened names of Jer 52:1–34 in V G could reflect the harmonization of this chapter toward 2 Kings 25:3–30 rather than a sign of V M’s expansion against 2 Kings 25 = Jeremiah 52.) More conclusive are Janzen’s reflections on the spelling of Nebuchadnezzar’s name in V M’s pluses (70) and on that text’s expansions of the divine name (75–86). With regard to the former, among the pluses of V M one finds two different spellings of Nebuchadnezzar’s name: (1) ‫נבוכדראצר‬, “Nebuchadrezzar” (with a resh in the penultimate syllable)—the name’s original orthography; and (2) ‫נבוכדנאצר‬, “Nebuchadnezzar” (with a nun replacing the first resh)—the later, more familiar Hebrew orthography—all of the occurrences of which are packed into couple of chapters (Jer 27:6, 8, 20; 28:3, 11, 14; 29:1, 3). Janzen cogently argues that the distribution of the two different orthographies reflects two distinct textual developments: the eight occurrences of the later orthography— clustered into a few chapters—probably stem from a later and isolated scribal reworking of these chapters. The filling in of Nebuchadrezzar’s name with the name’s original orthography, on the other hand, is likely the result of a more “sporadic process” (70). Moreover, as noted by Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 213, and Samuel R. Driver, An Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament (New York: C. Scribner’s, 1913), 272, these chapters of Jeremiah (27:1–29:19) contain nonstandard spellings of several names (‫ ירמיה‬for ‫ צדקיה ;ירמיהו‬for ‫ יכניה ;צדקיהו‬for ‫ חנניה ;יכניהו‬for ‫ ׁשמעיהו ;חנניהו‬for ‫)ׁשמעיהו‬, which also suggests that this section of Jeremiah was treated differently than its surrounding material. With regard to the latter, the title ‫צבאות‬, “of hosts,” occurs eighty-two times in V M; only ten of these eighty-two are also found in V G. Additionally, one finds ‫אלהי יׂשראל‬, “God of Israel,” attached to the divine name forty-nine times in V M; only fourteen of these forty-nine instances are represented by V G. Given the default scribal tendency to expand—as opposed to shorten—their texts, it seems very unlikely that the minuses of V G are a consequence of gradual scribal shortening. More likely is the possibility of a systematic shortening of the text by a solitary editing scribe within a single compositional moment. However, this possibility is not convincing. For if the minuses of V G represent a scribal abridgment of Jeremiah, one is left to wonder why the responsible scribe had the tenacity to eliminate seventy-three (V G contains one unique instance of ‫ צבאות‬in 30:20) occurrences of ‫ צבאות‬and thirty-five of ‫ אלהי יׂשראל‬but stopped short of removing all of them. Furthermore, it is difficult to imagine under what circumstances a scribe would erase the orthodox honorific ‫ צבאות‬at all, when its presence elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible is widespread. Janzen, ibid., 75, makes similar arguments against the possibility of attributing the shortened forms of the divine name to an abbreviating translator. In sum, the pluses to the divine name in V M are highly suggestive of scribal expansion.

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Gottesepitheta, Konjunktionen, Infinitivi absolute, Füllwörtern wie ‫ ֵלאמֹר‬, ‫ּכֹל‬, ‫ ִהּנֵ ה‬, ‫נָ א‬, ‫ עֹוד‬und anderem mehr (discussed in more detail below). The overall effect of these pluses, Stipp explains, is to lend the book of Jeremiah a higher degree of coherence. Stipp writes, “Die weitaus meisten abhängigen masoretischen Überschüsse lassen sich unter der Funktion subsummieren, die innere Kohärenz des Jeremiabuches zu steigern, indem vorhandenes Sprachmaterial an geeigneten Stellen vermehrt und Unebenheiten geglättet wurden.”59 For this reason, it is virtually inconceivable to consider these dependent pluses of V M as anything but expansions. The alternative explanation, that their absence in V G reflects abridgement, seems implausible since it would require an extremely random process of trimming that would result in a text that is less coherent and less smooth. Going beyond Janzen, Stipp offers further evidence of the secondary nature of the pluses of V M. First, he notes that around twenty of the abhängigen Sonderlesarten can be classified as Bearbeitungen which are readily explainable as intentional improvements to the text.60 While these Bearbeitungen span the breadth of the book, they lack coherence as a group.61 Beyond the general similarity of contributing to the coherence and smoothness of the text (functions which they share with abhängigen Sonderlesarten in general), these revisions do not form a coherent pattern or reflect a common motivation. They are isolated moments of revision each involving a few verses at most. For such reasons, these pluses in V M are easily explainable as small-scale revisions added to Jeremiah in the course of the book’s textual development. Once more, the alternative explanation, involving abridgment, is difficult to maintain. Since these pluses lack coherence as a group, the abridging scribe would in this scenario carry out an extremely random editing of the book—following no discernable rule but striking seemingly unproblematic phrases and words arbitrarily thereby producing a less coherent text. In addition to his analysis of V M’s unique Bearbeitungen, Stipp offers several further indicators of the secondary nature of the pluses of V M. For my purposes, a summary of these indicators will suffice: (1) several special readings of M are clearly disjunctive with their contexts;62 (2) others are grammatically

59 60 61 62

Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 130. Ibid., 66, 109–32. Stipp, ibid., 137, summarizes: “Regelrechte Bearbeitungen sind nach Zahl und Ertrag gering; sie modifizierten jeweils nur Einzelaspekte ihrer Vorlagen und lassen kein übergreifendes inhaltliches Konzept erkennen.” Ibid., 66–75.

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problematic;63 and, (3) certain special readings in M presuppose the relocation of the OAN.64 In summary, the lion’s share of pluses in V M (vis-à-vis V G) make sense only as expansions introduced non-systematically by scribes to shape Jeremiah into a more readable and coherent whole. Fourth Consideration: The Character of the prämasoretischen Idiolekt In his detailed textual analysis of the pluses of V M, Stipp noticed that a number of linguistic phenomena found in the special readings of M are unique to the pluses of V M and are often not found elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible.65 This prämasoretischer Idiolekt—consisting of Lexeme, Wortverbindungen, grammatische Konstruktionen and orthographische Besonderheiten—is rather substantial.66 Stipp counts eighty-seven different linguistic phenomena involving around two hundred sixty cases. About half of these—forty phenomena and about one hundred twenty-eight cases—are found exclusively in V M—i.e., they are found nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible. As is the case with the pluses of V M in general, there are three basic possible explanations for the prämasoretischen Idiolekt: it could reflect (1) expansions in V M, (2) deletions in V G, or (3) some combination of (1) and (2). To decide between the three, one must also determine to what degree such changes—whether arising from expansion or deletion—reflect intentional, systematic expansion or deletion as opposed to incidental, non-systematic expansion or deletion. Stipp makes two observations: first, as noted above, occurrences of the prämasoretische Idiolekt are very numerous; second, the Idiolekt, while widespread, lacks thematic cohesion. These observations rule out the possibility of non-systematic, haphazard deletion. Stipp explains, “Es ist unvorstellbar, dass Streichungen, ohne präzisen Plan durchgeführt, rein zufällig eine solche Masse an jeweils mehrfach belegten sprachlichen Eigentümlichkeiten beseitigt haben könnten.”67 Yet, Stipp’s observations also rule the possibility that systematic deletion could account 4.4

63

64 65 66 67

Ibid., 75–77. Here, I welcome the advice of Shead, The Open Book and the Sealed Book, 24, who—on the basis of “our imperfect knowledge of biblical Hebrew (a product of the small size of the body of surviving literature and the lack of native speakers)”—recommends caution in dismissing perceived difficulties in the Hebrew text. Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 84–87. Stipp first made this observation in ibid., 77–82. See idem, Studien zum Jeremiabuch, 59–67, 83–126 for Stipp’s fullest evaluation of the prämasoretischen Idiolekt as well as his most updated catalogue of the Idiolekt. Stipp, Studien zum Jeremiabuch, 61. Ibid.

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for the absence of the prämasoretischen Idiolekt in V G. Since the eighty-seven unique linguistic features constituent of the prämasoretischen Idiolekt are each categorically different from each other, the deletion of each would require its own rationale. Furthermore, for many linguistic features, there does not seem to be a compelling reason for deletion in the first place. Put succinctly, the lack of coherence of the different kinds of linguistic features of the Idiolekt precludes all systematic explanations. Stipp concludes, “Es ist daher das Manko aller Kürzungstheorien, dass der prämasoretische ldiolekt als Frucht weder systematischer noch unsystematischer Streichungen plausibel ist.”68 Taken together, the literal quality of the translation of G and the evidence of the Dead Sea Scrolls alongside the secondary nature of the pluses of V M and the widespread, but unsystematic, character of the prämasoretischen Idiolekt point in one clear direction: V M by and large represents a later and expanded version of Jeremiah (explanation #1 above). Even if copying error may account for some of the minuses in V G—which undoubtedly is the case—or if some minuses in V G originated from very occasional abridgment, the pluses of V M are almost entirely the work of revising scribes. Janzen concludes: The text of [V G] contains only a very small amount of secondary expansion. In the great majority of its zero variants, it preserves a text superior to that of [V M]. The evidence does not support the commonly held theory that the translator abridged his Vorlage, so that, except where scribal lapse is patent or must be assumed, [V G] may be taken as a substantially faithful witness to the Hebrew text at home in Alexandria.69 In a similar vein, Stipp writes: … [V G] repräsentiert insgesamt eine ältere Entwicklungsstufe des Buches, aber nicht so, dass sie dem masoretischen Typ in direkter Linie vorausliefe. Vielmehr hat sich die Texttradition aufgespalten, wobei ab dem Gabelungspunkt der masoretische Strang [V M] bis zu seinem Endstand noch beträchtlich weitergewachsen ist, während der alexandrinische Zweig [V G] bis zu seiner erhaltenen Gestalt nur noch schwache Modifikationen erfuhr, freilich auch derart, dass er diverse Schäden durch Parablepsen und Verschreibungen erlitt.70 68 69 70

Ibid., 62. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 128. Stipp, Studien zum Jeremiabuch, 58.

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Conclusion: Refining the Two-Editions Theory of Jeremiah

Soon after the publication of Janzen’s work, Tov offered a compelling interpretation of Janzen’s data that was widely adopted, an interpretation I call the Two-Edition Theory.71 Tov asserted that M represents a second “edition” of Jeremiah (edition II ≈ V M) which is almost entirely the work of a single “editor” (editor II) who expanded an earlier edition of Jeremiah (edition I)— more or less equal to Jer+n (≈ V G). Edition I is also the product of an editor (editor I), who may be the hypothetical Deuteronomistic editor of Jeremiah. Building on Janzen’s foundation, Tov provided a substantial catalogue of types of the pluses found in V M which he attributes to editor II.72 Importantly, this catalogue includes almost all the expansions of V M vis-à-vis Jer+n. Tov’s editor is also responsible for the different chapter arrangement of V M. As it appears today, Jeremiah is—by this theory—the product of two major and systematic revisions. While Tov’s Two-Edition Theory stands as a significant advancement in our understanding of the formation of Jeremiah, it requires some refinement.73 71

72 73

See esp. Tov, “Some Aspects of the Textual and Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah,” and idem, “The Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah in Light of Its Textual History.” The idea of considering the versions of Jeremiah as two separate editions was first articulated by Johann G. Eichhorn, Einleitung in das Alte Testament, vol. 4, 4th ed. (Göttingen: Rosenbusch, 1824), 170–222. Tov, “Some Aspects of the Textual and Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah”; idem, “The Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah in Light of Its Textual History.” The strength of the Two-Edition Theory is attested by the success of numerous studies that are built upon it: e.g., Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, “De Baruch à Jérémie: Les deux rédactions conservées du livre de Jérémie,” in Le livre de Jérémie. Le prophète et son milieu. Les oracles et leur transmission, ed. Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, BETL 54 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1981), 168–73; idem, “Les mécanismes rédactionnels en Jr. 10:1–16 (LXX et TM) et la signification des supplements,” in Le livre de Jérémie. Le prophète et son milieu. Les oracles et leur transmission, ed. Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, BETL 54 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1981), 222–38; idem, “La libération de Jérémie et le meurtre de Godolias: Le texte court (LXX) et la rédaction longue (TM),” in Studien zur Septuaginta—Robert Hanhart zu Ehren, ed. D. Fraenkel, U. Quast, and J.W. Wevers, MSU 20 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1990), 312–22; idem, “Urtext, texte court et relecture: Jérémie 33:14–26 TM et ses préparations,” in Congress Volume: Leuven, 1989, ed. John A. Emerton, VTSup 43 (Leiden: Brill, 1991), 236–47; Louis Stulman, “Some Theological and Lexical Differences between the Old Greek and the MT of the Jeremiah Prose Discourses,” HS 25 (1984): 18–23; McKane, “The History of the Text of Jeremiah 10,1–16”; A.R. Pete Diamond, “Jeremiah’s Confessions in the LXX and MT: A Witness to Developing Canonical Function?” VT 40 (1990): 33–50; Yohanan Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil: Les origines littéraires de la forme massorétique du livre de Jérémie, OBO 118 (Fribourg, Switzerland: Universitätsverlag, 1992); Johan Lust, “The Diverse Text Forms of Jeremiah and History Writing with Jer 33

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The formation of the two versions of Jeremiah undoubtedly involve some systematic revision—such as the relocation of the OAN; yet the conclusions of Janzen and Stipp suggest that V M, as well as V G, are not monolithic editions of Jeremiah, but are “snapshots”74 of an ongoing process of incremental revision.75 Janzen’s work established that many of the pluses of V M (double readings, intra-Jeremianic traditioning, and filled-in names and titles) are incremental, as a Test Case,” JNSL 20 (1994): 31–48; Anneli Aejmelaeus, “Jeremiah at the Turning-Point of History: The Function of Jer. XXV 1–14 in the Book of Jeremiah,” VT 52 (2002): 459–82; eadem, “‘Nebuchadnezzar, My Servant’: Redaction History and Textual Development in Jer 27,” in Interpreting Translation: Studies on the LXX and Ezekiel in Honour of Johan Lust, ed. Florentino García Martínez and Marc Vervenne, BETL 192 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2005), 1–18; Marvin A. Sweeney, “The Masoretic and Septuagint Versions of the Book of Jeremiah in Synchronic and Diachronic Perspective,” in Form and Intertextuality in Prophetic and Apocalyptic Literature, ed. Marvin A. Sweeney, FAT 45 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2005), 65–77. To spell out one example, in Jeremiah 10, V M includes a few extra verses praising Yhwh for Yhwh’s greatness (vv. 6–8, 10). As Emanuel Tov, “The Septuagint as a Source for the Literary Analysis of Hebrew Scripture,” in Exploring the Origins of the Bible: Canon Formation in Historical, Literary, and Theological Perspective, ed. Craig A. Evans and Emanuel Tov (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008), 37, explains, it is more “logical” that these verses were added than deleted. It is hard to imagine a scenario in which a scribe would deliberately erase lines of praise from a sacred text. Tov, ibid., 37, n. 18, points to examples in other texts where comparable doxologies are added. 74 Here, I borrow a term used by Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 140, to describe V G: this Vorlage is “… einer Blitzlichtaufnahme eines Körpers in Bewegung …” springing from “einem allmählichen, eher unsystematischen Wachstum.” This term seems equally descriptive of V M as V G. 75 Thus, this study takes a mediating position between Tov—who assigns virtually all textual changes to two “editors”—and McKane, who assigns all such changes to ongoing incremental revision: cf. McKane, Jeremiah, 1, lxxxi–lxxxii, who writes: “Here a comparison of MT and Sept. reveals how the Hebrew text has developed and shows that we are not encountering a systematic, comprehensive scheme of editing, but exegetical additions of small scope, operating within limited areas of text. This exegetical expansion or commentary is triggered by a verse or a few verses of pre-existing text, and it is this procedure which is indicated by the term ‘rolling corpus.’ Such triggering or generation necessarily has a piecemeal character: the pre-existing Hebrew text, as represented by Sept., has generated a kind of expansion which does not serve the ends of a thoughtful, all-embracing redaction or a superintending, theological tendency.” Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 140 advises against referring to V G and V M as “editions” but as “Revisionen” or “Rezensionen,” or even more neutrally “Textformen” or “Texttypen.” Criteria for distinguishing systematic and non-systematic insertions into Jeremiah are discussed in Ghormley, “Scribal Revision,” 171–7. These criteria help establish that Jeremiah is the end result of a complicated compositional process involving large-scale revision, independent small-scale revision, and a plethora of incremental revision.

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non-systematic insertions.76 Strengthening Janzen’s findings, Stipp demonstrates that both the Bearbeitungen of V M’s pluses as well as V M’s Idiolekt are a consequence of non-systematic expansion. While it is theoretically possible to ascribe every difference in V M vis-à-vis V G to one scribe acting in one composition moment—Tov’s editor II—the more likely and simpler explanation attributes such haphazard growth to a longer, more complicated process involving multiple scribes and different moments of revision.77 This conclusion is supported by the fresh perspective of ancient scribes and the formation of ancient texts discussed in chap. 2. Particularly on these matters, the Two-Edition Theory requires conceptual updating. It assumes a nowantiquated division of labor between “editors” who revise texts and “scribes” who simply copy them.78 As Tov wrote, “The anonymous author of edition II was not a scribe, as we are not dealing with scribal phenomena, but he was an editor who produced one of the stages of the literary growth of the book.”79 The division of labor assumed here reflects an earlier concern for distinguishing a text’s “literary” growth—by which “editions” are formed—from its textual transmission. On this point, Tov wrote: Editions … involve major changes, additions, and transpositions; the writers who produced them are termed editors. The textual transmission, performed by scribes for each edition, starts after that edition was

76

77

78

79

Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 86, summarizes that his analysis of V M’s double readings, intra-Jeremianic harmonization, and filled-in names and titles “… point[s] to the received text of Jeremiah [M] as the product of a long tradition of intense scribal activity, during which the text was reworked, clarified, and embellished.” Here Janzen uses the older (and now outdated) scribal-verses-editorial paradigm. By “scribal,” Janzen seems to mean non-systematic and incremental as opposed to systematic editing. Furthermore, as Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, argues, several pluses of M are idiosyncratic and incongruent, and thus difficult to ascribe to one hand; for example, the nearby pluses of 29:14 and 29:16–20 are incompatible; see ibid., 121–2. One could also add that the use of the term “editor” in modern scholarship is problematic. As Van Seters explains, the term often carries anachronistic assumptions about how modern editors work and the modern editing process; see: John Van Seters, The Edited Bible; cf. idem, “The Genealogy of the Biblical Editor,” in Editing the Bible: Assessing the Task Past and Present, ed. John S. Kloppenborg and Judith H. Newman (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 9–22, where Van Seters explains that the terms edition and editor are used inconsistently in modern scholarship and may refer to a variety of entities. Emanuel Tov, “Some Aspects of the Textual and Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah,” 151.

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completed. Scribes involved in this process did insert changes into the text, but to a smaller degree than editors.80 Here, Tov may seem to concede at least a small creative role to “scribes.” Yet, by “changes” inserted by scribes Tov appears to mean interventions only on the level of spelling and grammar and perhaps the occasional gloss. More significant differences between G and M are ascribed to editor II. These significant differences presumably include the nonsystematic, small-scale Bearbeitungen identified by Stipp as well as the large quantity of double readings, intraJeremianic traditioning, and name and title expansions cataloged by Janzen. When one appreciates the creative nature of scribal practice—particularly when literary or divinatory texts are in hand—automatically distinguishing editor from scribe or literary growth from textual transmission is unnecessary. Following Stipp, the two versions of Jeremiah—V G and V M—are best understood as snapshots of a more complicated process of textual growth involving some systematic revision—such as the relocation of the OAN—as well as many non-systematic revisions, such as Stipp’s Bearbeitungen, in addition to a plentiful amount of ongoing, incremental revision such as the textual changes identified by Janzen. Finally, the scholar must acknowledge his or her inability to determine how many scribes—one or many—were responsible for the various revisions and insertions that compose V M. In my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets in the following chapter, I assume this more complicated, refinement of the Two-Edition Theory. I do not, for example, presume that all the later doublets—those found in V M only—were added by a single “editor,” i.e., a duplicating scribe. In fact, an analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets reinforces the impression that the book formed through a more complicated process of textual growth. Thus, I leave open the possibility that each doublet may have an idiosyncratic origin. 80

Emanuel Tov, “The Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah in Light of Its Textual History,” 364, n. 6 (emphasis original).

chapter 5

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah A comparison of the two surviving forms of Jeremiah reveals that scribes frequently expanded the book through duplication. The earlier form of Jeremiah—i.e., the common text lying behind G and M ( Jer+n)—already contained around twenty-nine doublets;1 and among the pluses of later form—i.e., the Vorlage of M (V M)—one counts another five to seven more.2 In other words, the scribes who created the “later” doublets of V M were simply continuing a scribal practice utilized numerous times in the production of Jer+n. Examining these doublets offers first-hand evidence of how Jewish scribes created and shaped revelatory texts. The results of this chapter strongly suggest that scribes used duplication as a tool of textual divination, to discover new revelation out of existing records of divination. Each doublet marks an occasion when a scribe found a secondary application of existing verse and— through insertion of that verse into a secondary context—generated new revelation via vertical reading and occasionally through harmonization. In these ways, the duplicating Jewish scribes appear to play a similar divinatory role in ancient Judea as scribal scholars played in the ancient Near East. In the following chapter, I will lay out my argument for this conclusion. For now, 1 Various lists of Jeremiah’s doublets have been compiled; see for example: Jean Daniel Macchi, “Les doublets dans le livre de Jérémie,” in The Book of Jeremiah and Its Reception: Le livre de Jérémie et sa réception (Peeters: Leuven University Press, 1997), 120; Macchi mentions earlier lists compiled by Samuel R. Driver, An Introduction to the Literature of the Old Testament (New York: C. Scribner’s, 1913), 276–7, and Franz D. Hubmann, Untersuchungen zu den Konfessionen: Jer 11, 18–12, 6 und Jer 15, 10–21 (Würzburg: Echter Verlag, 1978), 219–20, 225. More recently, see: Geoffrey H. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah: Doublets and Recurring Phrases (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000). The twenty-nine “early” doublets of Jer+n are: 1:18–19 // 15:20; 2:26b, 27b // 32:32b–33a; 4:4b // 21:12b; 5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8; 6:22–24 // 50:41–43; 7:6 // 22:3; 7:16 // 11:14; 7:30–32 // 19:5–6,11 // 32:34– 35; 7:34 // 16:9 // 25:10 // 33:10a, 11a; 8:2b // 16:4a // 25:33; 8:15 // 14:19b; 9:14 // 23:15a; 10:12–16 // 51:15–19; 11:20 // 20:12; 11:23b // 23:12b // 48:44b; 16:14–15 // 23:7–8; 17:25 // 22:4; 18:16 // 19:8 // 49:17 // 50:13; 21:9 // 38:2; 21:14b // 50:32b; 23:19–20 // 30:23–24; 26:3 // 36:3; 32:4 // 34:3; 32:44 // 33:13 // 17:26; 34:22a // 37:8; 49:18 // 50:40; 49:19–21 // 50:44–46; 49:26 // 50:30; 50:23b // 51:41b. Not included in this count are the book’s twenty-five extra-Jeremianic doublets, i.e. external doublets shared by Jeremiah and another biblical book: see list in See Parke-Taylor, ibid., 213–42. 2 The five certain later doublets are: 6:13–15 // 8:10b–12; 23:5–6 // 33:14–16; 30:10–11 // 46:27–28; 48:40b, 41b // 49:22; 39:4–10 // 52:7–16. Two more doublets—15:12–14 // 17:1–4; 24:8–10 // 29:16–20—may be additions of V M or may have been lost through haplography.

© Justus Theodore Ghormley, 2022 | doi:10.1163/97890

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I offer in this chapter an examination of a sampling of doublets from these last two stages (or better, “snapshots”) of the formation of Jeremiah. I begin with Jeremiah’s later doublets—those found in V M alone—and then turn to consider Jeremiah’s earlier doublets—those found in Jer+n.3 For each doublet, I analyze the scribe’s duplication technique, the rationale for duplication, and the interpretive function of the duplicate in its (new) context. Before turning to my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets, I begin with a brief discussion of my methodology. First, doublets must be identified and distinguished from repetitious language in general. Each doublet consists of two textual units, or twins: the original twin and the secondary, duplicate twin. In describing two texts as a doublet, I am asserting that one of the two texts was created through the intentional copying of the other. This is to say, duplication is a conscious reproduction of a specific text. In this study, duplication does not refer to the scribal practice of creating a text out of bits of traditional diction and phrasing that accidently resembles another text made from this same traditional material.4 To be considered a doublet, the two texts must fall within certain parameters of length and similitude.5 With regard to length, to be considered a conscious reproduction of a specific text, the repeated text should consist of at least one verse roughly speaking. Jeremiah contains a plethora of shorter repetitions that are only a few words in length.6 These repetitions 3 This order follows the rule that when reconstructing the formation of a text, one should begin with textual additions supported by actual manuscript variants (e.g., the doublets unique to V M) before discussing potential additions inferred by literary features alone (e.g., the doublets of Jer+n); chap. 4, n. 16. 4 For example, I do not count the plus of Jer 11:7–8—found only in M—as a doublet though it bears a close resemblance to a few texts found elsewhere in Jeremiah. William L. Holladay, Jeremiah 1: A Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, Chapters 1–25, Hermeneia (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986), 346, sees the plus as a secondary expansion based on vv. 4–5. John Gerald Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1973), 39–40, 94, explains it as a duplication of Jer 7:24–26 and of “Deuteronomistic language elsewhere.” The problem is that 11:7–8 does not just resemble one text from somewhere else in Jeremiah, e.g. 7:24–26; it rather consists almost entirely of traditional Jeremianic and Deutero-Jeremianic language found throughout the book of Jeremiah. Cf. Louis Stulman, The Prose Sermons of the Book of Jeremiah: A Redescription of the Correspondences with Deuteronomistic Literature in the Light of Recent Text-Critical Research, SBLDS 83 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1986), 64–65; Wilhelm Rudolph, Jeremia, HAT 12 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1947), 67. 5 For a discussion on the definition of a doublet, see: Macchi, “Les doublets dans le livre de Jérémie,” 119–20. 6 For example, ‫תעלה אין לך‬, “there is no healing for you” (Jer 30:13; 46:11) and ‫כי־אתך אני‬ ‫)להוׁשיעך( להצלך‬, “for I am with you to rescue you (save you)” (Jer 1:8; 1:17 (G); 1:19; 15:20; 30:11; 42:11; 46:28). Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, describes such short repetitions as “recurring phrases.”

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are too short to establish the literary dependence of one occurrence of a given phrase upon another. With regard to similitude, the similarity of two texts must be strong enough to establish literary dependence. Duplication often creates doublet twins significantly different from each other (see discussion below). When the disparity between the two texts of a potential doublet is too great, there is not sufficient similitude to conclude that one text is directly based on the other and thus is a duplicate. Second, when a repetition is identified as a doublet, one must determine which doublet twin is the original and which is the duplicate. One must also establish the text of each doublet twin at the moment of duplication. For the text of each twin was not necessarily stable, but on some occasions likely developed and changed after the moment of duplication. Toward these ends, for each doublet, I offer a synopsis containing the Greek and Hebrew texts of both twins.7 Following each synopsis, I provide a textual analysis of all significant variants—both those existing between G and M and those existing between the original twin and its duplicate. I distinguish six categories of variants:8 1. Copying error 2. Non-significant variation: minor variations that fluctuate in the course of a text’s transmission and which typically have no real significance in meaning. Non-significant variants include differences in orthography, the addition and subtraction of minor elements like conjunctions and the direct object marker, and some variations in singular and plural and in masculine and feminine. In general, this study will not discuss nonsignificant variation. 3. Post-duplication harmonization (PDHarm): occasions when scribes— after the moment of duplication—harmonized doublet twins with each other thereby heightening their similitude. When the texts of doublet 7 For G, I use Joseph Ziegler, ed., Jeremias, Baruch, Threni, Epistula Jeremiae, vol. 15 of Septuaginta (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2013). For M, I use BHS. Other textual witness, such as the Dead Sea Scrolls, will be considered within the textual notes. The fragments of the book of Jeremiah from the Dead Sea Scrolls may be found in Eugene C. Ulrich, ed., Qumran Cave 4.X: The Prophets (DJD 15; Oxford: Clarendon, 1997): 145–207. The Greek text of each doublet is often the earliest textual witness of the doublet. Since the Septuagint is based on a Hebrew Vorlage (V G) that differs from the Hebrew Vorlage of M (V M), wherever the readings of G and M of a given doublet twin agree, one can be fairly confident that their agreement reflects the text of Jer+n. Additionally, when one encounters differences between G and M of a given twin, it is often possible to arrive at plausible—and even probable—explanations for these differences and thereby establish the text of that twin; see chap. 4, §3. 8 These categories follow similar categories employed by Molly M. Zahn, Rethinking Rewritten Scripture: Composition and Exegesis in the 4QReworked Pentateuch Manuscripts (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 17–19.

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twins in M agree with each other against the witness of G, harmonization may be suspected. In such cases, the variant reading in G may preserve the original reading of its respective twin. 4. Minor synonymous variation: variation of one minor word or element— such as the addition or subtraction of a pronoun or the word ‫“ כל‬all”9— an insignificant change in verbal form or in the vocalization of a Hebrew root, or the transposition of a series of single words or short phrases. 5. Synonymous variation: the addition, omission, replacement, or transposition of the text’s wording that does not change the text’s meaning; i.e., it does not introduce, replace, or omit a reference to a concrete entity.10 Synonymous variation may be intentional or accidental. 6. Minor and major innovation: the addition or replacement (or less often, the omission) of the text’s wording that changes the text’s meaning: i.e., that introduces and/or omits a concrete reference to a person, place, thing, or idea. Innovation is more likely than synonymous variation to be intentional, and thus offers insight into the scribe’s motivations. Such innovation may be minor or major. A minor innovation, while modifying the text’s referents in some way, does not alter the text’s meaning or function radically but complements the text’s existing meaning and function. A major innovation, in contrast, changes the meaning of the text in a radical way, so that the original function of the doublet is replaced. In addition to distinguishing these categories of variation, the textual analysis also marks occasions when additions in the text of a duplicate are intraJeremianic (added from elsewhere in Jeremiah) or intra-scriptural (added from elsewhere in Hebrew scripture).11 Third, on the basis of each textual analysis, I present a translation of each doublet at the moment of duplication and offer an assessment of the doublet’s duplication technique. Scribes enjoyed a range of creative license when creating a duplicate—from verbatim repetition to creative adaptation. The range of creative license practiced by scribes may be mapped onto two different, albeit related, spectra: adherence to the original text’s wording; and adherence to the original text’s meaning. Adherence to wording and adherence to meaning do not necessarily correspond to each other. For instance, doublet twins may be very dissimilar in terms of wording but nearly identical in terms of 9 10 11

For fluctuations of the word ‫ כל‬in the manuscripts of Jeremiah, see discussion in John Gerald Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1973), 65–67. See discussion of synonymity chap. 2, §1. See discussion of intra-Jeremianic and intra-scriptural traditioning chap. 2, §1.

82 table 1

chapter 5 Scribal duplication techniques

Adherence to meaning

Adherence to wording

Repetition (no change in meaning) Verbatim duplication (word-for-word duplication) Loose citation duplication (some synonymous variation) Paraphrastic duplication (more synonymous variation)

Minor adaptation

Verbatim repetition Verbatim repetition with minor adaptation

Major adaptation

Loose citation

Loose citation with minor adaptation

Verbatim repetition with major adaptation Loose citation with major adaptation

Paraphrase

Paraphrase with minor adaptation

Paraphrase with major adaptation

meaning (for example, see Jer 1:18–19 // Jer 15:20). Conversely, doublet twins may have almost identical wording but entirely different meanings (for example, see Jer 49:22 // Jer 48:40b, 41b). Since adherence to wording and adherence to meaning are distinct parameters, two distinct spectra are required for measuring scribal duplication technique. Table 1 maps the various duplication techniques utilized by Jeremiah’s scribes arranged according to adherence to wording and adherence to meaning. Regarding adherence to wording, scribes could produce an identical or nearly identical copy of their source, a technique which I label verbatim repetition. Aside from the expected “scribal noise”—such as non-significant variation and copying error, which arise inevitably as a text is transmitted—verbatim repetition produces a duplicate virtually identical to its twin, free from even minor synonymous variation.12 Moving down the vertical spectrum of the table, loose citation repetition reproduces the same meaning as the original while exhibiting minor 12

This technique may suggest something about the scribe’s intentions. Certainly, extra care was taken to replicate the original exactly. In comparison to the following modes of duplication, verbatim duplication may rely to a greater degree on the direct consultation of a written text—visually or aurally—rather than on memory.

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synonymous variation and very limited synonymous variation (roughly one instance per verse). If the synonymous variation of a given doublet is more substantial (two or more instances per verse), I classify the duplication technique as paraphrase.13 As noted above, when the disparity between the two texts of a potential doublet is too great, there is insufficient similitude to conclude that one text is directly based on the other, and thus cannot be identified as a duplicate. Each of the techniques of duplication defined above—verbatim, loose citation, and paraphrase—may be further parsed according to the scribe’s adherence to the source text’s meaning. When a duplicate twin strays from the meaning of its older sibling—introducing, omitting, or replacing a reference to a concrete entity—the duplicate no longer qualifies as a repetition but enters the realms of minor and major adaptation. Minor adaptions introduce some minor innovation, while major adaptions introduce at least one major innovation (and any amount of minor innovation). Finally, before turning to my analysis of the doublets, I offer here a brief comment on the role that literary features of a text should play in reconstructing the literary development of the text as appeals to literary features are frequently mustered to overcome the weight of apparent manuscript evidence. Attempts to reconstruct the literary history of a book like Jeremiah on the basis of observed literary features alone are often unsuccessful. For example, in wishing to adjudicate which twin of a doublet pair is more “original,” scholars often appeal to the degree to which a doublet twin fits or does not fit into its literary context.14 Sometimes, a twin is thought to be more “original” than its sibling simply because it coheres more convincingly in its immediate context. The assumption here is that a text would find itself repeated in a secondary context only through copying error or careless duplication, in which case the duplicate’s secondary status would be marked by its disjunction with its environment. However, one could just as easily argue the other way around. The twin that fits more snugly into its literary context is secondary, since: (1) a duplicate may be modified to fit the secondary context; (2) the secondary context may be modified in light of an inserted text; and (3) the suitability of the secondary context

13 14

The line between loose citation and paraphrase is not hard and fast. The difference between the two is a matter of degree, not kind. The point of distinguishing the two is to acknowledge that doublets display different amounts of synonymous variation. To give one example, with regard to the doublet of 15:12–14 // 17:1–4, William McKane, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Jeremiah. Volume 1: Introduction and Commentary on Jeremiah I–XXV, ICC (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1986), 384, calls 15:13–14: “a fragment of 17.1–4,” arguing that it “does not fit into the context of chapter 15….” Similarly, Allen, Jeremiah, 181 and 198, describes the text of the doublet as being “more at home” in chap. 17.

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may invite the insertion of a duplicate in the first place.15 As these counterarguments demonstrate, literary observations—such as the suitability of a doublet in its context—cannot on their own resolve questions of textual history. That said, literary observation can provide secondary, supporting evidence given the presence of stronger, primary evidence such as manuscript witnesses. 1

Text #1: From the Least to the Greatest, All Are Greedy (Jer 6:13–15 // Jer 8:10b–12)

1.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function I begin my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets by considering five doublets unique to V M and thus likely stemming from the final stages of the growth of the book. The first doublet—the doublet of Jer 6:13–15 // Jer 8:10b–12—illustrates how ancient Jewish scribes used duplication to tighten the coherence of the book of Jeremiah, drawing poetic text from one context (chap. 6) and copying it into a second, similar context (chap. 8).16 This is to say, the scribe created a secondary application of the text of 6:13–15. The doublet also exemplifies how duplication was used to interpret existing revelatory data through vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization. In this way, the duplicate generates new revelatory meaning within its (secondary) literary context. The original doublet twin—Jer 6:13–15—describes the widespread sin and deceit of the Judean people. Positioned after several oracles of doom (6:1–12), this description provides theological rationale for Judea’s impending destruction. A divining scribe transferred this description of evil conduct and its 15

16

In the analyses that follow, one finds certain examples of (1) and (3) and possible examples of (2). Every duplicate considered below (except the triplet of 5:9//5:29//9:8) was modified to fit its literary context. And, in several cases (e.g., 23:5–6 // 33:14–16) a strong argument can be made for considering the suitability of the secondary context as a primary reason for the duplication. Possible examples of (2) include the presence of the word ‫“ ׁשם‬name” in 33:9 (found in M but not G), which may have been inspired by the naming of the city in 33:16, and the word ‫“ גדלים‬great” in 50:9 (also found in M but not G), which may owe its existence to the occurrence of the singular form of this word in 50:41. Since Jer 8:10b–12 is not found in G and there is no trigger for haplography, Jer 8:10b–12 is most likely the duplicate; Cf. Jack R. Lundbom, “Haplography in the Hebrew Vorlage of LXX Jeremiah,” HS 46 (2005): 301–20; David N. Freedman and Jack R. Lundbom, “Haplography in Jeremiah 1–20,” in Frank Moore Cross Volume, ed. Baruch A. Levine et al., ErIsr 26 (Jerusalem: The Israel Exploration Society, 1999); McKane, Jeremiah 1, 146–7, and Robert P. Carroll, Jeremiah: A Commentary, OTL (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986), 197, include Jer 6:12 ≈ 8:10a as a part of the doublet on the basis of their similarities (detailed below). However, since 8:10a is represented in G and M while 8:10b–12 is found in M only, the latter must come from a different stage of textual development than the former.

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accompanying theological rationale to chap. 8 by means of duplication. The opening verses of chap. 8 (vv. 1–10a) are a rambling and somewhat obscure reflection on the dissolution of Judean society. The poetry of chap. 8 reflects on startling behavior: the people ‫“ מאנו לשוב‬refuse to return” (v. 5); and they stray from their natural course, breaking Yhwh’s ordinances (v. 7). The poetry also poses several rhetorical questions that highlight the magnitude and incoherence of this behavior: ‫“ היפלו ולא יקומו‬When they fall, do they not get up?” (v. 4); ‫“ מדוע שובבה העם הזה … משבה נצחת‬Why then has this people turned away in perpetual backsliding?”17 (v. 5); ‫איכה תאמרו חכמים אנחנו ותורת יהוה אתנו‬ “How can you say, ‘We are wise, and the law of Yhwh is with us’?” (v. 8). As a consequence of their sinful behavior, society’s patriarchs will lose wife and land (v. 10). While it is clear from chap. 8 that Judeans’ behavior is horrific, the poet never comes out and states what is specifically happening. Specification is needed. Such clarity arrives with the insertion of the text of the doublet. Through vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization, the doublet concretizes the people’s behavior: greed (‫ )בּ ֵֹצ ַע ָבּ ַצע‬has infected everyone (v. 10b); the religious hierarchy (‫ נביא‬and ‫“ כהן‬prophet” and “priest”) is corrupt (v. 10b); injustice is covered up with empty slogans (‫“ ׁשלום ׁשלום‬Peace! Peace!”) (v. 11); and once intolerable acts (‫ )תועבה‬are now normalized (v. 12). Going further, the text of the doublet interprets or echoes details found in its secondary context through vertical reading in at least five ways:18 (1) The rhetorical question in 8:4—asking ‫“ היפלו ולא יקומו‬when they fall, do they not get up again?”—assumes a positive answer: “Yes, they get back up.” The people’s falling is temporary. Read with the text of the doublet, the image of falling implies something permanent: the fallen are those slain (‫ )נפלים‬in battle (v. 12).19 The fallen of v. 4 are thus linked to corpses mentioned later in v. 23 (Eng. 9:1) (‫) ָח ָלל‬. (2) Verse 6 expounds the universality of guilt: ‫אין איׁש‬ ‫נחם‬, “there is not one who repents”; this universality is reemphasized by the opening words of the doublet which condemn all: from the least to the greatest, from prophet to priest (v. 10). (3) Chapter 8 holds the people accountable for deceit (‫ )תרמית‬in v. 5, and the sopherim (≈ scribes) for their lying pen (‫עט‬ ‫ )ׁשקר‬in v. 8; yet the nature of this falsehood is left unspecified. The text of the doublet provides some specificity; after reiterating that the people have acted with deceit (v. 10)—‫כלה עׂשה ׁשקר‬, “everyone practices falsehood”—the doublet’s text offers two examples of deceitful action: first, the people have 17 18 19

NRSV. The following observations are noted in part by Allen, Jeremiah, 110. For “slain” as a translation of ‫נפלים‬, see: Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 217.

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papered over a serious fracture (‫) ֶׁש ֶבר‬, pretending that it has been healed, and claiming that there is peace, when in fact the opposite is true (v. 11); second, when they should be ashamed (‫ )בוׁש‬of their behavior, they act as if nothing has happened (v. 12). (4) L. Allen also detects an echo of vv. 8–9 in the doublet’s indictment of priest and prophet (v. 10); v. 8 addresses the ‫תורת יהוה‬, “torah [teaching] of Yhwh”—which Allen argues is the domain of the priests—and v. 9, the ‫דבר־יהוה‬, “the word of Yhwh”—which is the concern of the prophets. (5) Finally, in Jer+n “the wise” (‫ )חכמים‬are said to be ashamed (8:9); the insertion of the duplicate in V M contrasts the shame of the wise with the feelings of the people as a whole who refuse to be ashamed (v. 12). In short, through vertical reading, the text of the doublet in chap. 8 (a) intensifies a few points made earlier in the chapter: the universality of guilt—especially that of the prophet and priest—and the problem of falsehood; (b) reimagines what is meant by “falling”; (c) provides specific examples of the deceit practiced by the people; and (d) widens the category of those deserving of shame.20 In addition to playing these interpretive functions, the present duplicate introduces two themes—the lack of healing and the absence of peace (Jer 6:14 // 8:11)—which like chords of a rope are intertwined throughout the remainder of chap. 8. Towards this end, the duplicating scribe apparently harmonized the text of the doublet slightly, inserting the word ‫“ בת‬daughter” into the phrase ‫“ ׁשבר עמי‬wound of my people” (8:11) in anticipation of the phrase in v. 21, ‫“ ׁשבר בת־עמי‬wound of the daughter of my people.”21 After the duplicate in v. 14, the reader/hearer learns of the people seeking protection in ‫ערי‬ ‫“ המבצר‬fortified cities”—a sure indicator of the absence of peace—and of ‫מי־ראׁש‬, “poisonous water”—a cause for failing health. The following verse, v. 15, mentions these two themes explicitly: ‫קוה לׁשלום ואין טוב לעת מרפה והנה בעתה‬, “[We] waited for peace, but there was nothing good; for a time of healing, but 20

21

Since the text of the duplicate does not contain innovations or (with the exception of the addition of “daughter” discussed below) significant synonymity, I cannot verify if the duplicating scribe intended these interpretive functions—echoing and interpreting its secondary context. Yet, as my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets as a whole will show, the use of vertical reading by duplicating scribes is widespread. Moreover, among the various examples of vertical reading found in those doublets as a whole, one encounters the same kinds of interpretive moves at those detected here: echoes, reinterpretations, and specifications of details found in each doublet’s secondary context. It would not be unreasonable, then, to consider that the occasions of vertical reading suggested here were intended by the duplicating scribe. Also, note the unusual orthography in 8:15 of ‫ מרפה‬for ‫“( ַמ ְר ֵּפא‬healing”), which could explain the atypical spelling of the same root in v. 11—‫ וירפו‬for ‫ ;וירפאו‬the duplicating scribe may have followed the quiescent spelling of the root found in 8:15 rather than preserving the orthography of the doublet’s text.

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87

look! Terror!” The absence of peace is further echoed in v. 16, which describes the sound of warhorses, and perhaps in v. 20, which alludes to the unexpected and unfortunate continuation of conflict even after the harvest season, when warring kings typically return home. The need for healing is flagged in v. 17 through the image of snake bites, in v. 18—which describes the prophet’s heart as being sick (‫—)דוי‬and in v. 21, which, as noted, mentions the ‫ׁשבר בת־עמי‬, “wound of the daughter of my people”—language repeated within the rewritten form of the doublet (v. 11). Finally, v. 22 completes this section lamenting the continuing sickness of the people in spite of the availability of balm (‫) ֳצ ִרי‬ and of a healer (‫)ר ֵֹפא‬. The insertion of the duplicate also increases the coherence of the book. The doublet heightens the similitude of two sections of Jeremiah that already partially resemble each other. Specifically, both doublet twins follow verses are notably similar (Jer 6:12 ≈ Jer 8:10a). Consider the following synopsis (common elements are in boldface):22 ‫נשים יחדו‬ ׁ ‫ונסבו בתיהם לאחרים שׂ דות ו‬ ‫כי־אטה את־ידי על־יׁשבי הארץ נאם־יהוה‬ Jer 6:12

‫נשיהם לאחרים שׂ דותיהם‬ ׁ ‫לכן אתן את־‬ ‫ליורׁשים‬ Jer 8:10a

Both verses speak of the handing over—‫“ נסבו‬they will be turned over” (6:12) and ‫“ אתן‬I will give away” (8:10a)—of Judah’s belongings—‫“ בתיהם‬their houses” (6:12 only); ‫“ ׂשדות‬fields” (6:12 and 8:10a); ‫“ נׁשים‬wives” (6:12 and 8:10a)—to “others” (‫)לאחרים‬. Moreover, preceding each doublet twin one finds a statement concerning the rejection of the divine word:23 Jer 6:10 states ‫הנה דבר־יהוה היה‬ ‫“ להם לחרפה לא יחפצו־בו‬Look! The word of Yhwh is to them an object of scorn. They take no delight in it”; in the same vein, Jer 8:9 tells, ‫הנה בדבר־יהוה מאסו‬ “Look! They reject the word of Yhwh.” These similarities likely invited the secondary application of the doublet’s text in the first place.24 22 23 24

For 6:12, G and M are virtually identical; G includes one extra pronoun ταύτην. Texts G and M are also virtually identical in 8:10a. For this reason, it is sufficient to present only the text of M in this synopsis. Carroll, Jeremiah, 198. Scholars have argued alternatively that the text of the doublet in chap. 8 is “more intrusive” than in than chap. 6 (E.g., Park-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 97. Note that Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 283, simply disregards Jer 8:10b–12 from his comments on the basis of its “secondary” character.) and that it as “an excellent redactional fit” (Allen, Jeremiah, 110; cf. Carroll, Jeremiah, 198). In fact, the duplicating scribe probably inserted the doublet’s text into chap. 8 precisely because it complements this chapter in several ways (as noted above) and because of these similarities shared by chaps. 6 and 8 (cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 95–96; Allen, Jeremiah, 110).

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In sum, the duplicating scribe used the text of the doublet, in its secondary context, to concretize unspecified references in chap. 8, to interpret and echo details from chap. 8, and to introduce two themes that dominate the remainder of the chapter. Duplication also served to augment the coherence of the book, strengthening the similitude of two already-similar sections of Jeremiah. In these ways, the scribe showcases the divinatory potential of duplication: duplication both reapplies existing revelation to a new context and generates new revelation within that new context through vertical reading and intratextual harmonization. 1.2 Duplication Technique The duplicating scribe created a loose citation of 6:13–15 in 8:10b–12: it includes between four and six occasions of minor synonymous variation (marked in the following quotation with boldface) and one synonymous intra-Jeremianic addition (bold and italicized). There are no innovations. The doublets were harmonized with each other after the point of duplication in as many as six places. ¹³ For from their least and to their greatest, all are greedy for unjust gain. From priest and to prophet, all deal falsely. ¹⁴ And they have healed the wound of       my people as if it were a small matter, saying, “Peace, Peace,” but there is no peace. ¹⁵ They acted shamefully, for they committed an abomination. Yet, they were not ashamed at all. They do not even know (their [disgrace]) how to be disgraced. Therefore, they will fall in their falling. In the time I visit them they will stumble, says Yhwh. Jer 6:13–15

¹⁰b For from the least and to the greatest, all are greedy for unjust gain. From prophet and to priest, all deal falsely. ¹¹ They have healed the wound of the daughter of my people as if it were a small matter, saying, “Peace, Peace,” but there is no peace. ¹² They acted shamefully, for they committed an abomination. Yet, they were not ashamed at all. And, they do not   know      how to be disgraced. Therefore, they will fall among the fallen. In the time I visit them they will stumble, says Yhwh. Jer 8:10b–12

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Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

1.3

Textual Analysis

Jer 6:13–15 G ¹³ ὅτι aἀπὸ μικροῦ αὐτῶν καὶ ἕως μεγάλουa πάντες bσυνετελέσαντο ἄνομαb c dἀπὸ ἱερέως καὶ ἕως ψευδοπροφήτουd πάντες ἐποίησαν ψευδῆ ¹⁴ καὶ ἰῶντο τὸ σύντριμμα eτοῦ λαοῦ μουe ἐξουθενοῦντες cκαὶ λέγοντες εἰρήνη εἰρήνη καὶ fποῦ ἐστιν εἰρήνη ¹⁵ κατῃσχύνθησαν gὅτι ἐξελίποσανg hκαὶ οὐδ᾽ ὧς καταισχυνόμενοι κατῃσχύνθησανh iκαὶ τὴν jἀτιμίαν kαὐτῶν οὐκ ἔγνωσαν διὰ τοῦτο πεσοῦνται lἐν τῇ πτώσει αὐτῶνl cκαὶ ἐν καιρῷ mἐπισκοπῆς ἀπολοῦνται εἶπε κύριος

Jer 6:13–15 M

‫ מקטנם‬a‫ כי‬¹³ a‫ועד־גדולם‬ b‫בוצע בצע‬b ‫כלו‬ ‫מנביא‬d‫ו‬c d‫ועד־כהן‬ ‫כלו עׂשה ׁשקר‬ ‫ וירפאו את־ׁשבר‬¹⁴ ‫ על־נקלה‬e‫עמי‬e ‫לאמר ׁשלום ׁשלום‬c ‫אין ׁשלום‬f‫ו‬ ‫ הביׁשו‬¹⁵ ‫גם־בוׁש‬h g‫כי תועבה עׂשו‬g h‫לא־יבוׁשו‬ k‫הכלים‬j‫גם־‬i ‫לא ידעו‬ ‫לכן יפלו‬ l‫בנפלים‬l ‫פקדתים‬m‫בעת־‬c ‫יכׁשלו אמר יהוה‬

Jer 8:10b–12 M

‫ מקטן‬a‫ כי‬¹⁰b a‫ועד־גדול‬ b‫בצע בצע‬b ‫כלה‬ ‫מנביא‬d c d‫ועד־כהן‬ ‫כלה עׂשה ׁשקר‬ e‫בת־עמי‬e ‫ וירפו את־ׁשבר‬¹¹ ‫על־נקלה‬ ‫לאמר ׁשלום ׁשלום‬c ‫אין ׁשלום‬f‫ו‬ ‫ הבׁשו‬¹² ‫גם־בוׁש‬h g‫כי תועבה עׂשו‬g h‫לא־יבׁשו‬ k‫הכלם‬j‫ו‬i ‫לא ידעו‬ ‫לכן יפלו‬ l‫בנפלים‬l ‫פקדתם‬m ‫בעת‬c ‫יכׁשלו אמר יהוה‬

a…a Minor synonymous variations (+/− pronoun); “from the (their) least to the (their) greatest”; M of Jer 6:13 includes both 3rd m. pl. pronouns, while both are lacking in M of 8:10; G has the first pronoun only. All three readings are virtually identical in meaning. The existence of different, synonymous versions of the same phrase suggest that the phrase belongs to the scribes’ memorized repertoire of traditional material, a possibility confirmed by the presence of additional variations of the phrase both in Jer+n (31:34; 42:1,8; 44:12) and in the pluses of V M (16:6). Moreover, the phrase (with variation) is a traditional trope found throughout Hebrew scripture: e.g., Gen 19:11, 1 Sam 5:9, 30:2, 19; 2 Kgs 23:2; 25:26; 2 Chr 15:13; 34:30. b…b Synonymous translation; συνετελέσαντο ἄνομα “carried out lawless deeds” (6:13 G) / ‫“ בוצע בצע‬are greedy for unjust gain”—or more literally, “the one

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who cuts (unjustly) a(n) (unjust) cut”;25 (6:13 M, 8:10 M); the rendering of the phrase in Greek is an acceptable (albeit generalizing) translation of the Hebrew idiom.26 One finds the same translation of this Hebrew phrase in Prov 1:19. c Non-significant variants (+/− conjunction); in three places a vav is added or subtracted. In the last two instances, the vav is found in 6:13–15 M and 8:10b–12 M but not 6:13–15 G; these instances of agreement in M could reflect post-duplication harmonization (hereafter, PDHarm). d…d Possibly minor synonymous variation (the order of ‫“ כהן‬priest” and ‫נביא‬ “prophet” in 6:13 G is reversed in 6:13 M and 8:10b M), with PDHarm of 6:13 M toward 8:10b M; when priests and prophets are mentioned collectively in Jeremiah, the priests are usually mentioned first, as in G of 6:13.27 In three other places besides this doublet, M reverses this standard order against G (Jer 14:18; 23:11, 33). It seems plausible that 6:13 G preserves the original order which was reversed in the duplicate. After the moment of duplication, the original sequence in 6:13 M was harmonized toward the reversed order of 8:10b M. Alternatively, the reading in G could represent a correction toward the more standard ordering of priest before prophet. Either way, this transposition may indicate the scribe’s reliance upon a mental text. e…e Synonymous variation (intra-Jeremianic addition); ‫(“ )בת־(עמי‬daughter of) my people”; in 8:11 the word “daughter” was probably inserted into the phrase “the wound of my people” in order to harmonize the duplicate with its context;28 the identical construct chain (“the wound of the daughter of my people”) already stands in 8:21, and the words “daughter of my people” are repeated in v. 22 and v. 23. The shorter variant (“my people”) is much more common—occurring about thirty-eight times in Jeremiah alone—than the longer variant (“daughter of my people”).29 This longer, synonymous variant enabled the duplicating scribe to harmonize the text of the doublet with its secondary context.

25 26 27 28 29

For a similar translation, see Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 216. For a study on the meaning of the word ‫בצע‬, see: Peter J. Harland, “‫בצע‬: Bribe, Extortion or Profit?,” VT 50 (2000): 310–22. McKane, Jeremiah 1, 146–7, understands the reading (συνετελέσαντο ἄνομα “carried out lawless deeds”) in G to be a generalization of the more specific sin of being “greedy for gain” in M. E.g., Jer 2:8, 26; 4:9; 8:1; 13:13; 18:18; 26:7, 8, 11, 16; 29:1; 32:32. Prophet is listed before priest only twice in 5:31; 23:33 (in both M and G). Cf. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 38. E.g.: Jer 4:11; 6:26; 9:6; 14:17.

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91

f

Copying error or synonymous translation; ‫“ אין ׁשלום‬there is no peace” (6:14 M, 8:11 M) possibly misread as ‫ = איה ׁשלום‬ποῦ ἐστιν εἰρήνη “where is peace” (6:14 G);30 one encounters the original phrase ‫ אין ׁשלום‬in Jer 12:12 and 30:5, both of which are translated as οὐκ ἔστιν εἰρήνη. Alternatively, the reading in G may simply be a synonymous representation of the Hebrew in Greek rhetorical style. g…g Uncertain: the Greek in 6:15 seems to translate a different and perhaps shorter Hebrew text (by one word) than the text shared by both doublet twins in M, unless the translation reflects a copying error. If the shorter reading is more original, the agreement in M between 6:15 and 8:12 at this point would be due to PDHarm.31 h…h Synonymous translation; ‫“ גם־בוׁש לא־יבוׁשו‬Yet, they were not ashamed at all” (6:15 M; 8:12 M) / καὶ οὐδ᾽ ὧς καταισχυνόμενοι κατῃσχύνθησαν “but they were not ashamed like those who are ashamed” (6:15 G); the translator offers a more or less synonymous take on this somewhat odd construction of an intensifying inf. abs.32 i Non-significant variant (different conjunction). j Minor synonymous variation (change in verbal form), or simply nonsignificant variant (orthography; insertion of mater); in 6:15 M the verb is vocalized as a hiphil inf. const. ‫“ ַה ְכ ִלים‬disgrace” / in 8:12 M, as a niphal inf. const. ‫“ ִה ָּכ ֵלם‬disgrace”; the reading in 6:15 G, ἀτιμίαν “disgrace,” is an apt translation of either. Apart from the Masoretic pointing, the consonants of both readings in M could be vocalized as either a hiphil or niphal inf. const.33 k Possibly minor synonymous variation (+/− pronoun) and PDHarm; 6:15 G includes the pronoun αὐτῶν “their [disgrace]” in the sentence “they do not know their disgrace” / the pronoun is not found in 6:15 M or 8:12 M (cf. +/− pronoun in a…a above and l…l below). The 3rd m. pl. pron. represented by 6:15 G may be original and may have been inadvertently 30 31

32 33

Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 211; Carroll, Jeremiah, 197; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 94. The fragmented text of 4QJera at 8:12 may indicate a reading closer to that of G; disregarding the superscript correction, this scroll, at the very least, presents a text that is shorter than M by one word just like G: 4QJera originally stood as … ‫ [… כי תועב]ה‬and was only later corrected to … ‫[… כי תועב]ה עשו‬. For a discussion of different constructions of the intensifying inf. abs., see: Bruce K. Waltke, An Introduction to Biblical Hebrew Syntax (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1990), 584–8. Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 211, corrects the hiphil in 6:15 to a niphal like 8:12, arguing that the hiphil, meaning “to humiliate,” does not make sense in this context. HALOT 2.480 advises reading a niphal in 6:15 as in 8:12; cf. McKane, Jeremiah 1, 147; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 95.

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omitted in the creation of 8:12 M, in which case the agreement of 6:15 M could reflect harmonization; or the pronoun could be a post-duplication insertion in V G. The presence or absence of the pronoun does not significantly affect the sentence’s meaning. l…l Minor synonymous variation (+/− pronoun / revocalization); ‫“ ּנ ְֹפ ִלים‬those who fall” (6:15 M, 8:12 M) / πτώσει αὐτῶν “their falling” (= ‫( )נִ ְפ ָלם‬6:15 G); cf. Jer 49:21 where this same Greek phrase translates ‫ ;נִ ְפ ָלם‬G likely witnesses to the original consonants, ‫( נפלם‬unless copying error is at play), which could be vocalized as a noun + pronoun (as in G) or as a pl. ptc. (as in 6:15 M and 8:12 M) by the insertion of a yod. The agreement of 6:15 and 8:12 in M thus probably reflects PDHarm. The difference in meaning created by this change is negligible. m Non-significant variant (post-duplication insertion of mater); ‫פקדתים‬ “I will visit (i.e., punish) them” (6:15 M) / ἐπισκοπῆς αὐτῶν “their visitation” (6:15 G; alternately, Ziegler omits αὐτῶν); the consonants of 8:12 M, ‫פקדתם‬, may be vocalize as a verb as in 6:15 M (‫ ) ְּפ ַק ְד ִּתם‬or as a noun in agreement with 6:15 G and with the Masoretic vocalization in 8:12 (‫) ְּפ ֻק ָּד ָתם‬. Originally, 6:15 probably read ‫פקדתם‬, which was copied exactly in 8:12, but interpreted as a noun + pronoun by G. The mater in 6:15 M was then added after the moment of duplication.34 Cf. the consistent presence of matres in 6:13–15 M vis-à-vis 8:10b–12 M: ‫ בוצע‬6:13 // ‫ בצע‬8:10b // ‫ הביׁשו‬6:15 // ‫ הבׁשו‬8:12; ‫ יבוׁשו‬6:15 // ‫ יבׁשו‬8:12; and ‫ הכלים‬6:15 // ‫ הכלם‬8:12 (see j above).35 2

Text #2: Your Wealth and Treasure I Give as Plunder (Jer 15:12–14 // Jer 17:1–4)

The doublet of Jer 15:12–14 // Jer 17:1–4 provides a second example of the divinatory potential of duplication. The text of Jer 17:1–4 is a plus in V M and is in all likelihood the duplicate (see discussion below). A scribe found a secondary application of Jer 15:12–14, a somewhat enigmatic text that describes Judah’s defeat and exile. Duplication of this text in chap. 17 offered the scribe the opportunity to clean up ambiguities and expand the text—with the help of references to Deuteronomy—so that it finds new life as an interpretation of

34 35

In contrast, Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 211, deems ‫ ְּפ ַק ְד ִּתים‬to be the lectio difficilior and thus takes it as the original reading of 6:15. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 95, notes that this is the only time parallel passages in Jeremiah display a consistent orthographic pattern.

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the end of chap. 16.36 Through vertical reading, the revised text of the doublet illuminates various aspects of this chapter and addresses a few unanswered questions tacitly raised therein. Most significantly, the duplicate equates the idolatry of chap. 16 with the illicit worship of the Canaanites condemned by Deuteronomistic theology; and it recasts the optimism of 16:14–15—a promise of return from exile—in a more pessimist light: the anger of Yhwh occasioning the exile will burn forever. In these ways, the duplicating scribe generated new revelation out of existing oracles. The insertion of the doublet’s text at the end of chap. 16 was likely inspired by this text’s verbal similarity with 16:13. In this verse one reads that Yhwh will hurl the people out of their land and “into a land which you [they] and your [their] ancestors do not know” (‫ )על־הארץ אׁשר לא ידעתם אתם ואבותיכם‬where they will serve (‫ )עבד‬alien gods. Similarly, the text of the doublet speaks both of an exile in “a land that you do not know” (‫ )בארץ אׁשר לא־ידעת‬and of the exiles being enslaved (‫)עבד‬. Yet, rather than stitch the doublet’s text into chap. 16 immediately after v. 13, the duplicator wove the doublet into an existing literary seam lying between the end of a thematic unit focused on the idolatry of Judah (16:11–13, 18–20) and the beginning of a short wisdom text which has a parallel in Psalm 1 (Jer 17:5–8).37 In this way, the doublet does not interrupt the flow of the thematic unit of chap. 16 and, placed after this unit, functions as an explication of that unit through vertical reading. 2.1 Preliminary Textual Issues Three interrelated textual issues complicate discussion about this doublet. I will deal with these three issues before discussing the duplicate’s function in more detail. Number one, while the doublet twin of 17:1–4 is missing in G— which suggests that it is a later addition in V M—this twin may have been lost through scribal sight error.38 I find this unlikely for two reasons.39 First, this parablepsis would require an improbable mistake: it would coincidentally correspond perfectly with the text of a lengthy doublet. One would expect scribal 36 37 38 39

Though it should be noted, the revised text of 17:1–4 has its own textual ambiguities (see textual analysis below). Cf. Carroll, Jeremiah, 350. I.e., parablepsis from ‫( יהוה‬the final word of 16:21) to ‫( יהוה‬in the opening formula of 17:5a); cf. Freedman and Lundbom, “Haplography in Jeremiah 1–20,” 34; Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 117. Even if lost by haplography, the doublet of chap. 17 would still be considered the duplicate (on the basis of the following arguments). The occurrence of haplography here would indicate only that the doublet is an early doublet, i.e., not part of the expansions of V M, and constituent of the common text of Jer+n.

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error to be less precise. Second, the minus in G includes the opening formula of 17:5a, ‫“ כה אמר יהוה‬Thus says Yhwh,” which in M separates the doublet from the wisdom text that follows it. This formula is readily explainable as an insertion marking the end of an addition (the text of the doublet) and the resumption of the base text.40 Number two, it is not immediately clear where the doublet begins. Verses 3b–4 of chap. 17 are very similar to 15:13–14, while 17:1–3a have only a little in common with 15:12. Thus, some limit the doublet to 15:13–14 // 17:3b–4.41 Others, myself included, find the minimal links between 17:1–3a and 15:12 to be sufficient for including these verses as a part of the doublet.42 Number three, while the majority of researchers consider the twin of chap. 15 to be the duplicate and that of chap. 17 to be the original, I believe a strong case can be made for considering the twin of 15:12–14 to be the original. The majority position is built on the impression that the text of the doublet—divine speech announcing the despoiling and punishment of Judah—interrupts the progression of Jeremiah’s confession (vv. 10, 15–18, and possibly, v. 11) and must have therefore been inserted accidentally.43 Upon closer examination however, this impression appears incorrect. To begin, the apparent disjunctive character of the chapter, alternating between divine speech and prophetic confession, may be nothing more than an example of the dialogical and polyphonic nature of the book at large.44 In 40

41 42 43

44

One characteristic of V M is the proliferation of such divine speech formula. The same (or a similar) formula is added to V M at least another ten times: 11:22; 13:12; 18:11; 22:30; 29:25; 31:37; 35:19; possibly also 23:16; three more instances are found in the large addition to V M, 33:14–26, namely 33:17, 20, 25; cf. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 84–85. Cf. Allen, Jeremiah, 181, 198; McKane, Jeremiah 1, 384; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 23–32. McKane, Jeremiah 1, 345, notes that Rudolph, Jeremia, sees 15:12 as a “corrupt form” of 17.1. E.g., Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 133, writes that within 15:12–14, “The verses are clearly intrusive, and in origin related to 17:1–4.” Cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 32, who writes that the doublet in chap. 15 “appears to be intrusive, and fits rather awkwardly in the context.” John Bright, “A Prophet’s Lament and Its Answer, Jeremiah 15:10–21,” Int 28 (1974): 61, writes that vv. 13–14 “interrupt the ‘autobiographical’ style of address of the lament.” Cf. Kathleen M. O’Connor, The Confessions of Jeremiah: Their Interpretation and Their Role in Chapters 1–25, SBLDS 94 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988), 37. John T. Willis, “Dialogue Between Prophet and Audience as a Rhetorical Device in the Book of Jeremiah,” JSOT 33 (1985): 63–82; Mark E. Biddle, Polyphony and Symphony in Prophetic Literature: Rereading Jeremiah 7–20, SOTI 2 (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1996); Louis J. Stulman, “Jeremiah as a Polyphonic Response to Suffering,” in Inspired Speech: Prophecy in the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of Herbert B. Huffmon, ed. John Kaltner and Louis Stulman, JSOTSup 378 (New York: T & T Clark, 2004), 302–18;

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the poetic sections of the book of Jeremiah, the speaking voice is constantly changing, oscillating between prophet, deity, and people. Such alternation may be intentional and does not necessarily indicate that a given line or verse is late or auxiliary. Secondly, the assertion of biblical scholars that the text of the doublet is disruptive in chap. 15 are often accompanied by textual analyses that undermine this assertion. Scholars often maintain either that v. 11 is divine speech or that the divine speech of v. 12 is not part of the doublet.45 In either case, the text of A.R. Pete Diamond, “Interlocutions: The Poetics of Voice in the Figuration of YHWH and His Oracular Agent, Jeremiah,” Int 62 (2008): 48. 45 I consider 15:11 to be a continuation of Jeremiah’s lamentation in v. 10. The opening words in M ‫“ אמר יהוה‬Yhwh said” (which present the verse as divine speech) are a misreading of ‫“ אמן יהוה‬May it be, O Yhwh” (= G γένοιτο δέσποτα)—which mark the verse as prophetic speech. Many commentators agree: e.g., Bright, A Prophet’s Lament and its Answer, 62–63; O’Connor, The Confessions of Jeremiah, 27, 29; Carroll, Jeremiah, 324. Others follow M: e.g. Henning Graf Reventlow, Liturgie und prophetisches Ich bei Jeremia (Gütersloh: Gerd Mohn, 1963), 211; Hubmann, Untersuchungen zu den Konfessionen, 206; Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 466; McKane, Jeremiah 1, 348; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 28. Several kinds of evidence favor the reading supported by G. First, the word “amen” here introduces an oath, which while uncommon is not unheard of (cf. Jer 28:6; 1 Kgs 1:36). The arguments of Erhard S. Gerstenberger, “Jeremiah’s Complaints,” JBL 82 (1963): 402, against following G are not convincing. Cf. the study of the use of “amen” for introducing oaths in Shemaryahu Talmon, “Amen as an Introductory Oath Formula,” Text 7 (1969): 124–9. Without accepting all of Talmon’s reconstructions and taking for granted the criticism of A.R. Pete Diamond, The Confessions of Jeremiah in Context: Scenes of Prophetic Drama, JSOTSup 45 (Sheffield, UK: JSOT Press, 1987), 218–9, n. 3, Talmon’s main thesis still holds. Second and conversely, the reading of M is highly irregular. The opening formula ‫אמר‬ ‫יהוה‬, as an introduction to divine speech, is never used again anywhere in Jeremiah nor in the entire prophetic corpus. Cf. Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 446. A longer version of the phrase stands at the beginning of Jer 46:25 (‫“ אמר יהוה צבאות אלהי יׂשראל‬Yhwh of hosts, the God of Israel, says”). Note that this longer phrase is entirely an addition of V M. By way of contrast, the phrase ‫“ כה־אמר יהוה‬Thus says Yhwh” introduces divine discourse over one hundred fifty times in Jeremiah alone. Holladay’s reasons (ibid.) for preserving the formula of 15:11 M are not convincing. Third, the remainder of v. 11—a verse with many difficulties—makes the most sense as a continuation of Jeremiah’s voice and not as divine speech. As O’Conner, The Confessions of Jeremiah, 34, concludes, “The language of these verses [15:10–11], therefore portrays Jeremiah as a faithful prophet who intercedes for his people on the day of judgment.” The theme of prophetic intercession, in turn, fits with the larger context of chap. 15 in which Yhwh rejects the intercession of Moses and Samuel—figures named for their status as paragons of faithful prophets and intercessors (15:1). For alternative interpretations of this difficult verse see: Hubmann, Untersuchungen zu den Konfessionen, 206–8, 262; Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 446–7, 453; Diamond, The Confessions of Jeremiah in Context, 59–60; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 28–31.

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the doublet could not be considered disruptive. The progression of Jeremiah’s confession would already be interrupted by the divine speech of v. 11 or v. 12 prior to the doublet.46 This is to say, the argument that the doublet’s text in chap. 15 is disruptive (and therefore secondary to chap. 15) is only coherent if one also concludes both that v. 11 is a continuation of Jeremiah’s lamentation in v. 10 and that v. 12 is constituent of the doublet.47 Thirdly, seen from a different angle, the text of the doublet fits extremely well within the larger context of chap. 15. In the first half of the chapter, Yhwh voices his condemnation and punishment of his people. This punishment is expressed both as a future occurrence (vv. 2–5, 9b) and as a past event (vv. 6–9a). The text of the doublet (vv. 12–14), which also describes Yhwh’s punishment of Judah in future terms, fits thematically with this material; and the return to future tense in v. 9b prepares for the future-oriented perspective of the doublet. Moreover, the giving away (‫ )נתן‬of Judah’s treasure and wealth as plunder (‫ )בז‬in v. 13 is a logical consequence of the giving away (‫ )נתן‬of the people’s life to the edge of the sword in v. 9. Seen from this angle, it is not vv. 12–14 that are disruptive, but the lines of the confession (i.e., vv. 10–11), which interrupt the coherent sequence of v. 9 to vv. 12–14. If these verses, vv. 10–11, were removed or transposed to after v. 14, the chapter would run smoothly.48 Fourthly, as explained below, the variants of 17:1–4 are readily explainable as deliberate modifications intended to harmonize the text of the doublet with its secondary context (i.e., chap. 16). The opposite hypothesis, that the doublet’s text was intentionally adapted to fit chap. 15, is unconvincing.49 In the end, two solutions remain. Either the doublet is original to chap. 15— where it acquired its somewhat disruptive appearance as a byproduct of the 46

47

48

49

Thus, I find unconvincing the arguments of those theorists who reject vv. 13–14 as disruptive but either assign v. 11 to Yhwh (e.g., Carroll, Jeremiah, 327–8) or do not include v. 12 as a part of the doublet (e.g., Bright, “A Prophet’s Lament,” 61–62). Naturally, theories that do both lack cogency (e.g., Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 28–29. McKane, Jeremiah 1, 343–50, 384). In light of this logic, it is not surprising to find that some who count v. 11 as divine speech also attribute the presence of the doublet in chap. 15 to intentional revision: e.g., Gerstenberger, Jeremiah’s Complaints, 394; Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 455; Diamond, The Confessions of Jeremiah in Context, 55–58, leans in this direction. Diamond, The Confessions of Jeremiah in Context, 54–64, solves the disjunction of these verses by dividing 15:10–21 into two separate units, each of which consists of a Jeremianic confession and of a divine response. In the first unit, the confession stretches for one verse only (v. 10), which is met by an answer from Yhwh in vv. 11–14. Verse 15 begins a second and independent confession. Cf. for example, Holladay Jeremiah 1, 455–7, and Gerstenberger, Jeremiah’s Complaints, 394–6.

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chapter’s progressive development—and was intentionally modified to fit chap. 17. Or, the text of the doublet was mistakenly inserted into chap. 15 from chap. 17, and only coheres with the first half of chap. 17 coincidentally. That a sizable doublet of multiple verses would be mistakenly inserted in the wrong chapter requires several complicated steps and is thus the more difficult and unlikely proposal.50 The alternative, involving intentional doubling and modification, reflects a well-attested scribal practice (as this study shows) and is much simpler.51 2.2 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function Having addressed the above textual issues, I return now to discuss how the duplicate generates new meaning in chap. 16, its (secondary) literary context. Most notably, the duplicate’s text—with its modifications—clarifies the nature 50

51

Cf. the often-cited proposal of Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 133. Janzen proposes two complicated stories for explaining the presence of the doublet in chap. 15 and its absence in chap. 17 of G. He supposes that the text of 15:12–14 either originated “as a marginal variant to 17:1–4” or as a marginal correction—aiming to restore a lacuna formed by the loss of 17:1–4 via haplography (an omission still attested in G)—which he conjectures was situated between these verses and chap. 15, and which at some point was wrongly inserted into chap. 15. Either way, M would represent a “conflation … of two manuscript traditions.” Certainly, one of these two suggestions could be correct. The first, however, requires a very incompetent scribe who would not recognize the relationship between the hypothetical marginal gloss and 17:1–4, and who would insert marginal notes into chapters seemingly at random. And the second suggestion requires the conflation of two distant manuscripts separated by at least two manuscript generations, and possibly three. Consider the manuscript stages required by this suggestion: (#1) an older manuscript, containing 17:1–4; (#2) a manuscript reflecting the accidental omission of 17:1–4; (#3) a manuscript containing a marginal correction (which may be the same manuscript as #2); (#4) a manuscript containing the incorrect insertion of the correction into chap. 15. Janzen’s conflating scribe would have had to have had access to both manuscripts #1 and #4, with which the scribe would have produce a fifth manuscript containing both doublet twins. Moreover, the scribe responsible for manuscript #4 would be as incompetent as the scribe necessitated by Janzen’s first suggestion. Both theories depend upon the assumption that the middle section of chap. 15 and the beginning section of chap. 17 were juxtaposed in parallel columns. While this suggestion is possible—given the existence of unusually wide-columned biblical scrolls such as 4QJerb—on the basis of manuscript evidence from Qumran, columns of biblical scrolls are typically narrower, which would preclude this possibility. The two sections were more likely out of line or separated by a third column containing the bulk of chap. 16. For a discussion of column width, see: Emanuel Tov, Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 78. One could also consider the fact that the twin of chap. 17 is longer than that of chap. 15; and, as this study shows, the duplicate twin is frequently longer than the original (cf. 1:18–19 // 15:20; 6:13–15 // 8:10b–12; 6:22–24 // 50:41–43; 23:5–6 // 33:14–16).

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of Judah’s idolatry and Yhwh’s response to this idolatry. While Jer 16:11–13, 16–20 highlights and condemns Judah’s idolatry in general, the chapter does not specify what kind of idolatry is in view.52 The text of the duplicate—especially in its many modifications—addresses this lacuna through vertical reading. Within the additions of 17:2, the duplicate mentions (illicit) altars (‫)מזבחות‬ and Asherim (‫—)אׁשרה‬cult objects associated with such illicit altars—both of which are said to be located upon tree and high hill. The modified duplicate also refers to “high places” (‫ )במות‬in 17:3. Taken together, these additions to the doublet’s text equate the idolatry of Judah in chap. 16 with a specific kind of idol worship condemned in the Deuteronomistic tradition, namely, the so-called “Canaanite” altars and cult objects. Consider, for example, Deut 7:5; 12:2–3; 1 Kgs 14:15, 23; 2 Kgs 17:10; 23:14, where cultic objects such as Asherim are said to be found upon every “high hill” and under every “green tree” and located on top of “high places.”53 The removal or building of high places in Judah were particularly important criteria employed in the Deuteronomistic historian’s evaluation of Judah’s monarchs (cf. 1 Kgs 22:43; 2 Kgs 12:3; 14:4; 15:4, etc.). The references to “altars,” “Asherim,” and “high places” in the text of the duplicate suggest that the duplicating scribe was familiar with this aspect of the Deuteronomistic tradition and intended to harmonize the text of Jeremiah with this tradition. The scribe’s awareness of the Deuteronomistic tradition helps explain another modification of the duplicate’s text. The final phrase of 15:14 (// 17:4)— ‫“ כי אש קדחה באפי עליכם תוקד‬for you have kindled a fire in my anger and it will burn against you”—was adapted in 17:4, perhaps on the basis of Deut 32:22, in the Song of Moses. The wording of Deut 32:22 and Jer 15:14b is already similar (see textual analysis below). When 15:14b was duplicated in Jer 17:4b, the wording was changed slightly—‫( עליכם‬15:14b) was replaced by ‫( עד־עולם‬17:4b)— which brought the resemblance of the two texts even closer together.54 Both 52

53 54

These verses describe Judah’s ancestors as worshiping and serving (‫ )עבד‬certain unspecified “other gods” (‫( )אחרי אלהים‬v. 11) and depict the land as being polluted with the “carcasses” of unspecified “abominations” (‫)נבלת ׁשקוציהם‬, i.e., idol worship (v. 18). Judah’s rebellion is emphasized by a favorable description of the nations rejecting their idols, literally their “worthlessness” (‫“ )הבל‬in which there is no profit” (‫ ;)אין־בם מועיל‬but these idols are not identified—in Jeremiah ‫ הבל‬is used only to describe idols (10:3; 10:15 // 51:18), and in Jer 2:8, 11, the phrase ‫“ לוא יועיל‬no profit” describes illicit deities (cf. Allen, Jeremiah, 193). Finally, v. 20 mentions certain manufactured gods without further description. Cf. Allen, Jeremiah, 199. Though, I must qualify this observation since another modification of the verse—namely, the change in verb form—moves the wording of the two texts apart slightly: the new verb form in 17:4 (‫ )קדחה‬differs from the form found in both 15:14 and Deut 32:22 (‫)קדחתם‬. However, these variant verb forms are synonymous—the sense of the whole passage is

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texts describe the divine anger as something boundless, burning unto the depths of Sheol (‫ )עד־ׁשאול תחתית‬in Deut 32:22 and unto eternity in Jer 17:4. By increasing the similarity of Deut 32:22 and Jer 17:4b, the duplicator strengthened the link between these two texts. This action was perhaps encouraged by the existing similitude of the two texts’ contexts: both are concerned with idolatry.55 Furthermore, the change from ‫( עליכם‬15:14b) to ‫( עד־עולם‬17:4b) redirects attention from those burned by the fire (the people of Judah) and to the nature of the fire (that it lasts forever). This shift in focus fits with other modifications of the duplicate. In 17:1, Judah’s sin is described as something permanent—it is inscribed “with an iron stylus” (‫ )בעט־ברזל‬and a “diamond point” (‫)צפרן ׁשמיר‬ upon the tablet of the people’s heart and upon the horns of the altar. In the ancient imagination, to inscribe a text upon a tablet or on a structure is to make a permanent record of that text.56 That Judah’s sin is so inscribed emphasizes its indelibility. The indelibility of Judah’s iniquity in 17:1—not to mention its ubiquity, being found on every hill and tree—is matched by the eternality of Yhwh’s fiery wrath in 17:4.57 These modifications work together, through vertical reading, to recast the oracles of chap. 16 in a more somber light. While these oracles do not shy away from pronouncing a sharp punishment of exile, the pronouncement is dulled slightly by a promise in vv. 14–15 (which itself forms a doublet with 23:7–8) that a new Exodus will follow exile.58 Any hope of return, however, is dashed with the insertion of the doublet in its modified form: Yhwh’s wrath will burn forever. The two doublets (16:14–15 // 23:7–8 and 15:12–14 // 17:1–4) perhaps reflect different historical contexts. In response to the Babylonian deportations, scribes divined that Yhwh would institute a new Exodus; hence the insertion of Jer 16:14–15. As those hopes faded, the scribes found illumination through the secondary application of 15:12–14: Exodus may be delayed, for Yhwh’s wrath burns on. To anticipate an observation made below, in this regard, the Tendenz of the duplicate 17:1–4 stands in tension with that of 30:10–11, which—like

55 56 57 58

not significantly altered by this difference—whereas the difference between ‫ עליכם‬and ‫ עד־עולם‬has more important consequences for the passage’s meaning (see below). Cf. Deut 32:16–17, 21. As Allen, Jeremiah, 98, notes, in Job 19:24, Job desires an iron stylus (‫ )עט־ברזל‬to make a permanent inscription of his words in rock. Cf. Carroll, Jeremiah, 349. Since 17:1–4 may have been lost through haplography in V G, it is not apparent which doublet came first. If that of 17:1–4 is earlier, one could understand the doublet of 16:14–15 as a hopeful response to the highly pessimistic tone of the former. On the other hand, if 16:14–15 came first, then 17:1–4 could be viewed as an intentional dampening of the hope sounded in 16:14–15.

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16:14–15—heightens hope for return. These competing Tendenzen suggest that these two later duplicates—while both being pluses of V M—did not originate from the same scribal hand. In addition to clarifying the nature of Judah’s idolatry and extent of Yhwh’s anger, the text of the duplicate reinterprets other aspects of its literary context through vertical reading. On the minor end of the spectrum, one learns in 16:17 that Judah cannot hide its sins from Yhwh’s gaze. The duplicate—in its adapted form—continues this thought with a novel image: Judah’s sins are inscribed in the sight of Yhwh upon the very corners of the altar (17:1). Also, chap. 16 contains many horrific images of suffering brought about by the hand of Yhwh including terminal illness (16:4), the cessation of joy (16:9), and exile (16:13). With the text of the doublet, a new degree of suffering is added to this list: the people of Judah will be plundered of their wealth and treasures (17:3). On the major end of the spectrum, the text of the duplicate explicates the meaning of the exile alluded to in 16:13. As noted above, the duplicate was probably attracted to the end of chap. 16 in the first place because of the verbal similarity of 15:14 (// 17:4) and 16:13. Through vertical reading, the doublet’s text reinterprets several details of this latter verse. First, both verses use the Hebrew verb ‫“ עבד‬to serve,” though to different ends. In 16:13, the verb reflects a minor Deuteronomistic motif in which Yhwh permits idolatry on the ironic condition that the idolaters are first expelled from their homeland.59 By use of the same verb, the duplicate recasts this trope in harsher terms. In the duplicate, the idolaters are doomed, not simply to serve (‫ עבד‬qal) their illicit deities in an alien land, as in 16:13, but to be enslaved (‫ עבד‬hiphil) by Yhwh to their enemies (17:4), who—in addition to removing the Judeans from their homeland—will plunder all of their wealth (17:3). Second, the text of the duplicate helps explain that exile is a logical consequence of idolatry: idolaters must be exiled because their idolatry pollutes the land. Apart from the duplicate, this logic is only tacitly present in chap. 16. While v. 13 states that the exile is a consequence of the people’s idolatry, it does not explain why exile is a suitable punishment for this crime. A few verses later (16:18), idolatry is featured again, this time in order to describe the pollution of the land and the defilement of Yhwh’s heritage (‫ )נחלה‬caused by idolatry. The polluted and defiled condition of the land arguably provides a tacit justification for exile, though such a justification is not made explicitly. The link between the land’s condition and the need for exile is made more explicit by a modification to the doublet in 17:4. This modification, describing Judah’s exile as the loss of its heritage (‫)נחלה‬, tethers the image of exile (from 16.13) to the language of heritage which in 16:18 is described as being polluted. Through 59

Cf. Deut 4:27–28; 28:64.

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vertical reading, one can now more readily infer the logic of exile: in order to preserve the purity and holiness of the land, defiling agents—i.e., idolatry and idolaters—must be expelled beyond the land’s borders. Naming the land that Judah lost in exile as its heritage (‫ )נחלה‬also heightens a subtle irony present in 16:18–19. There, the defilement of Judah’s heritage in v. 18 is subtly contrasted with the nations’ confession in v. 19 that their heritage of idolatry is an inheritance of lies. With the duplicate the irony is deepened: the nations—who serve other gods by birthright—give up this inheritance as something fallacious and worthless to stand before Yhwh, while Judah gives up its inheritance—the land where Yhwh dwells—to serve the worthless and fallacious idols that the nations have thrown away. Finally, through vertical reading the duplicate provides an illustration of Yhwh’s power (‫ )יד‬and might predicted at the conclusion of the polemic against Judah’s idolatry in 16:21. Apart from the duplicate, this prediction is left unfulfilled. It is immediately followed, not by a demonstration of power and might, but by a unit of seemingly unrelated wisdom material contrasting the cursed and blessed persons (17:5–8). With the insertion of the duplicate immediately after 16:21, the duplicate’s description of the punishment of Judah provides a demonstration of Yhwh’s power predicted in 16:21.60 In this way, the text of the doublet fills a lacuna of its secondary context, namely an unfulfilled prediction. In summary, the duplicating scribe strategically placed the duplicate, in its modified form, after 16:13–21 so that the doublet’s text could interpret and explicate this literary context through vertical reading. The duplication likely reflects the scribe’s desire to prolong the divinatory relevance of chap. 16 so that it could speak to a new historical horizon, when hopes for return from exile were diminishing. It also likely reflects a desire to harmonize chap. 16 with the Deuteronomistic critique of Canaanite-influenced idolatry. 2.3 Duplication Technique The duplicating scribe here created a loose citation with minor adaptation. One finds minor synonymous variation—at least four instances and possibly five (boldface)—and possibly one occasion of synonymous variation (bold and 60

The use of the metaphor of “hand” for Yhwh’s power recalls the Deuteronomist tradition in which Yhwh’s hand leads Israel out of slavery in Egypt (Deut. 4:34; 5:15; 7:19; 11:2; 26:8), a tradition known to the scribes of Jeremiah (cf. Jer 32:21). Within Jeremiah, however, one sees the reversal of this tradition, with Yhwh extending this hand to fight not for but against Judah (e.g., Jer 21:5). The placement of the duplicate continues this reversal, exhibiting the power of Yhwh, not to deliver his people, but to mete out judgment against them. The mighty hand of Yhwh, described in 16:21, empties the hands of Judah in 17:3 (if the usual reconstruction of the latter verse is correct).

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italicized), as well as four instances of minor innovation: a short one-word replacement, a short two-word replacement, a medium six-word addition, and a long twenty-five-word addition (counting variants b…b, c…c, and d…d as one addition). These innovations introduce several new ideas to the text of the doublet: the indelibility of Judah’s sin; an identification of Judah’s sin (unspecified in 15:13) as idolatry and specifically as the illicit worship of the high places and Asherim; an identification of Judah’s land (lost in the exile) as Judah’s inheritance; and the perpetuity of Yhwh’s anger. Additionally, these innovations prepare the doublet to complete important interpretive work within its secondary context. Yet, the innovations remain minor; the primary function of the doublet is not radically changed. Finally, observe that this doublet contains three extra-Jeremianic, intra-scriptural allusions to the Deuteronomistic tradition, which are the only occasions of intra-scriptural traditioning in the doublets analyzed in this chapter. ¹² Will iron, iron from the north, break also bronze?

¹ The sin of Judah is written with an iron stylus; with the point of a diamond it is engraved upon the tablet of their heart and on the corners of your altars. ² For their children remember their altars and their Asherim upon green tree and upon high hills, ³ (on) mountains in the open country. ¹³ Your strength and     your Your strength and all of your treasure I will give as plunder, as a treasure I will give as plunder, your payment   for all of your sins and high places, for     sin and in in all your territory. all your territory. ⁴ And you will loosen your hand from your inheritance which I gave to you. ¹⁴ And I will make you serve your And I will make you serve your enemy (all around) in a land (that) enemy.      in a land that you do not know. you do not know. For a fire is kindled in my anger. For you kindle a fire in my anger. It burns against you. It burns forever. Jer 15:12–14

Jer 17:1–4

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103

Textual Analysis

Jer 15:12–14 G Jer 15:12–14 M Jer 17:1–4 M ¹² εἰ aγνωσθήσεται ‫ירע‬a‫ ה‬¹² ‫חטאת יהודה כתובה‬b ¹ bσίδηροςb b‫ברזל ברזל‬b b‫בעט ברזל‬ cκαὶ περιβόλαιον χαλκοῦνc c‫מצפון ונחׁשת‬c ‫בצפרן ׁשמיר חרוׁשה‬c d…d

d…d

ἡ ἰσχύς σου e ¹³ fκαὶ τοὺς θησαυρούς σου εἰς προνομὴν δώσω gἀντάλλαγμαg f διὰ eπάσας hτὰς ἁμαρτίας σουh fκαὶ ἐν πᾶσι τοῖς ὁρίοις σου i…i ¹⁴ καὶ jκαταδουλώσω σεj kκύκλῳ τοῖς ἐχθροῖς σου ἐν τῇ γῇ lᾗ οὐκ ᾔδεις ὅτι πῦρ mἐκκέκαυται ἐκ τοῦ θυμοῦ μου nἐφ᾽ ὑμᾶςn καυθήσεται

‫ואוצרותיך לבז‬f e‫ חילך‬¹³ g‫ לא במחיר‬g‫אתן‬ h‫חטאותיך‬h‫כל־‬e ‫וב‬f ‫ובכל־גבוליך‬f

i…i

k j‫העברתי‬j‫ ו‬¹⁴

l‫את־איביך בארץ‬

‫לא ידעת‬ ‫קדחה באפי‬m ‫כי־אׁש‬ ‫תוקד‬n ‫עליכם‬n

‫על־לוח לבם ולקרנות‬ c‫מזבחותיכם‬ ‫כזכר בניהם מזבחותם‬d ² ‫ואׁשריהם על־עץ רענן על‬ ‫ הררי‬³ ‫גבעות הגבהות‬ d‫בׂשדה‬ ‫אוצרותיך‬f‫ כל־‬e‫חילך‬ g‫ במתיך‬g‫לבז אתן‬ h‫חטאת‬h e ‫ב‬f ‫בכל־גבוליך‬f ‫וׁשמטתה ובך מנחלתך‬i ⁴ i‫אׁשר נתתי לך‬ k j‫העבדתיך‬j‫ו‬ ‫ אׁשר‬l‫את־איביך בארץ‬ ‫לא־ידעת‬ ‫ קדחתם באפי‬m‫כי־אׁש‬ ‫ תוקד‬n‫עד־עולם‬n

a

Copying error (‫ ;)ד → ר‬γνωσθήσεται “it is known” (from γινώσκω = ‫“ ידע‬to know”) (15:12 G) / ‫“ יָ ר ַֹע‬it/he breaks” (from ‫“ רעע‬to break”).61 b…b Minor innovation: the reference to ‫“( ברזל‬iron”) in the original twin (Jer 15:12) provided an opportunist scribe an occasion for introducing a new image and theme; namely the image of Judah’s sins engraved with an iron stylus (‫ )עט ברזל‬which introduces the theme of the indelibility of Judah’s sin, a theme emphasized by a few more modifications to the doublet’s text (see c…c and n…n below). This innovation also replaces the reference to “iron from the north,” which probably refers to Babylon.62

61 62

Cf. Gerstenberger, Jeremiah’s Complaints, 395, n. 9. Cf. Allen, Jeremiah, 181; O’Connor, The Confessions of Jeremiah, 35–36; McKane, Jeremiah 1, 348–9; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 27. For a diversity of interpretations of the phrase “iron from the north,” see: Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 454.

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The second occurrence of the word iron in M of 15:12, missing in G, may have been lost via haplography63 or doubled through dittography. c…c Minor innovation and (possible) copying error; ‫“ ִמ ָּצפֹון‬from the north” (15:12 M) / περιβόλαιον “covering” (= ‫“ ִצּפּוי‬plating”) (15:12 G)64 /… ‫ִצּפ ֶֹרן‬ “point …” (17:1 M); the reading in G of 15:12 “a covering of bronze” appears to reflect a copying error or perhaps an intentional textual modification (in V G), anticipating Yhwh’s making Jeremiah to be a bronze wall in 15:20. The reading of 15:12 M is likely original. The innovative addition created by the duplicating scribe is introduced with a wordplay on ‫מצפון‬, namely ‫“ בצפרן ׁשמיר‬with the point of a diamond,” which parallels ‫“ בעט ברזל‬with an iron stylus” (see b…b above). This addition continues the new theme of the indelibility of Judah’s sin introduced in the first part of 17:1. The innovation also replaces a reference to bronze which perhaps alluded to the temple structures destroyed by the Babylonians.65 d…d Minor innovation (in part, intra-scriptural); along with the innovative additions of b…b and c…c, the duplicating scribe inserting other new material into the beginning of chap. 17 (vv. 2–3a). In 17:2b, the phrase ‫“ על־עץ רענן על גבעות הגבהות‬upon green tree and upon high hills”— denoting the ubiquity of the people’s idolatry—is a synonymous variation of a traditional phrase (‫“ על כל־גבעה גבהה ותחת כל־עץ רענן‬upon every high hill and under every green tree”) used elsewhere—with slight variation—in Jer+n (2:20; 3:6; cf. 3:13) and in DtrH (1 Kgs 14:23; 2 Kgs 16:4; 17:10; cf. Deut 12:2–3; Ezek 6:13; 20:28). Given the minor variations in wording of the phrase in 17:2—the repetition of the preposition ‫ על‬with tree instead of ‫ תחת‬and the double omission of ‫—כל‬the phrase was perhaps added here from memory. Importantly, the tree and hills of 17:2b are said to be occupied in 17:2a by (illicit) altars (‫ )מזבחות‬and Asherim (‫)האׁשרים‬. This specific description of illicit cult sites connects this addition more closely to the employment of the phrase in DtrH and D where the phrase is explicitly connected with idolatry. In contrast, the phrase in chaps. 2 and 3 of Jeremiah refers to idolatry only implicitly, by means of a metaphor of adultery. The stronger connection with DtrH and D marks this phrase as an intra-scriptural borrowing (as opposed to intra-Jeremianic). The inclusion of references to altars and Asherim also harmonizes the 63 64 65

Thus, Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 117. Cf. Gerstenberger, Jeremiah’s Complaints, 394, n. 7; Bernhard Duhm, Das Buch Jeremia, KHC 11 (Tübingen and Leipzig: J.C.B. Mohr, 1901), 134. Jeremiah 52:17 recounts how Babylon (the enemy from the north) breaks into pieces the bronze pillars, stands, and basin of the temple.

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doublet conceptually with its secondary context which is devoted to idolatry (see discussion above). This addition ends in 17:3a with the difficult words ‫(“ הררי בׂשדה‬my?) mountain in the field.”66 Perhaps this line was intended as a parallel to “high hills,” and should be emended to “mountains in the open country” (‫)הרים בׁשדה‬.67 e Minor synonymous variations (+/− ‫“ כל‬all”); twice in 15:13 // 17:3. f Non-significant variations (+/− conjunction); thrice in 15:13 // 17:3. g…g Minor innovation (intra-scriptural); ‫“ לא במחיר‬without price” (15:13 M) / ἀντάλλαγμα “as a payment” (= ‫“ ְמ ִחיר‬price”)68 (15:13 G) / ‫“ במתיך‬your high places” (17:3 M); the reading of 15:13 M, “without price,” simply reiterates the sense of the preceding accusative ‫“ לבז‬as plunder.”69 From context, the giving away of wealth and treasure without price is an enactment of punishment. In spite of the omission of the negative particle ‫לא‬, this sense of punishment is not lost in the variant reading in G, “as a payment.” The fact that G of 15:13 and M of 17:3 both lack the negative particle may suggest that it was added to M 15:13 after the moment of duplication. Most scholars eliminate the particle.70 Holladay’s attempt to see the reading of 15:13 M as an intentional adaptation of the reading found in 17:3 is unconvincing.71 As is the case with d…d, the replacement reading found in 17:3b, “for your high places,” harmonizes the verse conceptually with its surroundings (16:11–13, 18–20), which are focused on the theme of idolatry (see discussion above).72 The concern for idolatry located specifically atop 66 67 68 69 70

71

72

Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 483, finds the reading in M “impossible” (“O my mountain in the field”) and reads the phrase as ‫“ ַהר ִריב ָׁשדּוד‬the mountain of strife is devastated.” Cf. Allen, Jeremiah, 197 n. f. See the translation of ‫ ְמ ִחיר‬in 1 Kgs 21:2 = 20:2 G; cf. 2 Sam 24:24 (ἄλλαγμα). Cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 24. E.g., Gerstenberger, Jeremiah’s Complaints, 395; Leslie C. Allen, “More Cuckoos in the Textual Nest: At 2 Kings xxiii. 5; Jeremiah xvii. 3, 4; Micah iii. 3; vi. 16 (LXX); 2 Chronicles xx. 25 (LXX),” JTS 24 (1973): 70; idem, Jeremiah, 179, O’Connor, The Confessions of Jeremiah, 30. The interpretation for this particle offered by Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 456, is not convincing. Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 456, suggests that in 15:13 Yhwh responds to Jeremiah’s confession of v. 10 with the barely comforting words, “I will give your wealth (or perhaps ‘strength’) and treasure [as plunder], but not for payment”; i.e., Jeremiah’s despoiling should not be counted as divine punishment, “recompense” for sin, but as something gratuitous. That such words could be thought an appropriate response to Jeremiah’s confession is far from persuasive. Allen, “More Cuckoos in the Textual Nest,” 70–71, believes that 17:3 originally read “without price,” but received a suitable annotation “your high places” from the wider context; after the insertion of this annotation, however, the original reading was accidentally

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high places is distinct to D and DtrH (see discussion above), and with d…d and n…n links this section of Jeremiah to the Deuteronomistic tradition. Moreover, like the innovation of i…i below, this replacement alters the meaning of the doublet, specifying that the “wealth and treasure” plundered in 17:3 includes Judah’s high places, or perhaps the treasure of those high places. h…h Minor synonymous variation (s./pl.; +/− pronoun). i…i Minor innovation (in part, intra-Jeremianic); this large plus introduces the idea that the wealth and treasure plundered in Jer 15:13 // 17:3 includes the people’s ancestral heritage (‫ )נחלה‬given to them by Yhwh. This addition harmonizes the doublet with the end of chap. 16, which discusses Judah’s heritage (16:18–19). The Hebrew phrase ‫“ וׁשמטתה ובך‬and you will loosen and with you” does not make sense. Most correct ‫ ובך‬to ‫“ ידך‬your hands” (cf. Deut 15:3: ‫“ תׁשמט ידך‬your hand will loosen”).73 j…j Copying error (‫ ;ר → ד‬+/− pronoun): ‫“ והעבדתיך‬I will make you serve (your enemies)” (15:14 G, 17:4 M) / ‫“ והעברתי‬and I will make (your enemies) pass through” (15:14 M); the fact that 15:14 G agrees with 17:4 M strongly suggests that 15:14 originally read “I will make you serve”; after the moment of duplication, a copying error led to the misreading in 15:14 (including the loss of the final kaph). The attempts of some to find meaning in the reading ‫ והעברתי‬in 15:14 M are not convincing.74

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dropped. Allen points to Micah 1:5 as a parallel example where the same mistake occurs. My interpretation can easily accommodate Allen’s proposal, should it be correct; I would, however, attribute the annotation to the duplicating scribe who harmonized this doublet with the secondary context of chap. 17. Cf. discussion in Allen, Jeremiah, 197 n. h. For example, Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 455–6, among others, interprets this sentence as Yhwh’s comforting response to Jeremiah’s complaint in v. 10 that all curse him. By this understanding, Yhwh, in v. 14, assures Jeremiah that Yhwh will cause Jeremiah’s personal enemies—those who curse him—to “pass through”—i.e., be exiled—into a land unfamiliar to Jeremiah. Cf. O’Connor, The Confessions of Jeremiah, 38. Diamond, The Confessions of Jeremiah in Context, 219, n. 5. The problems with this interpretation are multiple. First, the term enemy (‫)איב‬, used in v. 14, never refers to personal opponents in the book of Jeremiah. In virtually every case it refers to a foreign national enemy, usually Babylon. The possible, though unlikely, exceptions to this rule are the occurrences of the term in this very verse, 15:14, and in 15:11, which is a particularly difficult verse to interpret. Second in the immediately following verse, v. 15, Jeremiah asks Yhwh to take vengeance (‫ )הנקם‬on his persecutors. This request makes little sense if Yhwh has just explained to Jeremiah that he will carry away Jeremiah’s enemies into captivity. Third, it is difficult to read v. 14a as a word of comfort or salvation in light of the rest of v. 14, where Yhwh’s wrath burns against his addressee. Fourth, in the larger Jeremianic tradition, Jeremiah shares the same fate as his personal opponents—being taken into exile in Egypt (Jer 43:5–6)—which seems to undercut the reading of v. 14a as a timely response of Yhwh to Jeremiah’s complaint. In

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k

Synonymous variant (intra-Jeremianic) and possibly PDHarm: + κύκλῳ “all around” (= ‫( )סביב‬15:14 G); The foreign enemy of Judah is frequently described as attacking from “all sides” (‫)סביב‬: e.g., 1:15, 4:17, 6:3, 25; 12:9; 20:10; 52:4, 7; cf. 21:14, where the destruction caused by the enemy is described as being found “all around”; in 25:9, Babylon will bring destruction against “all the surrounding” [‫ ]סביב‬nations; in the great reversal of chaps. 50–51, Babylon herself is attacked on “all sides” (50:14, 15, 29, 32; 51:2). If the word stood in 15:14 Jer+n, it was dropped (perhaps unconsciously) by the duplicator in 17:4, and its absence in 15:14 M would be due to PDHarm. Alternatively, the word may be unique to V G and inserted to 15:14 after the moment of duplication. l Copying error or possibly minor synonymous variation (+/− ‫“ אׁשר‬that”); 15:14 M is missing the relative pronoun (against 15:14 G and 17:4 M). The larger phrase in which the relative pronoun is found—‫בארץ אׁשר לא־ידעת‬ “in a land you do not know”—occurs two more times in Jeremiah with different subjects (16:13; 22:28). In both cases, the relative pronoun is present. This observation plus the agreement of 15:4 G with 17:4 suggests the pronoun’s absence in 15:14 M may be accidental. In any case, the variations are synonymous. m Minor synonymous variation (change in verbal form); ‫[“ קדחה‬a fire] is kindled” = ἐκκέκαυται (15:14 M G) / ‫“ קדחתם‬you kindled [a fire]” (17:4)—the difference between the two readings is negligible;75 in both, Yhwh’s anger is kindled like a fire. The reading in 17:4 seems to place more emphasis on the addressee’s culpability, but such culpability is already present in the previous verse which interprets Judah’s plundering as a consequence of its sins. n…n Minor innovation (probably intra-scriptural); ‫“ עליכם‬against you” (15:14 M and G) / ‫“ עד־עולם‬forever” (17:4 M); with this replacement, the scribe introduces to the doublet the idea of the unending punishment—a concept otherwise not found in the book of Jeremiah. This reading was perhaps inspired by Deut 32:22, where in the Song of Moses is found a phrase nearly identical to Jer 17:4b: ‫“ כי־אׁש קדחה באפי ותיקד עד־ׁשאול תחתית‬for fire is kindled in my anger and it burns to the depths of Sheol.” In both verses the burning of Yhwh’s anger is compared to something boundless, the depths of Sheol and the stretches of time, respectively. This innovative replacement works together with b…b and c…c above to emphasize the indelibility of Judah’s sin.

75

light of these difficulties, I accept the far simpler solution—and the witness of G—that this variant in M is a product of a copying error. Though Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 484, sees the verb in 15:14 as impossible.

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Text #3: Look! Days Are Coming, Says the Yhwh! (Jer 23:5–6 // Jer 33:14–16)

The doublet of 23:5–6 // 33:14–16 provides one of the clearest examples of how duplication can serve as a tool of textual divination. Most scholars agree that the text of Jer 33:14–16, missing in G, is a duplication of Jer 23:5–6 added in V M.76 Importantly, the duplicate twin (33:14–16) is part of a seventeen-verse plus of V M (33:14–26), the largest plus of V M; though I argue below that vv. 17–26 were added separately, after the insertion of vv. 14–16. Through duplication, the divining scribe discovered a secondary application of an existing oracle that originally addressed the enthronement of Zedekiah. Zedekiah, the oracle told, was Yhwh’s pick for Jerusalem’s throne. Time had passed, however, and the future of the kingship was uncertain. The divining scribe extended the relevance of this oracle, borrowing its words of divine favor and modifying them to address the city of Jerusalem itself: though kingless, Jerusalem would know Yhwh’s restoration and prosperity.

76

See: Michael A. Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel (Oxford: Clarendon, 1984), 427; William L. Holladay, Jeremiah 2: A Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, Chapters 26–52, Hermeneia (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1989), 228; Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, “Urtext, texte court et relecture: Jérémie 33:14–26 TM et ses préparations,” in Congress Volume: Leuven, 1989, ed. John A. Emerton, VTSup 43 (Leiden: Brill, 1991), 236–47; Johan Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” in VII Congress of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies, Leuven, 1989, ed. Claude E. Cox, SBLSCS 31 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1991), 100–101; Bernard Gosse, “La nouvelle alliance et les promesses d’avenir se référant à David dans les livres de Jérémie, Ezéchiel et Isaie,” VT 41 (1991): 422; Yohanan Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil: Les origines littéraires de la forme massorétique du livre de Jérémie, OBO 118 (Fribourg, Switzerland: Universitätsverlag, 1992), 11–12; Marvin A. Sweeney, “Jeremiah’s Reflection on the Isaian Royal Promise: Jeremiah 23:1–8 in Context,” in Uprooting and Planting, ed. John Goldingay, LHBOTS 439 (New York: T & T Clark, 2007), 309; Allen, Jeremiah, 377. The verses of Jer 33:17–26, also unrepresented by G, are considered secondary as well. Of primary importance is determining whether these additional verse (vv. 17–26) were added to chap. 33 in the same composition moment as the duplicate. It is possible that the moment of duplication provided an occasion for inserting this large plus into the chapter. While most scholars have simply assumed this to be the case, there are good reasons for considering vv. 17–26 as an addition introduced to V M sometime after the moment of duplication. I will present these reasons below. In disagreement with the majority, Lundbom, “Haplography in the Hebrew Vorlage of LXX Jeremiah,” 316, maintains that all thirteen verses of Jer 33:14–26 were lost through haplography, on the very unlikely basis of homoeoarcton of the initial ‫ ה‬of ‫ הנה‬in v. 14 with that of ‫ הדבר‬in 34:1. The possibility that these verses were dropped intentionally by a scribe or translator is convincingly refuted by Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 122–3.

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The scribe’s reuse of the text of the doublet also illustrates literary generation. Stitched onto the end of Jeremiah’s “Book of Consolation” (BOC) (Jer 30–33), the duplicate—in its modified form—interprets this new context through vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization and functions as a climactic conclusion to that book.77 The text of the duplicate presented itself to the scribe as a possible conclusion to the BOC probably because its diction had the potential to address a lacuna of that book. Conspicuously absent from the BOC is any reference to Yhwh’s reestablishment of righteousness and justice. Also missing is an emphasis on the Davidic kingship.78 This relative disinterest in the Davidic dynasty likely reflects a time when that dynasty was viewed negatively (perhaps after the reign of Zedekiah) or when its importance was overshadowed by the hope for an end of exile.79 The oracle selected for duplication (23:5–6) could potentially address both of these lacunae. It describes the restoration of righteousness and justice as 77

78

79

The “Book of Consolation,” while a modern designation, marks a section of Jeremiah that served as a repository for hope-filled oracles. The title Book of Consolation may also refer, more narrowly, to chaps. 30–31. Yet, this smaller unit of hope-filled oracles is connected thematically to the following two chapters which narrate (a) a symbolic prophetic act of hope (32:1–15)—Jeremiah’s purchasing of real-estate—(b) a prayer of Jeremiah uttered in response to this prophetic act (32:16–25), (c) Yhwh’s reply to Jeremiah which ends on a hopeful note (32:26–44), and (d) oracles concerning the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the restoration of Judah (33:1–13). Within these chapters the future of this kingship is touched on only lightly (cf. 30:9, 21). Carrol, Jeremiah, 638, assumed the duplication of Jer 23:5–6 in 33:14–16 was designed to address this lacuna. However, that the kingship is markedly deemphasized in the duplicate argues against this assumption. There is no scholarly consensus as to when the Book of Consolation (BOC) took shape. Norbert Lohfink, “Der junge Jeremia als Propagandist und Poet: Zum Grundstock von Jer 30–31,” in Livre de Jeremie: Livre de Jeremie: le prophète et son milieu, les oracles et leur transmission, ed. Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, BETL 54 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1981), 351–68, and Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 158–62, hold to an early date—attributing seven core strophes of Jeremiah 30–31 (which are seemingly directed toward the Northern Kingdom) to a young Jeremiah during the time of Josiah. Jeremiah himself revised these strophes, so they argue, reapplying them to the southern kingdom. On the other end of the spectrum, Carroll, Jeremiah, 569, attributes the whole collection to later “anonymous circles during and after the exile….” Most scholars, however, are interested in explaining the formation of the form of BOC as found in M, without considering the ways in which the book was actually expanded in V M vis-à-vis V G. For a survey of the widely differing scholarly theories on the formation of M’s version of the Book of Consolation, see Bob Becking, Between Fear and Freedom: Essays on the Interpretation of Jeremiah 30–31, OtSt 51 (Leiden: Brill Academic, 2004), 3–8. More recently, Christl Maier, “Prophetic Expectations and Aspirations in Late Babylonian and Early Persian Texts in Jeremiah,” HBAI 3 (2014): 145–65, views the development of the BOC through post-trauma and postcolonial lenses.

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well as the establishment of the monarchy. Regarding the former, this oracle is the one place in Jeremiah where such a restoration is imagined. Significantly, however, the duplication of this oracle in Jer 33:14–16 was designed to address the first lacuna (the absence of a reference to the reestablishment of righteousness and justice) but not the second (the lack of emphasis on the monarchy). The duplicating scribe downplayed the oracle’s references to a restored kingship thereby aligning the oracle with the BOC’s more subdued expectations for a new king. Perhaps, then, this doublet was added to Jeremiah not long after the early form of the BOC (i.e., the form attested in G) took shape, when the restoration of the kingship was still not a priority.80 3.1 Original Meaning of 23:5–6 To grasp how the duplicate twin transforms the meaning of the original oracle, one must consider the initial purpose of 23:5–6. There are several compelling reasons for agreeing with the following conclusions reached by Lipinski and Lust: (1) Jer 23:6 originally contained the name ‫( יוצדק‬still preserved in G), an alternative spelling of king Zedekiah’s name. (2) At the moment of duplication, the duplicating scribe replaced this reference to Zedekiah with an appellation of Jerusalem (in 33:16), ‫יהוה צדקנו‬ (which at some point also replaced the name ‫ יוצדק‬in 23:6). First, ‫ יוצדק‬is a viable alternate spelling of Zedekiah’s name. The sole difference between the traditional spelling of Zedekiah (‫ )צדקיהו‬and the name’s alternate spelling (‫ )יוצדק‬is the placement of the theophoric element (‫יהו‬/‫)יו‬, coming at the end in the former and the beginning in the latter.81 The transposition of the theophoric element within a person’s name occurs elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible. In fact, just a few verses prior to the doublet (Jer 22:24, 28) Zedekiah’s predecessor, Jehoiachin (‫)יהויכן‬, is twice referred to as Coniah (‫)כניהו‬, a name in which the theophoric element has also been transposed from front to end.82 The inverted spelling of Zedekiah’s name in 23:6 fits convincingly in this context. 80

81 82

Maier, “Prophetic Expectations and Aspirations in Late Babylonian and Early Persian Texts in Jeremiah,” 222, dates Jer 33:14–16 to a time when “all efforts to re-establish the Davidic monarchy have failed.” In any case, it is clear that Jer 33:14–16 was added to Jeremiah at a different stage than the large plus of Jer 33:17–26—verses which do emphasize the place of the Davidic dynasty in Yhwh’s restoration of Judah. Zedekiah may also be spelled ‫צדקיה‬. In Jer 24:1, a third form of Jehoiachin’s name appears (‫)יכניהו‬, demonstrating that the spelling of kings’ names was not fixed. Cf. Lipiński, Edouard. “Études sur des textes ‘messianiques’ de l’Ancien Testament.” Sem 20 (1970): 54; Lust, “Messianism and the Greek

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Second, the longer name ‫—יהוה צדקנו‬found in M—does not look like a personal name, but like an appellation for Jerusalem, and for this reason fits the perspective of the duplicate—which is focused on the holy city—as opposed to that of the original—in which no such focus is found. As Lust explains, the long form of the divine name (‫ )יהוה‬never appears as a component of a person’s name; rather, “Most if not all of the names in which [the long form] is attested are symbolic appellations of Jerusalem.”83 Thus, it seems highly plausible that the name ‫ יהוה צדקנו‬originated with the creation of the duplicate and was only copied into the text of chap. 23 at a later point. Third, the oracle of 23:5–6 as a whole (including the assumed reference to Zedekiah) works cogently as prophecy addressing the enthronement of Zedekiah.84 As argued below, the original oracle champions a certain legitimate heir (‫ )צמח צדיק‬of David’s throne. Importantly, concerns of legitimacy likely hounded Zedekiah’s reign. He was installed as king by Nebuchadnezzar in 597 BCE after the Chaldean ruler exiled Jehoiachin to Babylon (2 Kgs 24:12, 17). As Lipinski explains, given these circumstances it would not be surprising if at that time Zedekiah’s claim to the throne were contested.85 It seems probable that some Judeans would have continued to support the deposed king, viewing with suspicion the new monarch propped up by Babylon. In such a setting, an oracle supporting the legitimacy of Zedekiah would be fitting.

83 84

85

Version of Jeremiah,” 89–90, points to two more examples in the Bible of names in which the location of the theophoric element moves around: “Eli-am, father of Bathsheba in [2 Sam 11:3], is called Ami-el in [1 Chr 3:5]. Jeho-ahaz, the youngest son and successor of Jehoram in [2 Chr 21:17 and 25:23], is called Ahaz-iah in [2 Chr 22:1] and in [2 Kgs 8:25–26, 29; 9:27; 10:13ff].” Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 90; e.g., ‫“ כסא יהוה‬Throne of Yhwh” (Jer 3:17), ‫“ יהוה ׁשמה‬Yhwh is there” (Ezek 48:35), and ‫“ עיר יהוה‬City of Yhwh” (Isa 62:14). Raik Heckl, “‘Jhwh ist unsere Gerechtigkeit’ (Jer 23,5f.): Überlieferungsgeschichtliche Erwägungen zu Jer 21–24*,” in Die unwiderstehliche Wahrheit: Studien zur alttestamentlichen Prophetie. Festschrift für Arndt Meinhold, ed. R. Lux and E.-J. Waschke, ABG 23 (Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2006), 181–98. Carroll, Jeremiah, 446; cf. discussion in McKane, Jeremiah 1, 560. While McKane himself disagrees with this view, he points to a number of scholars who see 23:5–6 as referring to Zedekiah, e.g., Joseph Klausner, The Messianic Idea in Israel: From Its Beginning to the Completion of the Mishnah (New York: Macmillan, 1955), 103–4; Bright, Jeremiah, 143, writes: “Very probably Jeremiah uttered these words early in Zedekiah’s reign, when dynastic hopes were being attached to that king by certain of his courtiers”; cf. Abraham Malamat, “Jeremiah and the Last Two Kings of Judah,” PEQ 83 (1951): 86. Lipinski, “Études sur des textes ‘messianiques’ de l’Ancien Testament,” 54. Lipinski’s explains that the reference to a “legitimate heir” in 23:5 “vise précisément à combattre pareille contestation.” Cf. Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 92.

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Fourth, an oracle legitimizing Zedekiah coheres with the text’s literary context. The oracle comes a few verses after another in which Yhwh takes responsibility for the Babylonian deposal of Jehoiachin (22:24–30).86 If Yhwh has rejected the current monarch, one would expect the deity to endorse a replacement. That the Jeremiah tradition would claim divine approval for Zedekiah— who happened to be Nebuchadnezzar’s choice for Jerusalem’s throne—fits with the general pro-Babylonian perspective of that tradition.87 All in all, following an oracle rejecting Jehoiachin an oracle supporting Zedekiah as the legitimate heir is fitting. Still, not all have taken the reading of G seriously. For instance, Holladay— convinced that the historical Jeremiah did not support Zedekiah—believes the reading preserved in M is original.88 With the name ‫יהוה צדקנו‬, so Holliday argues, Jeremiah has deliberately reversed Zedekiah’s name, placing the theophoric element first, and replaced the first per. s. poss. pron. (‫י‬- “my”) with the first per. pl. poss. pron. (‫נו‬- “our”) in order to draw a contrast between the Judean ruler and a future Yhwh-backed monarch who would “reverse the characteristics of the reign of Zedekiah.”89 Holladay’s reading, however, relies upon a highly speculative reconstruction of late Judean monarchial history. Moreover, he does not account for the origin of the reading in G. If Jewish tradition came to view Zedekiah in a bad light, why would a later scribe replace an uncontroversial reading (as found in M) with a reference to the last and rejected king?90 Given Zedekiah’s ensuing failure, it is much easier to follow Lipinski and argue that the reading in M of 23:6 is the result of a later scribe’s efforts to erase a reference to Zedekiah as the legitimate heir.91 In short, all evidence points toward 86

87 88 89

90

91

Similarly, John Skinner, Prophecy and Religion: Studies in the Life of Jeremiah (Cambridge: The University Press, 1922), 312–3, n. 1, argues that this oracle comes exactly where one would expect an oracle about Zedekiah—at the end of a series of oracles against the last kings of Judah: Jehoahaz (Jer 22:11–12), Jehoiakim (22:18–19), Jehoiachin (22:24–30). Carroll, Jeremiah, 446, makes a similar point: “The oracle here legitimates Zedekiah … Such a reading is consistent with the attitude shown by Jeremiah toward Zedekiah in the narratives and indicates the pro-Babylonian nature of his rule.” Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 619–20. Ibid., 617. In the same vein, Holladay, ibid., 620, writes that the foreseen king would “embody the faith of the whole people in the realization of righteousness that has its sources only in [Yhwh]”; cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 57; Peter C. Craigie, Jeremiah 1–25, WBC 26 (Dallas, TX: Word Books, 1991), 329. See Hermann-Josef Stipp, “Zedekiah in the Book of Jeremiah: On the Formation of a Biblical Character,” CBQ 58 (1996): 627–48, for the characterization of Zedekiah in Jeremiah; Stipp traces how the king, once viewed positively, is later presented in a negative light. Lipiński, “Études sur des textes ‘messianiques’ de l’Ancien Testament,” 54–55: “… la disparition du nom de Yôṣedeq dans le texte reҫu serait due à la volonté d’éliminer de ce texte

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the conclusion that the oracle of 23:5–6—in its original form—aimed to garner support for the contested kingship of Zedekiah, but at a later moment was harmonized in light of its duplicate, 33:14–16. 3.2 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function Many of the adaptations of the duplicate in 33:14–16, vis-à-vis the original in 23:5–6, work together toward two interdependent goals: (1) the curtailing of the Davidic king’s importance in the coming age; and, at the same time, (2) the conceptual harmonization of the doublet with its secondary literary context—a context concerned with the return of the Judeans from exile and the restoration of righteousness and justice in Jerusalem.92 I will review these adaptations briefly. First, with the expansions in v. 14, the duplicating scribe shifted the focus of the oracle away from the king and onto the people of Judah and Israel as a whole—who are the primary subjects of chaps. 30–33. Moreover, the scribe expanded the scope of Yhwh’s action to include the return of his people from exile (v. 14)—assuming that ‫“( הדבר הטוב‬the good word”) inserted in 33:14 echoes the “good word” promising such a return in 29:10 (cf. 32:42)—and the restoration of Jerusalem (v. 16)—two themes that dominate the BOC.93 Thus, the oracle is no longer primarily interested in the Davidic heir but reflects the broader concerns of the oracle’s secondary context. The new emphasis on Jerusalem in v. 16, in particular, radically displaces attention that was originally focused on the king. The naming of Jerusalem now occupies the oracle’s climactic position—a position once filled by the name ‫יוצדק‬. Second, in place of a ‫צמח צדיק‬, the oracle now speaks of a ‫—צמח צדקה‬an agent through whom God will establish God’s righteousness. Here, focus shifts from the legitimacy of a king to the restoration of righteousness. While a new king will play a role in fulfillment of God’s justice, the significance of the king’s reign is diminished. Erased is the articulation that “the king will rule and deal wisely” (‫)ומלך מלך והׂשכיל‬. As Goldman argues, this deletion is not innocuous, but untethers the king’s execution of “justice and righteousness” (‫)מׁשפט וצדקה‬

92

93

par trop embarrassant toute allusion à un roi qui fut imposé illégalement par le souverin babylonien et qui a entrainé par sa politique la ruine du Temple, de la capital er de l’État.” Cf., Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 13–15. Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 104, writes, “… in this version of the oracle, the reference to the historical situation of the individual king Zedekiah disappears. The Davidic expectations are collectivized and transferred to the town.” The theme of the return from exile occurs frequently: e.g., in 30:3, 8, 10 (in M only); 31:8–13, 16–18, 21; 32:37. The same is true of the theme of the restoration of Jerusalem and Judah: e.g., 30:3, 17, 18; 31:4–5, 18, 23–25, 28; 33:7, 11. See textual analysis below.

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in v. 15 from the king’s own ruling and wise dealing. Through this deletion, the enactment of justice and righteousness is anchored directly onto Yhwh’s action of “springing up a branch of righteousness.”94 It is Yhwh’s initiative rather than the king’s wise dealings that brings about the justice of Yhwh. Third, attention is further diverted from David’s heir with the replacement of ‫“( בימיו‬his [the king’s] days”) with ‫ בימים ההם‬in v. 16—a phrase that echoes the earlier line ‫ בימים ההם ובעת ההיא‬which itself was inserted into the oracle at the beginning of v. 15. Both of these insertions emphasize that Judah will be saved—not in the days of the new king in particular—but in the days when Yhwh fulfills his good word mentioned in v. 14—i.e., the return of the Judeans from exile. The text of the doublet also interprets its secondary context through vertical reading. Most importantly, the duplicate interprets the meaning of v. 9 which states that Jerusalem will be “a name of joy.”95 While the verse describes the city’s name as joyful, it does not reveal what that name is. Clarification is found in v. 16 where Jerusalem is explicitly named. This link between v. 16 and v. 9 reveals a major interpretive purpose of the duplicate: the restoration of Jerusalem described in v. 9 is to be understood as a manifestation of Yhwh’s righteousness. Earlier in Jeremiah 33, Jerusalem is a location of grave injustice. Verse 4 describes an unjust, material consequence of war, namely the destruction of civilian houses that were seized and torn down for the war effort. In the following verses, Yhwh makes known his intentions to put the city under repair (‫ ) ֲא ֻר ָכה‬and to give it a fresh beginning (vv. 6–7). In v. 9, the foretelling of this restoration continues and is symbolized by Yhwh’s description of the city as a joy. Potentially, the rebuilding of Jerusalem depicted in these verses could amount to a restoral of justice—the righting of wartime 94 95

Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 14; cf. Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 104. In G, the word “name” is absent; this word may have been lost due to parablepsis reading ‫ לׂשׂשון‬for ‫ ;לׁשם ׂשׂשון‬cf. William McKane, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Jeremiah. Volume 2: Introduction and Commentary on Jeremiah XXVI–LII, ICC (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1996.), 858. Alternatively, if G is more original, the word ‫ לׁשם‬may have been added at the same time as vv. 14–16; cf. Bogaert, “Urtext, texte court et relecture,” 239. While the name Jerusalem is not found in v. 9, Jerusalem is undoubtedly the subject. The last f. s. subject mentioned in the previous verses is the city, Jerusalem. In v. 6, the f. s. pronoun ‫“ לה‬to her” (= αὐτῇ) clearly refers to the city of Jerusalem. And although the word “city” in v. 5 may be a later addition (it is missing in G), the setting of v. 4 is the city, Jerusalem, and this setting does not change in the following verses. Here I disagree with Bogart, ibid., who seems to assume that apart from the additions of the word “city” in v. 5 and of the word “name” in v. 9, the verb in v. 9 would be impersonal and would not refer to the city.

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wrongdoing—and a material manifestation of Yhwh’s own righteousness. Yet, this potential connection, if intended, is not made explicit. With the introduction of the duplicate, however—and the revealing of the city’s new name, ‫יהוה‬ ‫—צדקנו‬the restoration of Jerusalem becomes a symbol and embodiment of Yhwh’s righteousness.96 Moreover, the adapted text of the doublet relies on its new context to be fully understood. Only through vertical reading can one determine that Yhwh’s good word (‫ )הטוב הדבר‬in v. 14 refers to the return from exile mentioned in 29:10 and 32:37–42. Similarly, the language of Jerusalem “dwelling in safety” (‫ )תׁשכון לבטח‬in 23:6 (// 33:16) takes on new meaning in chap. 33. Here it echoes 32:37, where the return from exile comes with Yhwh’s promise: ‫הׁשבתים לבטח‬ “I will make them [the citizens of Jerusalem (see 32:36)] dwell in safety.” Through vertical reading, the content of Jer 33:16 is thus understood to be about the return. In summary, the text of the duplicate in Jer 33:14–16 both interprets its literary context and relies upon this context for comprehension. In this way, the duplicating scribe prolonged the divinatory meaning of an existing oracle. 96

My view is perhaps compatible with that of Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, “Les mécanismes rédactionnels en Jr. 10:1–16 (LXX et TM) et la signification des supplements in Le livre de Jérémie,” in Le livre de Jérémie: Le prophète et son milieu, les oracles et leur transmission, ed. Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, BETL 54 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1981), 236, and Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 27–29. Both believe that the modifications of 33:16—namely the insertion of the name Jerusalem and the new name given to it—give the doublet a “coloration sacerdotale” (Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 27), arguing that “Jerusalem” is a cipher for the temple and the temple cult and is thus connected to the reference to temple worship in 33:11. They also ascribe these modifications and a reference to the Levitical priests in 33:18 (the references to these priests in vv. 21–22 may be secondary) to the same revising hand; cf. Allen, Jeremiah, 377–8; McKane, Jeremiah 2, 861. Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 29, suggests further that the new name of Jerusalem is a symbol for Yhwh’s special presence in the temple in Jerusalem. While the introduction of the reference to the priesthood in 33:18 may suggest that the toponym “Jerusalem” (at some point) carried this symbolic meaning, it is uncertain if the city name carried this meaning at the moment of duplication that created 33:14–16. None of the modifications of the doublet’s text emphasize the sacerdotal character of the city or acknowledge the reference to temple worship in 33:11. Instead, its modifications are explicitly connected to the renaming of Jerusalem (which seems to be linked to the rebuilding of Jerusalem described in v. 6) and to its safety (‫ )בטח‬from the war described in vv. 4–5. If the doublet were to be modified with a sacerdotal Tendenz, I would expect these modifications to reference the cult or the temple more explicitly. Mentioning Jerusalem on its own is hardly a certain indicator of a concern for the priesthood; and for reasons explained below, I consider it probable that Jer 33:17–26 is a later addition composed after the duplicate of Jer 33:14–16. Still, I leave open the possibility that at a later point, another scribe heard cultic overtones in the name “Jerusalem” in v. 16 and added the reference to the priesthood in 33:18 (and possibly vv. 21–22).

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3.3 The Relationship of 33:14–16 to 33:17–26 Many scholars assume that the whole plus of Jer 33:14–26 was added to Jeremiah at the same time, since these verses are part of a continuous plus of V M and since V M is thought to be the work of a single reviser.97 However, a fresh look at the textual data suggests an alternate hypothesis. Much of vv. 17–26—namely vv. 20–22, 25–26—consists of a reworking of 31:35–37.98 For this reason it is possible to compare the duplication technique, function, and Tendenz of the duplicate (33:14–16) with those of 33:17–26.99 Such a comparison suggests that the plus of Jer 33:17–26 originates from a different hand and later time period than the duplicate—a time when imaging the restoration of the kingship was urgent; a time when the dearth of references to the Davidic dynasty in the BOC had to be addressed.100 First, the reworking of 31:35–37 in 33:20–22, 25–26 is quite distinct from the duplication technique of 33:14–16. The latter consists of a verbatim repetition with major adaptation of 23:5–6 (see discussion of duplication technique below), while the former is so free that it would hardly qualify as a paraphrase. Consider the following synopsis of Jer 31:35–37 and Jer 33:20–22, 25–26:101 ‫ כה אמר יהוה‬³⁵

[Description of the natural order established by Yhwh]

‫נתן ׁשמׁש לאור יומם חקת ירח וכוכבים‬ ‫לאור לילה רגע הים ויהמו גליו יהוה צבאות‬ ‫ׁשמו‬

97

[Oath #3]

‫ כה אמר יהוה‬²⁰

‫אם־תפרו את־בריתי היום ואת־בריתי‬ ‫הלילה ולבלתי היות יומם־ולילה בעתם‬ ‫גם־בריתי תפר את־דוד עבדי מהיות־לו בן‬²¹ ‫מלך על־כסאו ואת־הלוים הכהנים מׁשרתי‬

E.g. Bogaert, “Urtext, texte court et relecture”; Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 11–12; Allen, Jeremiah, 376–7. 98 Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 16–21. 99 Bogaert, “Urtext, texte court et relecture,” 246, simply describes both the duplicate and the rewritten material of vv. 17–26 as “une paraphrase,” a definition of his term “paraphrase” is required. 100 The Tendenz of Jer 33:14–16 is clearly distinct from (but not necessarily at odds with) the repeated concern for Yhwh’s covenant with the Levitical priest in 33:18, 21–22. McKane, Jeremiah 2, 861, understands the references here to the Levites to be “a promotion of the priesthood at the expense of the Davidic king.” Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 27–28, considers this repeated interest in the Levitical priesthood to be later glosses. The arguments made in this section are not contingent upon a decision on this matter. 101 For the following analysis, cf. Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 16–21, and Bogart, “Urtext, texte court et relecture,” 242–6, who make similar observations about these two texts. For an analysis of the textual differences between M and G in 31:35–37, see: Becking, Between Fear and Freedom, 43–45.

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

[Oath #1]

‫ אם־ימׁשו החקים האלה מלפני נאם־יהוה‬³⁶ ‫גם זרע יׂשראל יׁשבתו מהיות גוי לפני‬ ‫כל־הימים‬

[Oath #2]

‫ כה אמר יהוה‬³⁷

‫אם־ימדו ׁשמים מלמעלה ויחקרו מוסדי־‬ ‫ארץ למטה‬ ‫גם־אני אמאס בכל־זרע יׂשראל על־כל־‬ ‫אׁשר עׂשו נאם־יהוה‬ Jer 31:35–37 M

117

[Analogy from nature]

‫ אׁשר לא־יספר צבא הׁשמים ולא ימד‬²² ‫חול הים כן ארבה את־זרע דוד עבדי ואת־‬ ‫הלוים מׁשרתי אתי‬

[Oath #4]

‫ כה אמר יהוה‬²⁵

‫אם־לא בריתי יומם ולילה חקות ׁשמים‬ ‫וארץ לא־ׂשמתי‬ ‫ גם־זרע יעקוב ודוד עבדי אמאס מקחת‬²⁶ ‫מזרעו מׁשלים אל־זרע אברהם יׂשחק‬ … ‫ויעקב‬ Jer 33:20–22, 25–26 M

The text of Jer 31:35–37 consists of a description of the natural order and two divine oaths (oaths #1 and #2) promising the continuation of Israel as a nation. Jer 33:20–22, 25–26 contains an analogy from nature and its own two oaths (oaths #3 and #4) all of which are focused on the permanence of the Davidic covenant (and the Levitical priesthood). The scribe responsible for creating oaths #3 and #4 and the analogy from nature in 33:20–22, 25–26 utilized some of the themes and language of 31:35–37 and even imitated the oath form found therein;102 yet what the scribe created out of these bits and pieces was an entirely new text. The two texts are too dissimilar to be described as a doublet.103 102 The dependence of the protases of oaths #3 (33:20) and oath #4 (33:25) upon the protasis of oath #1 is easily perceived. The protasis of oath #1 considers an inconceivable hypothetical, namely that certain aspects of the natural order should fail, i.e., the natural orders described in the preceding verse, 31:35. Following suit, the protases of oath #3 and oath #4 both entertain their own of inconceivability—that is, the failure of a different set of natural orders (cf. Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 19). The apodoses of the three oaths display further similarities. All three state as impossible the cessation of something: the end of Israel as a nation in oath #1; the breaking of the Davidic covenant (and a Levitical covenant) in oath #3; and the rejection of the descendants of David and Jacob in oath #4. The two texts (i.e. 31:35–36 and 33:20–22, 25–26) also exhibit a small amount of similar and identical diction: ‫“ יומם … לילה‬by day … by night” (31:35; 33:25) ≈ ‫“ היום … הלילה‬the day … the night” (33:20); and, ‫“ חקת‬statues” (31:35; 33:25; cf. 31:26) (cf. Goldman, ibid.). On the basis of these formal, thematic, and linguistic similarities the dependence of the addition of 33:20–22, 25–26 upon 31:35–37 is undeniable. 103 For instance, both the description of the natural order in 31:35 and the protases of oaths #3 and #4 refer to “day” and “night.” Yet, the former does so as a consequence of its concern to describe the sun, moon, and stars, and their ordained purpose of illuminating day and night, while the two oaths take interest in day and night only insofar as they occur during their appointed times. These two oaths have no interest in the cosmic luminaries nor

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In short, the scribal technique used to create the duplicate of 33:14–16 is markedly distinct from that which was utilized in the composition of vv. 17–26. Second, the duplicate of 33:14–16 and the plus of 33:17–26 may be further distinguished by their function. The plus is entirely concerned with guaranteeing the Davidic dynasty (and the Levitical priesthood). Verse 17 affirms: ‫לא־יכרת‬ ‫“( לדוד איׁש יׁשב על־כסא בית־יׂשראל‬David shall never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel”).104 Add to this the primary concern of 33:20–22, 25–26 which, as noted above, is the permanence of the Davidic covenant. This covenant is on par with the laws of nature. Yhwh guarantees the continuation of the Davidic line: as long as there is day and night, David will rule over the descendants of Israel. In other words, the function of 33:17–26 stands in tension with the concern of 33:14–16 which, as I showed, transfers significant attention away from the Davidic dynasty. Third, and in the same vein, of the duplication Tendenz of 33:14–16 and the rewriting Tendenz of 33:20–22, 25–26 work in opposite directions. All of the modifications of the doublet’s text observable in vv. 14–16 cohere according to a clear pattern: the minimization of references to the Davidic dynasty. In stark contrast, the modifications of the text of 31:35–37, apparent in 33:20–22, 25–26, serve to maximize references to the Davidic king. These modifications actually undo and undermine the modifications of the doublet twin of 33:14–16. For this reason, it appears improbable that both sections were added to V M by the same scribal hand. Instead, it seems inescapable that these sections arose from two different scribal hands in two different time periods. The former (33:14–16) stems from a time when imagining the restoration of the Davidic dynasty was politically difficult or perhaps less desirable or urgent, while the latter (33:17– 26) reflects a later date when hope for such restoration was renewed. in their ordained purpose. The description of the natural order in 31:35 also describes the stirring and roaring of the sea; this subject is completely missing from the oaths of Jer 33:20–22, 25–26. The apodosis of oath #1 is concerned with the continuation of Israel as a nation. While this concern is reflected to a small degree in the apodosis of oath #4 (but not that of oath #3), it is substantially dwarfed by the concern for the continuation of David’s line, the main focus of the apodoses of oaths #3 and #4. The analogy from nature in 33:22 clearly borrows from oath #2, but since the two are formally distinct (an analogy is not an oath) one cannot describe them as a doublet. For its part, the diction of the second oath’s apodosis was employed by the apodosis of oath #4 (33:26). The former reads: “Then I will reject all the descendants of Israel on account of all that they did.” Some of this wording is carried over to oath #4: the apodosis of oath #4 describes the impossibility of Yhwh’s rejection of Jacob’s descendants, though as mentioned above, the primary concern of oath #4 is the continuation of the Davidic kingship. 104 NRSV. For a discussion of the origins of 33:17–18, see: Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 15–16.

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3.4 Duplication Technique The duplicating scribe radically changed the sense of the doublet’s text creating a verbatim repetition with major adaptation. The duplicate contains seven innovations (counting a…a, b…b, and c…c as a single innovative addition), minor (in small caps) and major (in italic small caps): an addition of sixteen words, fifteen of which are drawn from elsewhere in Jeremiah (intra-Jeremianic); five replacements (totaling seven words); and an omission of three words. These innovations introduce many new ideas to the text of the doublet and omit a few that are original: a new temporal specificity for when the Davidic heir will arise—namely at the same moment Yhwh keeps his word regarding the end of the exile; an expansion of the oracle’s audience to include not just the king but also the people of Israel and Judah; the erasing of two references to a concrete figure (Zedekiah) and, by extension, of a specific historical context (when Zedekiah’s throne was contested); and the downplaying of the significance of the Davidic heir in tandem with a new focus on the city of Jerusalem. In many regards, we are looking at a very different oracle when we read the duplicate of 33:14–16. The original function of the doublet—promoting the reign of a specific king at a specific moment in history—has been eliminated. In its place, one finds a text with a more general concern for the people of Judah (and Israel) and the well-being of the city Jerusalem. In other words, this doublet is a major adaptation. It is interesting to note, however, that in spite of the proliferation of innovation in the duplicate, the base text of 23:5–6 is copied verbatim. This is to say, unlike the previous two doublets, one finds zero examples of synonymous variation (including no cases of minor synonymous variation). The remaining seventeen words of the original doublet twin are simply reproduced wordfor-word in the duplicate. This exactitude could suggest that the duplicating scribe created the duplicate through the direct consultation of a written copy of 23:5–6. The scribe took this text and adapted it significantly; yet by leaving almost two-thirds of the original text untouched, the scribe preserved a record of the genetic relationship between the twins. ⁵ Look! Days are coming, says Yhwh, when I will establish

for David a legitimate heir.

¹⁴ Look! Days are coming, says Yhwh, When I will establish the good word which I spoke to the house of Israel and to the house of Judah ¹⁵ In those days and in that time, I will cause to sprout for David a righteous heir.

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And he will rule as king and deal wisely, and he will enact justice and righteousness in the land. ⁶ In his days, Judah will be saved and Israel will dwell in safety. And this is his name by which he will be called, “Zedekiah.” Jer 23:5–6

                 and he will enact justice and righteousness in the land. ¹⁶ In those days, Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will dwell in safety. And this is        what they will call her, “Yhwh is Our Righteousness” Jer 33:14–16

3.5 Textual Analysis Jer 23:5–6105 G ⁵ ἰδοὺ ἡμέραι ἔρχονται λέγει κύριος καὶ ἀναστήσω a…a b…b c…c τῷ Δαυιδ dἀνατολὴν δικαίανd eκαὶ βασιλεύσει βασιλεὺς καὶ συνήσειe καὶ ποιήσει κρίμα καὶ δικαιοσύνην ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ⁶ fἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις αὐτοῦf σωθήσεται Ιουδας καὶ gΙσραηλ κατασκηνώσειg πεποιθώς hκαὶ τοῦτο τὸ ὄνομα ὃ καλέσει αὐτὸν [κύριος]h lΙωσεδεκl

Jer 23:5–6 M

Jer 33:14–16 M

‫ הנה ימים באים נאם־יהוה‬⁵ ‫ הנה ימים באים נאם־יהוה‬¹⁴ a…a‫והקמתי‬ ‫את־הדבר הטוב‬a ‫והקמתי‬ ‫אל־בית‬b a‫אׁשר דברתי‬ b…b b‫יׂשראל ועל־בית יהודה‬ c…c ‫בימים ההם ובעת ההיא‬c ¹⁵ c‫אצמיח‬ d‫ צמח צדיק‬d‫לדוד‬ d‫צמח צדקה‬d ‫לדוד‬ e‫ומלך מלך והׂשכיל‬e e…e ‫ועׂשה מׁשפט וצדקה בארץ ועׂשה מׁשפט וצדקה בארץ‬ f‫בימיו‬f ⁶ f‫בימים ההם‬f ¹⁶ ‫תוׁשע יהודה‬ ‫תוׁשע יהודה‬ ‫ לבטח‬g‫יׂשראל יׁשכן‬g‫ו‬ ‫ לבטח‬g‫ירוׁשלם תׁשכון‬g‫ו‬ h‫וזה־ׁשמו אׁשר־יקראו‬h h‫וזה אׁשר־יקרא־לה‬h l‫יהוה צדקנו‬l l‫יהוה צדקנו‬l

105 In G, Jer 23:6 ends with the words ἐν τοῖς προφήταις (“among the prophets”); these words translate the introductory formula of 23:9 ‫“( לנבאים‬concerning the prophets”) which originally introduced a series of oracles concerning prophets (23:9–40) that directly followed 23:5–6. In G, vv. 7–8 (M) are found after 23:40; cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 57. Initially, G probably read τοῖς προφήταις (compare the translation of ‫ ל‬in 46:2; 48:1; 49:1, 7, 23, 28) and acquired the preposition ἐν by analogy from the use of this preposition with τοῖς προφήταις in 23:13, 14.

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a…a Minor innovation (intra-Jeremianic); ‫]הקמתי[ את־הדבר הטוב אׁשר דברתי‬ “[I will fulfill] the promise (good word) that I have made”; this phrase was probably drawn from Jer 29:10, where Yhwh promises to fulfill (‫ )הקמתי‬his good words (‫)דברי הטוב‬.106 Furthermore, it harmonizes the doublet’s text with its immediate context: ‫כן אנכי מביא עליהם את־כל־הטובה אׁשר אנכי דבר‬ ‫“ עליהם‬Thus I will bring upon them all the good fortune that I promise them” (Jer 32:42).107 The addition introduces to the doublet the notion of promise fulfillment and perhaps also alludes specifically to the promised return from exile which is the subject of Jer 29:10 and 32:42 (see 32:37 for the reference to the return). With b…b and c…c, this addition constitutes a major plus added to the text of the doublet. b…b Minor innovation (intra-Jeremianic); this addition reflects stock Jeremiah language; the use of the phrase of ‫“ בית יׂשראל‬house of Israel” in parallel with ‫“ בית יהודה‬house of Judah” is found only in Jeremiah where it occurs another six times.108 The specific combination of these phrases plus the doublet’s opening words—“Look! Days are coming!”—may have been inspired by Jer 31:27, 31, where the same combination is found. Importantly, this addition widens the oracle’s audience specifying that the people of Judah and Israel in general, and not simply the Davidic heir, are the beneficiaries of Yhwh’s intentions. Holladay suggests that the preposition ‫ אל‬used in the phrase “to the house of Israel” is an error and should be corrected with ‫על‬. The immediately following, parallel phrase “to the house of Judah” uses the correct preposition.109 c…c Minor innovation (intra-Jeremianic); ‫“ בימים ההם ובעת ההיא אצמיח‬In those days and in that time I will cause to sprout.” The first part, ‫בימים ההם ובעת‬ ‫ההיא‬, was probably borrowed from Jer 50:4, 20; outside of Jeremiah, the phrase is only employed in Joel 4:1.110 These words provide some temporal specificity to the doublet’s promise that an heir of David will rise up: the heir will come at the same time Yhwh fulfills his promise to the people (see a…a above). With the following verb—‫—אצמיח‬this addition 106 Jeremiah 29:10 M reads ‫“ דברי הטוב‬my good words”; ‫ הטוב‬is missing in G. This suggests that the scribe responsible for Jer 33:14–16 is dependent upon an expanded version of chap. 29; cf. Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 15; Bogaert, “Urtext, texte court et relecture,” 240–1. Less likely is the possibility that the duplicating scribe also inserted the word “good” into 29:10. 107 Cf. Allen, Jeremiah, 376; Gosse, “La nouvelle alliance,” 422. 108 5:11; 11:10, 17; 13:11; 31:27 (V M only), 31; cf. 3:18. 109 Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 227. 110 Cf. Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 103.

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functions as a Wiederaufnahme (cf. … ‫ והקמתי ימים באים‬in Jer 23:5 = 33:14), thus marking the end of the major insertion of v. 14. Yet, since the duplicating scribe already utilized the doublet’s verb ‫ הקמתי‬in v. 14 with regard to Yhwh’s “good word,” the scribe composed the Wiederaufnahme with a synonymous verb whose root (‫ )צמח‬is taken from the original sentence’s direct object: ‫“ ֶצ ַמח‬shoot” → ‫“ אצמיח‬I will cause to sprout.”111 d…d Major innovation; ‫“ צמח צדיק‬legitimate heir” (Jer 23:5 M) ≈ ἀνατολὴν δικαίαν “righteous dawn” (Jer 23:5 G) / ‫“ צמח צדקה‬branch of righteousness” (Jer 33:15 M). Many scholars concur that ‫ צדיק‬in 23:5 means “legitimate,” pointing to Phoenician inscriptions, which employ the same phrase with this meaning, as evidence.112 For this reason, the original oracle suggests a historical context in which a certain Davidic ruler’s claim to the throne was being contested and needed legitimation. In the duplicate—which reads ‫—צמח צדקה‬the phrase’s original historical import is completely lost. With the duplicate, concern shifts from a specific king’s legitimacy to the righteousness that will accompany a future king’s rule. The oracle thus becomes less tied to a particular historical context. The rendering of ‫ צמח‬by ἀνατολὴν in G requires brief comment.113 Some have thought the translation reflects a later messianic interpretation of the passage, since ἀνατολὴν carries messianic overtones in later texts.114 Lust, however, believes the ἀνατολὴν was selected for its capacity to represent multiple nuances of ‫ צמח‬and argues that it acquired its messianic overtone only later.115 Either way, the Greek Vorlage equals M. e…e Minor innovation (omission); the duplicated text of Jer 33:15 omits the phrase ‫“ ומלך מלך והׂשכיל‬And he will rule as king and deal wisely,” probably 111 Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 12; Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 103–4. 112 See especially James Swetnam, “Some Observations on the Background of ‫ צדיק‬in Jeremias 23,5a,” Bib 46 (1965): 29–40, and the discussions in Holladay Jeremiah 1, 617–8; cf. Sigmund Mowinckel, He That Cometh (New York: Abingdon, 1954), 161; McKane, Jeremiah 1, 561; Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 92; Johan Lust, “The Diverse Text Forms of Jeremiah and History Writing with Jer 33 as a Test Case,” JNSL 20 (1994): 38–39. 113 Georg Walser, Jeremiah: A Commentary Based on Ieremias in Codex Vaticanus (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 328–9, suggests ἀνατολὴν may simply mean “shoot,” noting that in early Greek usage the verbal root ἀνατέλλω refers to plants springing up. 114 E.g., Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 56–57; Parke-Taylor cites Raymond E. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah: A Commentary on the Infancy Narratives in Matthew and Luke, New Updated Ed. (New York: Doubleday, 1993), 373–4, 390; cf. Skinner, Prophecy and Religion, 311–9. 115 Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 91–92, 99.

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in order to downplay the importance of the kingship in this oracle (see discussion above). f…f Minor innovation (different pronoun); in the duplicate text, the phrase ‫“ בימיו‬in his [the king’s] days” (Jer 23:6 M and G) is replaced by ‫בימים ההם‬ “in those days” (Jer 33:16 M); once again, the duplicator appears to be drawing attention away from the monarch.116 g…g Major innovation (intra-Jeremianic); ‫“ יׂשראל יׁשכן‬Israel will dwell (in safety)” (Jer 23:6 M and G) / ‫“ ירוׁשלם תׁשכון‬Jerusalem will dwell (in safety)” (Jer 33:16 M); in the duplicate, the city Jerusalem supplants the Davidic heir as the main subject of the oracle’s latter half. Thus, the subject “Jerusalem” must be introduced here at the beginning of v. 16. The following verb was also adapted accordingly: ‫“ יׁשכן‬it (m.) will dwell” → ‫“ תׁשכון‬it (f.) will dwell.” The image here of Jerusalem (as opposed to Israel) dwelling in safety (‫ )לבטח‬echoes Jer 32:37 where Yhwh states that he will gather the people of Jerusalem (see 32:36) from exile and make them dwell in safety (‫)לבטח‬. h…h Major innovation; ‫“ וזה־ׁשמו אׁשר־יקראו‬And this is his name, by which he [κύριος “the Lord” (G only)] will call him …” (Jer 23:6 M and G) / ‫וזה אׁשר־‬ ‫“ יקרא־לה‬And this is what it (f. s. = Jerusalem) will be called” (Jer 33:16 M); the duplicating scribe has made the city Jerusalem the topic of the oracle’s final sentence rather than the Davidic king; it is the city, and not the king, that will be given a new name. The reading in G specifies that it is “the Lord” (κύριος) who is announcing the name, though Ziegler is doubtful of the originality of this word, hence the square brackets.117 l…l Major innovation (and PDHarm); Ιωσεδεκ = ‫( יוצדק‬Jer 23:6 G) / ‫יהוה צדקנו‬ “Yhwh is our righteousness” (Jer 23:6 M and Jer 33:16); Lipinski and Lust argue convincingly that G preserves the original reading—‫—יוצדק‬which they accept as an alternate spelling of king Zedekiah’s name.118 In the 116 Goldman, Prophétie et royauté au retour de l’exil, 14; cf. Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 104. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 62, states that the reading in the duplicate is “more general” than that of the original twin. 117 Joseph Ziegler, Beiträge zur Ieremias-Septuaginta (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1958), 263; cf. translation in NETS. Walser, Jeremiah, 329, describes the extra references to the divine name (κύριος) as a “double rendering.” 118 Lust, “Messianism and the Greek Version of Jeremiah,” 89–90; idem, “Diverse Text Forms of Jeremiah,” 39–40; cf. Lipiński, “Études sur des textes ‘messianiques’ de l’Ancien Testament,” 53–55. This Hebrew retroversion (‫ )יוצדק‬is supported Ziegler, Beiträge zur Ieremias-Septuaginta, 92 and Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 31–32. Cf. HermannJosef Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches: Textgeschichtlicher Rang, Eigenarten, Triebkräfte, OBO 133 (Fribourg, Switzerland: Universitätsverlag, 1994), 110.

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duplicate, this name was replaced with ‫יהוה צדקנו‬, which according to Lust can only be an appellation for Jerusalem. At a later point, V M of Jer 23:6 was harmonized with Jer 33:16. The notion that the city, rather than the king, should be renamed may have been inspired by 33:9 where the “name” of the city, Jerusalem, is featured (see above).119 4

Text #4: But You, My Servant Jacob, Do Not Fear! (Jer 30:10–11 // Jer 46:27–28)

The next doublet considered in this chapter—Jer 30:10–11 // Jer 46:27–28— provides a fourth example of the divinatory potential of the practice of duplication. The doublet twin of 30:10–11 is a plus in V M and is probably the duplicate (see below). The original twin—an oracle of salvation for Judah— is situated after the oracles against Egypt (46:2–26) in the Oracles against the Nations (OAN). In this location, the oracle of salvation spells out a consequence of the judgment of Egypt: Egypt’s downturn implies Judah’s ascent. Like the hermeneutical principle pars familiaris / pars hostilis (observed in the Old Babylonian omen compendia), the misfortune of one’s enemies foretells the good fortune of oneself. The duplicating scribe found a secondary application of this oracle of salvation for the Book of Consolation (BOC). Lodged in this new context, the text of the doublet interprets the BOC through vertical reading and intra-textual harmonization. Most importantly, the doublet’s text updates the conception of salvation imagined in Jer 30:4–8. There the people are promised salvation from ‫עת־צרה‬ “a time of distress” (v. 7) which from the context appears to refer to an impending military conquest (see discussion below). Yet, this promise apparently failed. The people of Judah were not saved from conquest, but exiled. The text of the doublet, which specifically describes return from exile, addresses this incongruity: the words of salvation in 30:4–8 have not failed, but are to be understood as Yhwh’s promise that the exile will come to an end. In this way, the duplicating scribe helps extend the divinatory relevance of the BOC for a new historical horizon.120 119 As discussed above, the reference to the name of Jerusalem in v. 9 occurs in M only. Bogaert, “Urtext, texte court et relecture,” 239–40, argues that this reference was added by the same reviser who created the doublet. 120 The later interpretive perspective of the doublet’s text echoes the perspective taken by the introductory verses of the Book of Consolation: Jer 30:3 also imagines salvation in terms of returns from exile. Other references to the end of exile in the BOC include 31:8– 13, 16–18, 21; 32:37.

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

125

The duplication of this hopeful oracle from the OAN in the BOC was partially motivated by structural concerns. This duplication continues an ongoing scribal effort of consolidating Jeremiah’s hopeful oracles into a single collection (cf. the duplication of 23:5–6 in 33:14–16). As was case for the first doublet considered in this chapter (Jer 6:13–15 // Jer 8:10b–12), this doublet thus illustrates how duplication was used to increase the structural coherence of Jeremiah. 4.1 Preliminary Textual Issues Before detailing the interpretive function of the doublet’s text in its secondary context, I must first defend my conclusion that 30:10–11 is the duplicate twin. A number of scholars accept 30:10–11—found in V M only—as the duplicate twin on the basis of the expansive nature of V M.121 Others are not convinced even though there is not a trigger for haplography.122 Once again, the fittingness of the doublet in its two contexts is an issue.123 The doublet shares many verbal and thematic connections with chap. 30, and thus appears to be a better fit there than in chap. 46 where the logic of its placement—nestled between the oracles against Egypt (46:1–26 = 26:1–25 G)124 and the oracles against the Philistines (47:1–7 = 29:1–7 G)—is not immediately obvious.125 In an earlier arrangement of the OAN, however, the doublet’s text lay between the oracles against Egypt and the lengthy oracles against Babylon (Jer 50–51 = 27–28 G) (see the ordering of G). Here the text makes perfect sense: the doublet’s text—which promises return from captivity—coheres nicely with the

121 Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 93–94; Lust, “Diverse Text Forms of Jeremiah,” 33; Yohanan Goldman, “Juda et son roi au milieu des nations: La dernière rédaction du Livre de Jérémie,” in The Book of Jeremiah and Its Reception: le livre de Jérémie et sa réception, BETL 128 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1997), 157, 169, 175–7; Allen, Jeremiah, 336–7; Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches, 93. 122 Some consider 30:10–11 to be the original, e.g., Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 160–1; Alfred Marx, “A propos des doublets du livre de Jérémie: Réflexions sur la formation d’un livre prophétique,” in Prophecy: Essays Presented to Georg Fohrer on His Sixty-Fifth Birthday, 6 September 1980, ed. John A. Emerton, BZAW 150 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1980), 109. Others believe it is impossible to determine which twin is original: McKane, Jeremiah 2, 762–3, 1137; Georg Fischer, Das Trostbüchlein: Text, Komposition und Theologie von Jer 30–31, SBB 26 (Stuttgart: Katholisches Bibelwerk, 1993), 63; Becking, Between Fear and Freedom, 18–19. 123 Cf. Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 324. 124 Jer 46:26 is missing in G. 125 On the basis of fit, one may conclude that the doublet is integral, and thus original, to chap. 30 and disjunctive, and so secondary, to chap. 46. Though, as explained at the beginning of this chapter, the fittingness of a doublet in a given context may simply be the result of harmonization by a duplicating scribe.

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oracles against Babylon, promising the defeat of Judah’s captor.126 After all, the doom of Babylon and Judah’s salvation are linked several times in this oracle (cf. 50:17–19, 34; 51:5–6, 49). Put simply, the punishment of Judah’s enemies is correlative with Judah’s salvation. Words of hope for Judah found in the oracles against Ammon (49:2) provide a parallel example.127 Seen in this light, the doublet’s placement at the end the oracles against Egypt (46:27–28) is not actually disjunctive but reflective of a larger trend of the OAN which correlates Judah’s flourishing with the withering of its international 126 Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 93–94, 116. Janzen, ibid., 221, n. 19, argues that the doublet’s “motifs of Israel’s return from Exile and [Yhwh’s] judgment on her captors” cohere extremely well with the beginning of Babylon’s oracle—which announces Babylon’s doom and Israel’s safe return from exile. He further observes that in the book of Isaiah the same connection is made between Babylon’s defeat (Isaiah 13–14) and Israel’s return from captivity (Isa 14:1–3). Janzen proposes that the doublet began as a marginal gloss on Jer 50:2–5, which was added to the text before 50:1 (and thus after the oracles against Egypt according to the ordering of oracles in G); but with the rearrangement of the oracles in M, the doublet’s connection to the oracles against Babylon was lost. Here, Janzen, adapts the theory of Ferdinand Hitzig, Der Prophet Jeremia, KHAT 3 (Leipzig: Weidmann, 1841), 363, who understands the doublet as a gloss on 50:2. Janzen acknowledges the criticism of Hitzig’s theory found in Carl Heinrich Cornill, Das Buch Jeremia (Leipzig: Tauchnitz, 1905), 457. Fischer, Das Trostbüchlein, 60, rejects Janzen’s theory partly because he finds it unconvincing and partly because it does cohere with his earlier conclusion that the order of the OAN in M is more original than that of G. Idem, “Jer 25 und die Fremdvölkersprüche: Unterschiede zwischen hebräischem und griechischem Text,” Bib 72 (1991): 476, acknowledges that the doublet and 50:2–5 share in common references to the fall of Babylon and to the return from exile, but he argues that differences in vocabulary, imagery, and emphasis preclude a direct relationship between the two: e.g. the addressee of the doublet is “my servant Jacob” and Israel, whereas in 50:2–5 it is the people of Israel and the people of Judah; the former speaks of the chastisement of Judah, while the latter is more thoroughly hopeful; and the two passages use different Hebrew words to describe the return from exile (‫“ ׁשוב‬return/turn back” and ‫“ בוא‬come,” respectively). Fischer, ibid., 476, writes, “Auch wenn sicherlich vom Thema der Heimkehr eine Nähe zwischen beiden Texten besteht, so ist die Ausarbeitung doch zu verschieden, um zwischen beiden einen direkten Zusammenhang anzunehmen.” Yet, while the doublet may not work well as an exegetical gloss of 50:2–5—i.e., a gloss that elucidates the lemma’s meaning—it is completely adequate as an associative gloss—a gloss attracted to the lemma due to lexical or thematic similarities. Moreover, one need not accept every detail of Janzen’s argument to recognize the link between Israel’s salvation and Babylon’s doom. 127 Helpful here is the comment of Allen, Jeremiah, 459, who notes a patterned distribution of references to Israel in the OAN: “As a result all the oracles against the nations function as implicit pronouncements of salvation for [Yhwh’s] own people, inasmuch as they involve disaster for Israel’s foreign enemies” (cf. ibid., 469). Though, Allen’s comment has in mind the arrangement of the OAN in M in particular, the point remains true for the arrangement of the oracles found in G. In addition to highlighting references to Judah’s (Israel’s) salvation in the oracles against Ammon and against Babylon, Allen flags the reference to Moab’s mocking of Israel in 48:27, which he counts as the given reason for Moab’s ill fate.

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

127

adversaries.128 In sum, the textual evidence suggesting that 30:10–11 is a later addition in V M cannot be brushed aside on the grounds that one text is more disjunctive than the other; the doublet twin of 46:27–28 is clearly the original while that of 30:10–11 is the duplicate. 4.2 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function As implied above, the specific placement of the doublet in the BOC is strategic.129 Stitched into the beginning of chap. 30, the doublet’s text echoes and interprets much of its new environs. Immediately prior to the doublet, chap. 30 describes the fearful, current conditions of Yhwh’s people: in v. 5, there is a cry of panic (‫ )חרדה‬and terror (‫ ;)פחד‬in v. 6, extreme pain; and in v. 7, a time of distress. On the heels of this description, words of comfort emerge: in v. 7, Jacob (‫ )יעקב‬will be saved (‫ ;)יוׁשע‬in v. 8, foreign oppressors will no longer enslave them (‫ ;)לא־יעבדו־בו‬and in v. 9, they will instead once more serve (‫ )עבדו‬Yhwh and David. Following the doublet, the chapter continues with a portrayal of Judah’s suffering as an incurable sickness (vv. 12–13), and then, v. 14 associates Judah’s current suffering with divine chastisement (‫)מוסר‬. Finally, in v. 16, one hears of the punishment of Judah’s enemies. The language of the doublet fits snugly in the midst of this imagery:130 The word ‫ חרדה‬in v. 5 is matched by ‫“ מחריד‬one who frightens” in v. 10; ‫ יוׁשע‬in v. 7 by ‫“ מוׁשיעך‬save you” in v. 10 and by ‫“ להוׁשיעך‬to save you” in v. 11; ‫ עבדו‬in vv. 8–9 by ‫“ עבדי‬my servant” in v. 10; ‫מוסר‬ in v. 14 by ‫“ ויסרתיך‬and I will chasten you” in v. 11; and, the divine punishment of Judah’s enemies in v. 16 by ‫“ אעׂשה כלה בכל־הגוים‬I will make a full end of all the [enemy] nations” in v. 11. Also, both v. 7 and v. 10 refer to the salvation of 128 As Allen, ibid., 459, points out, one encounters the converse in 30:16: there in the milieu of the Book of Consolation—chapters devoted to Israel’s restoration—one finds pronouncements against Israel’s oppressors. Fischer, “Jer 25 und die Fremdvölkersprüche,” 477, suggests that the text of the doublet makes more sense when placed between the oracles against Egypt against the Philistines, Judah’s neighbors. Those oracles, he explains, present a picture of impending divine destruction from the north (i.e., from Babylon), destruction which threatens to annihilate nearby Judah in the process. The text of the doublet responds to this threat, first by promising salvation, telling Judah to fear not, and second by ensuring that any destruction inflicted on Judah by Yhwh will be restrained. In 50:2–5, in contrast, there is no urgent threat of annihilation for Judah, since it is Babylon, and not Judah’s neighbors, who is facing destruction. However, the pressing issue of the doublet is not the impending destruction of Babylon’s conquest of the Levant, but the aftermath of that conquest. In the doublet, Judah is in need of salvation from exile, a salvation which corresponds to the destruction of Babylon articulated in 50:2–5, and the remainder of chaps. 50–51. 129 In the words of Allen, Jeremiah, 337, the doublet’s text is “a good redactional fit” with its secondary context. 130 For the following, cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 120; Allen, Jeremiah, 337; Fischer, Das Trostbüchlein, 61.

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Jacob specifically.131 In short, the numerous verbal and thematic links existing between the doublet’s text and the beginning of chap. 30 made the latter a suitable context in which to nest the former.132 In several respects, the location of the duplicate—after v. 9 and before v. 12—is the only place in the BOC in which the doublet would makes sense. In this position, the words of divine assurance of v. 10, “‫אל־תירא‬,” respond through vertical reading to Judah’s cry of panic and terror in v. 5 and to the following description of the people’s suffering in vv. 6–7. Nowhere else would these words of divine assurance be so appropriate; for the reference to Judah’s fear in v. 5 is the only place in the BOC where such fear is mentioned.133 Moreover, apart from the text of the doublet, the people’s fear expressed in v. 5 is never explicitly addressed in the BOC. Thus, the doublet’s words of assurance fill an important lacuna in the beginning of this book. Within chaps. 30–33, the emotional and thematic pitch oscillates from reflections on Judah’s suffering to announcements of divine consolations, from specific plight to fitting solution. For example, the images of Judah’s sickness in 30:12– 15 are met by a promise of healing in 30:17; the recounting of Rachel’s weeping for her lost children in 31:15 finds consolation in the assurance of their return in 31:16–17; and the portrayal of Ephraim as a wayward and chasten child in 31:18–19 is answered by the compassionate voice of a forgiving and welcoming divine parent in 31:20. This pattern of matching specific plight with fitting solution is broken by the cry of fear and panic of v. 5. Apart from the text of the doublet, this cry is left unaddressed. The duplicate, placed after v. 5, completes the pattern, providing the cry with a timely answer. Also, as described above, the reference to Judah’s salvation in v. 10 elucidates the meaning of the salvation mentioned in v. 7 through vertical reading.134 Originally, v. 7 offered a promise of salvation to those facing impending military conquest: ‫“ וממנה יוׁשע‬Yet, he will be saved from it.” In its immediate context, the antecedent of “it” is a specific calamity detailed in vv. 5–7: v. 5 mentions a cry of panic and terror, v. 6 offers an image of men in great pain—like the pain of childbirth—and v. 7 recounts both the fear of v. 5 and the suffering of v. 6 131 It is possible that the passages referring to Jacob and Israel in the Book of Consolation originally referred to the northern kingdom: c.f. Lohfink, “Der junge Jeremia als Propagandist und Poet,” 352–3; Holladay, Jeremiah, 156–9; Marvin A. Sweeney, “Jeremiah 30–31 and King Josiah’s Program of National Restoration and Religious Reform,” ZAW 108 (1996): 569–83. Yet, in the book’s present form, these passages have come to address Judah as well. 132 Fischer, Das Trostbüchlein, 61, also points out the lexical link between “justice” in v. 11, and the resetting up of Jerusalem’s palace upon its foundations (‫ )מׁשפטו‬in v. 18. 133 Other kinds of fear are referenced in the Book of Consolation: divine fear is mentioned in 32:21 and 32:39–49; and in 33:9 Judah is the one feared. 134 Cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 125.

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

129

as a horrific day (‫ )גדול היום‬and as time of distress (‫)עת־צרה‬. Altogether, these images paint a picture of siege and conquest.135 Yet, from such conquest, Judah was definitively not saved. With the fall of Jerusalem, the promise of salvation in v. 7 was shipwrecked. The duplicating scribe, however, saw a way to salvage this promise by reimagining its meaning.136 With the text of the doublet, the scribe clarifies that the kind of salvation promised in v. 7 is salvation from exile. The scribe strengthened the link between the doublet’s text and v. 7 by rewriting the former in light of the latter: the scribe replaced the short form of the divine Mitsein formula of 46:27—‫—כי אתך אני‬with a longer variant of the formula that employs the root ‫ יׁשע‬the same root used in v. 7 (and v. 10)—namely, ‫כי־אתך אני נאם־יהוה להוׁשיעך‬.137 This is to say, through vertical reading and intratextual harmonization, the expanded divine Mitsein formula of v. 11 interprets the promise of salvation in v. 7. Vertical reading shapes the meaning of the verses following the doublet as well. The reference to chastisement in v. 11 serves to qualify the punishment depicted in v. 14. In that verse, Yhwh takes responsibility for Judah’s suffering: ‫“ מכת אויב הכיתיך מוסר אכזרי על רב עונך עצמו חטאתיך‬I have struck you with the blow of an enemy, the chastisement of the cruel, because of the greatness of your guilt; your sins are vast.”138 This language seems to imply that Judah’s punishment is excessive and disproportionate: Yhwh does not punish as a loving parent or loyal patron, but as an “enemy” who is “cruel” (‫—)אכזרי‬a word used to describe the mercilessness of Babylon in 6:23. With the language of the doublet, however, the duplicating scribe provides a theological clarification that this punishment is never meted unjustly: “I chastise … in just measure” (v. 11). The scribe’s intentions are made clear by the insertion of the conjunction ‫“ כי‬indeed” at the beginning of v. 12 immediately after the text of the doublet.139 With this conjunction, the duplicator indicates that the following 135 Cf. the use of similar imagery in 4:31 and 6:22–24. 136 The content of chap. 30 likely suggested to the scribe several alternative interpretations of the salvation of v. 7: v. 3 looks for the return from exile; vv. 8–9 foretell the end of foreign rule and the securing of political independence; and v. 17 speaks of the healing of Judah’s sickness and injury (described in vv. 12–15). The text of the doublet offered the duplicating scribe an echo of the first—the promise of a return from exile. 137 Longer and shorter variations of the divine Mitsein formula are found in Jer 1:8; 1:17 (G); 1:19; 15:20; and 42:11. See textual analysis below. 138 Besides these two verses (v. 11 in the doublet and v. 14 [and v. 15?]), chaps. 30–31 do not include such explicit references to the divine punishment of Judah (less explicit references to Judah’s punishment may perhaps be discerned in 31:18–19, and 28). Thus, the placement of the doublet (vv. 10–11) a few verses before v. 14 looks strategic. 139 Also, Fischer, Das Trostbüchlein, 62, suggests that the “nach der Errettung Züchtigung” of v. 11b connects the hopeful tone of vv. 8–11a with the following dismal images of “Verletzungen und Schmerz.”

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verses (including v. 14) are illustrative of the point made by v. 11. The (troubling) poetic depiction of divine punishment of v. 14 now must be read in light of the declaration in v. 11 that Yhwh’s chastisements are just. In sum, it seems certain that the scribe’s placement of the doublet within chap. 30 was strategic. The text of the doublet helps solve interpretive problems of the BOC: the otherwise unaddressed fears of v. 5 are allayed, thus reinforcing this book’s existing pattern of moving from plight to solution; the reference to Judah’s salvation mentioned in v. 7 is reinterpreted in light of the exile; and the harsh image of Yhwh as a cruel punisher in v. 14 is qualified by an assertion of Yhwh’s justness. Anticipated above, the hopeful Tendenz of this duplicate stands in some tension with the pessimistic outlook of the duplicate of 17:1–4, which imagines Judah’s sin as indelible and Yhwh’s wrath as unending. This observation suggests that the two duplicates—though both being pluses of V M—were not created by the same scribe. 4.3 Duplication Technique The duplicating scribe created a paraphrase of Jer 46:27–28. The text of 30:10–11 contains neither minor synonymous variation nor scribal innovations (unlike the previous doublets). Yet this doublet of forty-eight to forty-nine words does display a high degree of (major) synonymous variation (bold and italicized): in the duplicate one finds two insertions (one of two words and one of three), an omission of seven words, and a replacement of a single word. The three-word insertion and the single-word replacement are drawn from stock Jeremianic language (intra-Jeremianic); and the omission simplifies the doublet’s text, eliminating a redundant sentence. This doublet straddles the border between loose citation and paraphrase. With regard to the first verse, 46:27 is virtually identical to 30:10, save for the transposition of divine speech formula. The wording of the second verse (46:28 // 30:11), however, exhibits three synonymous variations which makes it a paraphrase. ²⁷ But you, do not be afraid, O my servant Jacob.         And do not be dismayed, O Israel For look! I will save you from afar and your offspring from the land of their captivity. And Jacob will return and have quiet and ease and none will frighten (him). ²⁸ You, do not be afraid, O my servant Jacob, says Yhwh. For I am with you.

¹⁰ But you, do not be afraid, O my servant Jacob, says Yhwh. And do not be dismayed, O Israel For look! I will save you from afar and your offspring from the land of their captivity. And Jacob will return and have quiet and ease and none will frighten. ¹¹                             For I am with you,

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         For I will make and end of all the nations into which I have driven you there. But of you, I will not make an end. And, I will chastise you as justice requires, and will by no means leave you unpunished. Jer 46:27–28

4.4

says Yhwh, to save you. For I will make and end of all the nations into which I have scattered you there. Only of you, I will not make an end. And, I will chastise you as justice requires, and will by no means leave you unpunished. Jer 30:10–11

Textual Analysis

Jer 46[26]:27–28 G Jer 46:27–28 M ²⁷ σὺ δὲ μὴ aφοβηθῇς ‫ ואתה אל־תירא‬²⁷ aδοῦλός μου Ιακωβ b…b b…b‫עבדי יעקב‬ μηδὲ πτοηθῇς Ισραηλ ‫ואל־תחת יׂשראל‬ διότι ἰδοὺ ἐγὼ σῴζω σε ‫כי הנני מוׁשעך מרחוק‬ μακρόθεν ‫ואת־זרעך מארץ ׁשבים‬ καὶ τὸ σπέρμα σου ἐκ γῆς ‫וׁשב יעקוב וׁשקט‬ αἰχμαλωσίας αὐτῶν ‫וׁשאנן ואין מחריד‬ καὶ ἀναστρέψει Ιακωβ ‫אתה אל־תירא‬d c ²⁸ καὶ ἡσυχάσει καὶ ὑπνώσει c‫עבדי יעקב נאם־יהוה‬ καὶ οὐκ ἔσται ὁ παρενοχλῶν e‫כי אתך אני‬e c dαὐτόν ²⁸ μὴ aφοβοῦ aπαῖς μου Ιακωβ λέγει ‫כי אעׂשה כלה בכל־הגוים‬ κύριοςc ‫ הדחתיך ׁשמה‬f‫אׁשר‬ eὅτι μετὰ σοῦ ἐγώ εἰμιe ‫ואתך לא־אעׂשה כלה‬g ὅτι ποιήσω aσυντέλειαν ἐν παντὶ ἔθνει εἰς οὓς fἐξῶσά σε ἐκεῖ σὲ gδὲ οὐ μὴ ποιήσω aἐκλιπεῖν καὶ παιδεύσω σε εἰς κρίμα καὶ ἀθῷῶν οὐκ ἀθῳώσω σε a

‫ויסרתיך למׁשפט‬ ‫ונקה לא אנקך‬

Jer 30:10–11 M

‫ ואתה אל־תירא‬¹⁰ b‫ נאם־יהוה‬b‫עבדי יעקב‬

‫ואל־תחת יׂשראל‬ ‫כי הנני מוׁשיעך מרחוק‬ ‫ואת־זרעך מארץ ׁשבים‬ ‫וׁשב יעקב וׁשקט‬ ‫וׁשאנן ואין מחריד‬

cdc

‫כי־אתך אני‬e ¹¹ e‫נאם־יהוה להוׁשיעך‬

‫כי אעׂשה כלה בכל־הגוים‬ ‫ הפצותיך ׁשם‬f‫אׁשר‬ ‫אך אתך לא־אעׂשה כלה‬g ‫ויסרתיך למׁשפט‬ ‫ונקה לא אנקך‬

Synonymous translations; in three places one encounters different but synonymous Greek translations of the same Hebrew word: (1) ‫אל־תירא‬ “fear not” (2nd m. s. juss.) is first rendered with μὴ φοβηθῇς “fear not” (2nd s. subj.) in v. 27 and second with μὴ φοβοῦ “fear not” (2nd s. impv.) in v. 28; (2) ‫“ עבד‬servant” is translated as δοῦλός “servant” in v. 27 and as παῖς

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“servant” in v. 28; while the latter Greek word is the most frequent translation of ‫ עבד‬in Jeremiah, occurring at least sixteen more times, the former does translate this Hebrew word on three other occasions (Jer 2:14; 7:25; 25:4); (3) ‫“ כלה‬annihilation / end” is translated as συντέλειαν “end” in its first occurrence in v. 28 and as ἐκλιπεῖν “to fail” in its second occurrence in v. 28; συντέλειαν appears to be a standard translation of the noun ‫כלה‬, representing this noun three more times in Jeremiah (4:27; 5:10; 5:18); on the other hand, there is no consistent Greek translation of the verbal form of ‫כלה‬, and so the possibility of determining if this variant translation reflects a different Vorlage is unlikely. b…b Synonymous variation (addition); ‫“ נאם־יהוה‬says Yhwh”; the insertion of this divine speech formula is probably connected below c…c. In the process of simplifying the doublet, the duplicating scribe added to the opening line this formula, perhaps taken from the beginning of v. 28 (see below). c…c Synonymous variation (omission); ‫“ אתה אל־תירא עבדי יעקב נאם־יהוה‬You, do not be afraid, my servant Jacob, says Yhwh”; this divine “fear not” command in v. 28 is virtually identical to the divine command that opens v. 27, the only difference being the absence in v. 27 of the divine speech formula. In the duplicate, the scribe eliminated the second occurrence of this command while simultaneously harmonizing the first occurrence with the second; i.e., the scribe added the divine speech formula from the second occurrence to the first (cf. b…b), a duplication technique I call maximal conflation. d Probably copying error; ‫“ אתה‬you” (46:28 M) / αὐτόν “him” = ‫“ אֹתֹו‬him” (46:28 G); it is possible that a scribe mistook the Hebrew 2nd per. s. pron. for the 3rd per. s. pron., or vice versa. In G, the pronoun serves as the object of the previous sentence, whereas in M, it is the subject of the following sentence.140 e…e Synonymous variation (intra-Jeremianic addition); ‫“ כי אתך אני‬For I am with you” (46:28 M G) / ‫“ כי־אתך אני נאם־יהוה להוׁשיעך‬for I am with you, says Yhwh, to save you” (30:11 M); the original reading, “For I am with you,” 140 Alternatively—but less likely—one could attribute this variant to the translator. In four cases, the Hebrew phrase ‫“ אין מחריד‬there is none to frighten” is translated in the Septuagint with οὐκ “not” + a form of the verb to be (εἰμί) + a particle (meaning “one who frightens”) + an extra pronoun not represented in the Hebrew text (Lev 26:6; Job 11:19; Ezek 34:28; Zeph 3:13). Thus, one could propose that this convention prompted the translator to add the pronoun to Jer 46(26):27. However, one would then still have to explain why the pronoun ‫ אתה‬was missing from G. Plus, in six cases—including once more in Jeremiah (Jer 7:33)—the phrase is translated in the Septuagint without the pronoun (Deut 28:26; Isa 17:2; Ezek 39:26; Mic 4:4; Nah 2:12), and thus adding the pronoun was not obligatory.

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

f

g 5

133

served as a trigger for the longer Mitsein formula, a formula which was added to the Jeremiah on more than one occasion.141 It is found in 1:8, 17 (G), 19; 15:20; the occurrence in 1:19 is part of a duplication of 15:20.142 In my discussion of that doublet, I note that this formula may occur with the root ‫“ יׁשע‬to save” or with the root ‫“ נצל‬to deliver”; the use of the former in this doublet links the Mitsein formula with the first verse of the doublet (46:27 // 30:10) where Yhwh says ‫“ הנני מוׁשיעך‬Look! I will save you.” The addition is synonymous since it merely repeats an idea already present in the doublet’s text. Synonymous variation (intra-Jeremianic replacement); ‫“ הדחתיך‬I (have) driven you” (46:28 M G143) / ‫“ הפצותיך‬I (have) scattered you” (30:11 M); the duplicating scribe replaced the original wording of the doublet with a near synonym perhaps borrowed from stock Jeremianic language (cf. 9:15 [Eng. 9:16]). Both verbs are used frequently in Jeremiah in similar contexts to describe the exile, and they stand in parallel in 23:2.144 This substitution may have been inadvertent. For reason explained below, the placement of this oracle in its secondary context seems intentional; yet in straying from the original reading of this verse, the scribe missed a potential lexical connection with 30:17, where Judah’s enemies are said to consider Judah to be ‫“ נִ ָּד ָחה‬the one driven away.”145 Non-significant variant (+/− conjunction /particle). Text #5: Look! Like an Eagle (Jer 48:40b and 41b // Jer 49:22)

5.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function The doublet of Jer 48:40b and 41b // Jer 49:22 offers a further illustration of the divinatory potential of duplication. To begin, the absence of the doublet twin in 48:40b and 41b in G suggests that this doublet is part of the expansions of V M and that 49:22 is the original text.146 This conclusion is supported by 141 For a discussion of the use of this phrase in Jeremiah, see: Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 36, 39–40, 41. 142 See chap. 5, §5.6 below. 143 With one exception (50[27]:6), the verb ἐξωθέω in G always translates the Hebrew root ‫( נדח‬nine more times), including an occurrence in 51(28):34, in which case a copying error likely occurred. 144 Cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 120. 145 Cf. Fischer, Das Trostbüchlein, 63. 146 In the case of 48:40b, no trigger for haplography exists, though one could argue 48:41b was so lost. Cf. Lundbom, “Haplography in the Hebrew Vorlage of LXX Jeremiah,” 319; in 48:41, the scribe’s eye could have skipped from the ‫ ה‬of ‫ נתפׂשה‬to that of ‫מצרה‬, or from the ‫ ו‬of ‫ והיה‬to that of ‫ונׁשמד‬, the first word in 48:42. The fact that the minus in 48:41b corresponds

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the observation that Jer 48:40b and 41b, standing near the end of the oracles against Moab, is one of several intra-textual links clumped together at the close of this oracle collection. And thus, as discussed further below, the duplication of 49:22 in 48:40–41, is best understood as one instance of a larger process of intra-scriptural and intra-Jeremianic expansion of the oracles against Moab. Regarding the doublet’s divinatory function, the doublet exemplifies how scribes created secondary applications of existing oracles. The original doublet twin (49:22) stands at the conclusion of the oracles against Edom. It consists of a couplet containing two metaphorical images: (1) the soaring (‫ )דאה‬of an eagle, and (2) the affliction (‫ ) ְמ ֵצ ָרה‬of a woman (in labor?). Both images appear to be derived from the two proper names used in 49:22, ‫“ אדום‬Edom” and ‫בצרה‬ “Bozrah,” respectively. Together, these images convey the coming judgment of Yhwh upon Edom and its capitol. The duplicating scribe recycled this couplet, inserting a modified version of it into the oracles against Moab (chap. 48). This secondary application of the couplet is based on the hermeneutical principle—which perhaps is a relative of pars familiaris / pars hostilis—that what is true for one of Judah’s enemies may be true for another. Edom and Moab have an analogous relationship with Judah, and thus divine revelation pertaining to one may be applicable to the other. Within the new context of the oracles against Moab, the text of the doublet generates new revelation through vertical reading. Relevant here is the unique technique of duplication employed in the creation of the duplicate: the scribe cut the original couplet in half inserting each half-couplet into a different verse toward the end of chap. 48.147 In their respective verses in chap. 48, both images have the same interpretive function: they each provide a new lemma, namely a vivid metaphor, that is deciphered by the verse that follows. Or, to relate this technique to that of the Old Babylonian omen compendia, in both cases the inserted text serves as a protasis, and the existing text of chap. 48 plays the role of apodosis. perfectly with the doubled text, however, may seem too exact to attribute its loss to parablepsis. Furthermore, the wordplay in 49:22 (‫ דאה‬/ ‫ אדום‬and ‫ ְמ ֵצ ָרה‬/ ‫ )בצרה‬suggests that the doublet’s text was originally designed for the oracles against Edom in chap. 49. The other version of the doublet (48:40b, 41b) lacks a comparable wordplay. 147 Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 59, suggests that 49:22—a verse mentioning Edom’s capital Bozrah—found its way to chap. 48 initially as a gloss on 48:24 where a Moabite city with the same name (Bozrah) is mentioned; this gloss, he continues, was then accidently slipped into 48:40–41; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 139, agrees. While possible, Janzen’s theory does not explain why the text of 49:22 was not inserted into chap. 48 in one piece but was instead divided in half and inserted in two different places.

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

135

The first half-couplet, inserted into 48:40, describes the flight of a raptor:

‫“ הנה כנׁשר ידאה ופרׂש כנפיו אל־מואב‬Look! Like an eagle, it will soar and spread

its wings upon Moab.” The duplicator thoughtfully inserted this half-couplet into v. 40 to illustrate vividly the theme of invasion found in chap. 48.148 While the image of an eagle in flight could be interpreted in various ways—favorably149 or unfavorably—the following half verse confirms that invasion, and thus disfavor, is in view: ‫“ נלכדה הקריות והמצדות נתפׂשה‬the cities are captured, and the strongholds are taken.” In other words, through vertical reading, v. 41a deciphers the eagle metaphor duplicated from 49:22.150 The placement of the second half-couplet of 49:22 may also reflect scribal intentionality. This half-couplet compares the affliction of a woman’s heart to the heart of Moab’s army: ‫“ והיה לב גבורי מואב ביום ההוא כלב אׁשה מצרה‬And on that day, the heart of the warriors of Moab will be like the heart of an afflicted woman.” The scribe’s placement of this half-couplet in v. 41b allows the image to interpret the surrounding verses of chap. 48. The despair of Moab’s army helps explain why Moab’s towns are “taken” (‫ )לכד‬and why its strongholds are “seized” (‫( )תפׂש‬v. 41a), and why Moab is annihilated: ‫“ ונׁשמד מואב מעם‬And Moab will be destroyed from (being) a people” (48:42a). When Moab’s defenses fail, there is nothing left to protect them from total ruin. In short, this doublet illustrates an additional way duplication enables textual divination. In this example, the scribe generated secondary applications for the metaphors of 49:22 uniquely through dividing and duplicating them into new literary contexts. Each metaphor serves as a protasis while the new literary contexts supply each protasis with a secondary apodosis. A Comparison of the Doublet with the Other Additions to the Oracles against Moab As noted above, the inclusion of this doublet in chap. 48 reflects a larger literary trend, namely the intra-Jeremianic and intra-scriptural expansion of the end of this chapter. Alongside this doublet, chap. 48 contains other additions 5.2

148 E.g., Jer 48:2, 8, 15, 18, 41a. 149 In Exod 19:4, for example, a soaring eagle symbolizes Yhwh’s deliverance of his people. 150 This association of a soaring eagle with invasion is not arbitrary but conforms to a standard trope in Hebrew scripture. For example, previously in Jeremiah (4:13), the invasion of Judah’s enemy from the north is compared to the speed of the eagle (‫)נׁשר‬. The same trope is also found in Lam 4:19, where the pursuers of Zion are swifter than ‫נׁשרי ׁשמים‬ “the eagles of heaven.” In Deut 28:49, the invasion by Israel’s enemy is described metaphorically in language close to Jer 49:22: ‫“ כאׁשר ידאה הנׁשר‬as the eagle soars.” One could also point to Hab 1:8, where the Babylonian invasion comes ‫“ כנׁשר‬like an eagle,” and to Hos 8:1, where a ‫ נׁשר‬perched on the temple is an ill omen.

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not found in Jer+n: vv. 45–46 which were quarried from Num 21:28–29 and 24:17; and v. 47, which echoes a word of restoration repeated elsewhere in Jeremiah. These verses (45–47) clearly come from a different time and from a different hand than the doublet. This conclusion is hinted (though not confirmed) by the observation that the duplication technique that created 40b, 41b is distinct from that which created vv. 45–46. The former was produced by loose citation (or possibly verbatim repetition) with major adaption (see discussion below). In contrast, the verses borrowed from Numbers amount to a paraphrase with minor adaptation. The following synopsis displays the main textual changes introduced with the creation of Jer 48:45–46:151

‫… פאתי מואב‬

‫וקרקר כל־בני־ ׁשת‬

Num 24:17b

‫ כי־אׁש יצאה מחׁשבון‬²⁸ ‫להבה מקרית סיחן‬ ‫אכלה ער מואב‬ ‫בעלי במות ארנן‬

‫ בצל חׁשבון עמדו מכח נסים‬⁴⁵ ‫כי־אׁש יצא מחׁשבון‬ ‫ולהבה מבין סיחון‬ ‫ותאכל פאת מואב‬ ‫וקדקד   בני ׁשאון‬

‫ אוי־לך מואב אבדת‬²⁹ ‫עם־כמוׁש‬ ‫  נתן בניו פליטם‬ … ‫ובנתיו בׁשבית‬

‫אוי־לך מואב אבד‬⁴⁶ ‫עם־כמוׁש‬ ‫כי־לקחו בניך בׁשבי‬ ‫ובנתיך בׁשביה‬

Num 21:28–29

Jer 48:45–46

Leaving aside non-significant variants, there are three cases of minor synonymous variation (in light typeface). More substantial synonymous variations (in sans serif typeface) include the following: – ‫“ מקרית‬from the city of” (Num 21:28) → ‫“ מבין‬from the midst of” (Jer 48:45)152 – ‫“ נתן‬he has given/made” (Num 21:29) → ‫“ לקחו‬they are taken” (Jer 48:46) – ‫“ פליטם‬fugitives” (Num 21:29) → ‫“ בׁשבי‬into captivity” (Jer 48:46) The duplicate also introduces at least two and possibly three minor innovations (marked with boldface):

151 For a discussion of these textual variants, see: Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, “Heshbon entre Moab et Ammon: la finale ajoutée à l’oracle sur Moab en Jr 48,45–47 TM,” in Interpreting Translation: Studies on the LXX and Ezekiel in Honour of Johan Lust, ed. Florentino García Martínez and Marc Vervenne, BETL 192 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2005), 140–3. 152 Bogaert, ibid., 47, notes that the duplicator (inadvertently?) interpreted the king’s name “Sihon” as a toponym parallel to Heshbon. Alternatively, some manuscripts have replaced ‫ מבין‬with ‫“ מבית‬from the house of”; cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 141.

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

137

– The replacement of Num 21:28b with Num 24:17b, an innovation that changes the subject who is devoured. – Possibly, ‫“ קרקר‬he will tear down” (Num 24:17b) → ‫“ קדקד‬crown of the head” (Jer 48:45)—though copying error (‫ ד → ר‬2×, or vice versa) seems to be a simpler explanation.153 – ‫“ ׁשת‬Seth” (Num 24:17b) → ‫ׁשאון‬: “Tumult” (Jer 48:45).154 The occurrence of three synonymous variations in the span of two verses marks the duplicate as a paraphrase. The scribe who produced this duplicate was freer with his or her language than the scribe who produced 48:40b, 41b. Moreover, although both duplicates contain innovations, those introduced into the duplicate from Numbers are of a different nature than those found in Jer 48:40b, 41b. In the case of the latter, the duplicate twin addresses an entirely different subject than its source—Moab instead of Edom. In the case of the former, the innovations found in 48:45–46 each merely replace a concrete referent (‫“ ער‬Ar,”155 ‫“ במות ארנן‬the heights of Arnon,” and ‫“ בני ׁשת‬the sons of Seth”) with more abstract poetic imagery (‫“ פאת מואב‬the edge of Moab,” ‫קדקד‬ “the crown of the head” and ‫“ בני ׁשאון‬of the sons of tumult”). In spite of such innovation, the duplicate continues to address the same subject as its doublet twin, i.e., Moab. The employment of distinct duplication techniques may give the impression that the two additions have distinct origins. This impression is reinforced by the observation that the additions have conflicting outlooks. The duplicate 153 Many prefer to correct ‫ קרקר‬of Num 21:17 with ‫ קדקד‬which is found in the Samaritan Pentateuch and Jer 48:45: e.g., Gordon J. Wenham, Numbers: An Introduction and Commentary, TOTC 4 (Leicester, UK: Inter-Varsity, 1981), 179; Philip J. Budd, Numbers, WBC 5 (Waco, TX: Word Books, 1984), 256; Jacob Milgrom, Numbers = ‫במדבר‬: The Traditional Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation, JPSTC (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1990), 323, n. 66; Timothy R. Ashley, The Book of Numbers, NICOT (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1993), 501; Eryl W. Davies, Numbers: Based on the Revised Standard Version, NCB (London: Marshall Pickering, 1995), 275; Baruch A. Levine, Numbers 21–36: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, 1st ed., AB 4A (New York: Doubleday, 2000), 202. 154 To whom “the sons of Seth” refers is uncertain. Commentators point to the suggestion of Archibald H. Sayce, “Balaam’s Prophecy (Numbers XXIV, 17–24) and the God Sheth,” Heb 4 (1887): 1–6, and promoted by William F. Albright, “The Oracles of Balaam,” JBL 63 (1944): 220, n. 89, interpreting ‫ ׁשת‬as a reference to the Šutu, a tribe mentioned in an early 2nd millennium BCE execration text from Egypt; cf. Ashley, The Book of Numbers, 497; Milgrom, Numbers, 208. The uncertainty of this reference may have invited the duplicating scribe to offer a novel reading; cf. Levine, Numbers 21–36, 202. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 142, suggests the name “sons of tumult” may be inspired by Amos 2:2 which contains the phrase ‫“ ומת בׁשאון מואב‬and in tumult Moab will die.” 155 For possible locations of Ar, see: J. Maxwell Miller, “The Israelite Journey Through (around) Moab and Moabite Toponymy,” JBL 108 (1989): 590–5.

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of 48:40b, 41b strengthens the chapter’s pessimistic outlook: violent military conquest and Moab’s annihilation. In contrast, the material added from Numbers, while still dire, is more hopeful: the people are not killed, but taken into captivity (‫)ׁשבי‬, a root used twice in 48:46. The opening of v. 45—words also added at a later point, though not from a known Hebrew text—even speaks of Moabites who have escaped and are fugitives (‫)נסים‬.156 For its part, the insertion of v. 47 reveals the Yhwh’s plan to restore Moab: ‫וׁשבתי ׁשבות־מואב‬ ‫“ באחרית הימים נאם־יהוה‬But I will restore the fortunes of Moab in the last days, says Yhwh” (48:47).157 Set as the final word on Moab, this addition—alongside vv. 45–46—undermines, or at least seriously qualifies, the perspective of the doublet (48:40b, 41b) which reinforces the pessimism of vv. 40–44. Given their conflicting visions of Moab’s future, it seems unlikely that both the highly pessimistic doublet and the following more optimistic pluses (vv. 45–47) were added by the same scribal hand in a single compositional moment. If so, these additions make a second occasion (cf. the doublet of 23:5–6 // 33:14–16 and the later addition of 33:17–26), in which neighboring pluses of V M do not come from the same moment but attest to the gradual formation of V M in the hands of multiple divining scribes. 5.3 Duplication Technique This doublet stands on the boundary between verbatim repetition (with adaptation) and loose citation (with adaptation). The duplicate shows two possible occasions of minor synonymous variation (boldface), though they both could be the result of copying error. There is otherwise no synonymous variation. By means of two major innovations (italicized small caps), however, a scribe adapted the couplet to address an analogous though entirely new subject (both subjects are enemy nations of Judah). Since these innovations radically change the function of the doublet—replacing its original purpose (announcing the 156 The expectation in the plus of 48:45—that there will be Moabite fugitives—undermines the sense of the previous verse which asserts that such escapees (‫“ הנס‬the one who flees”) will be caught (48:44). 157 This addition is itself a duplication or at least a reflex of what became a minor Jeremianic trope, a phrase that was incrementally appended to individual oracles of the OAN. By the time of Jer+n, variations of the phrase could already be found at 30:3, 18; 31:23; 32:44; 33:7, 11; and (in the OAN) 49:39; in V M, variations were also added to 29:14; 33:26; and (in OAN) 49:6 (cf. 46:26). Variations of this phrase are also found throughout Hebrew scripture. For a discussion of this phrase in its many variations, see: Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 142; Ernst Ludwig Dietrich, ‫ׁשוב ׁשבות‬: Die endzeitliche Wiederherstellung bei den Propheten, BZAW 40 (Giessen: A. Töpelmann, 1925), summary on 36–37; John M. Bracke, “Šub Šebût: A Reappraisal,” ZAW 97 (1985): 233–44.

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end of Edom) with a secondary purpose (announcing the end of Moab)— I classify the duplication technique utilized in the creation of this doublet as a loose citation (or possibly verbatim repetition) with major adaptation. ²² Look! Like an eagle, it will soar and spread its wings against Bozrah. And the heart of the warriors of Edom, in that day, will be like an afflicted woman. Jer 49:22

5.4

²² ἰδοὺ ὥσπερ ἀετὸςa b cὄψεται καὶ dἐκτενεῖ τὰς πτέρυγας eἐπ᾽ fὀχυρώματα αὐτῆςf καὶ ἔσται ἡ καρδία τῶν ἰσχυρῶν τῆς fΙδουμαίαςf ἐν τῇ ἡμέρᾳ ἐκείνῃ gὡς καρδία γυναικὸς ὠδινούσηςg

b

Jer 48:40b, 41b

Textual Analysis

Jer 49:22 [29:23] G

a

²² Look! Like an eagle, it will soar and spread its wings against Moab. And the heart of the warriors of Moab, in that day, will be like an afflicted woman.

Jer 49:22 M

Jer 48:40b, 41b M

‫ כי־כה אמר יהוה‬⁴⁰

‫ יעלה‬a‫ הנה כנׁשר‬²² ‫יפרׂש כנפיו‬d‫ידאה ו‬c‫ו‬b

a‫הנה כנׁשר‬ ‫פרׂש כנפיו‬d‫ידאה ו‬c b

f‫בצרה‬f‫על־‬e

f‫מואב‬f‫אל־‬e

‫ נלכדה הקריות‬⁴¹ ‫והמצדות נתפשׂ ה‬

‫והיה לב גבורי‬

‫והיה לב גבורי‬

‫ביום‬f ‫אדום‬f ‫ההוא‬ g‫כלב אׁשה מצרה‬g

‫ביום‬f ‫מואב‬f ‫ההוא‬ g‫כלב אׁשה מצרה‬g

Synonymous variation (intra-Jeremianic; post-duplication insertion); + ‫“ יעלה‬it will go up” (49:22 M). Given the absence of this word in 49:22 G— in agreement with 48:40b M—this verb was probably added after the moment of duplication to 49:22 to harmonize the doublet with the open words of 49:19, which reads: ‫“ הנה כאריה יעלה‬Look! Like a lion goes up.”158 Non-significant variant (+/− conjunction)

158 The suggestion of Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 138, that the added verb ‫ יעלה‬reflects the tradition of Isa 40:31 is unnecessary given the proximity of 49:19 to 49:22.

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c

Copying error (‫“ ידאה ;)ר → ד‬he will soar” (49:22 M; 48:40b M) / ὄψεται (= ‫“ )יראה‬he will see.”159 d Minor synonymous variant (change in verb tense: wayyiktol → wqatalti), or perhaps copying error; ‫“ ויפרׂש‬and it will spread” (49:22 M G) / ‫“ ופרש‬and it spread” (48:40b M). e Copying error (‫ )א → ע‬or possibly minor synonymous variation (different preposition); ‫“ על‬upon” (49:22 M G) / ‫“ אל‬to” (48:40b).160 f…f Major innovation; ‫“ בצרה…אדום‬Bozrah … Edom” (49:22) / ‫מואב…מואב‬ “Moab … Moab” (48:40b, 41b); in order to reapply the text of the doublet to its secondary context, the duplicating scribe replaced the two toponyms of 49:22 with the name Moab. The variant in 49:22 G, ὀχυρώματα αὐτῆς “her strongholds,” possibly reflects a variant Hebrew text: ‫מבצרה‬ “her fortress” (ὀχύρωμά translates ‫ מבצר‬in 48:18).161 g…g Synonymous translation; ‫“ כלב אׁשה מצרה‬like the heart of an afflicted (or besieged) woman (in labor?)” (49:22 M; 48:41b M) / ὡς καρδία γυναικὸς ὠδινούσης “like the heart of a woman in birth pangs” (49:22 G); the meaning of this phrase in M, a phrase occurring nowhere else in Hebrew scripture, is uncertain but is usually taken as a reference to a woman in labor (so also G). The phrase looks like a (slightly garbled) synonymous variation of a more common simile comparing one’s anguish to the pain of a woman “giving birth” (‫)כיולדה‬.162 Three times in Jeremiah—including twice in the OAN—the simile ‫ כיולדה‬is used in parallel with the noun ‫צרה‬ “distress” from ‫“ צרר‬to oppress, afflict” (Jer 6:24; 49:24; 50:43). The simile used in the doublet appears to be pieced together out of this imagery to the same effect; most follow M and vocalize ‫ מצרה‬in the doublet as a f. hiphil part. from ‫צרר‬. 6

Text #6: I Will Make You to Be a Wall of Bronze (Jer 1:18–19 // Jer 15:20)

I continue my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets by turning attention toward a sampling of the book’s early doublets—i.e., doublets attested by both G and 159 Cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 138. 160 Parke-Taylor, ibid., suggests that these prepositions are interchangeable in the book of Jeremiah. 161 Parke-Taylor, ibid., suggests on the basis of 48:41a—where τὰ ὀχυρώματα translates ‫“ המצדות‬the strongholds”—that the text of G 49:22 reflects the Hebrew wording ‫על־‬ ‫“ מצדותיה‬against her strongholds.” 162 Cf. Jer 6:24; 22:23; 30:6; 49:24; 50:43; and outside of Jeremiah: Ps 48:7; Isa 13:8; 42:14; Mic 4:9, 10.

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M, and thus, arguably part of Jer+n—beginning with the doublet of Jer 1:18– 19 // Jer 15:20. 6.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function The twin of 1:18–19 is significantly longer than that of 15:20 containing several pluses. There are good reasons for considering this longer twin to be the duplicate.163 Most significantly, the pluses of 1:18–19 (vis-à-vis 15:20) are readily explainable as adaptations that suit the doublet for chap. 1. The converse argument—that the minuses of 15:20 are the result of intentional shortening— is less compelling.164 Seeing the divinatory potential of the text of 15:20, the scribe created a secondary application of this text. Modifying and inserting it at the end of chap. 1, the scribe employed the doublet to address both interpretive problems of chap. 1 as well as a larger-scale structural problem of the book as a whole. The text of 15:20 stood out as an apt source for duplication most likely because this text and the first chapter share several lexical and thematic links.165 The opening declaration of 15:20, ‫ונתתיך‬, “and I will make you,” echoes the prophet’s initial call in 1:5, ‫נתתיך‬, “I appoint you.” The description of Jeremiah as a “wall” (in 15:20) invites a comparison of the prophet with the walled city of Jerusalem whose bulwark is noted in 1:15.166 And the formulaic assurance of divine presence and deliverance in 15:20—“for I am with you to save you and to deliver you, says Yhwh”—is repeated almost verbatim in 1:8 (and 1:17 G). Additionally, chap. 1 and the immediate context of 15:20 (i.e., 15:19) share some thematic similarities: both contexts have in view Jeremiah’s vocation as a prophet and his need for perseverance. In 15:19, in response to Jeremiah’s confession in 15:15–18, Yhwh reminds the prophet of his calling and spells out what that calling requires: Jeremiah must turn away from his difficult circumstances and turn toward Yhwh. Comparably in chap. 1, the deity presents Jeremiah with his calling (vv. 4–10) and in v. 17 charges him to persist in that calling. 163 Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 36; in contrast, Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 465, sees 15:20 as an adaptation of 1:18–19. 164 To mention a further argument: the twin of 1:18–19 is consistently the more expansive of the two, and expansion is more common than deletion. Here I disagree with Hans-Winfried Jüngling, “Ich mache dich zu einer ehernen Mauer, literarkritische Überlegungen zum Verhältnis von Jer 1:18–19 zu Jer 15:20–21,” Bib 54 (1973): 9, who sees 1:19b as an abbreviation of 15:20b–21a. I would argue instead that the duplicated text simply ends with 15:20 and does not include 15:21a. While 15:20b contains a double reading not found in 1:19 (see textual analysis below), it may have been added after the moment of duplication. 165 Cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 39. 166 Christl Maier, “Jeremiah as YHWH’s Stronghold (Jer 1:18),” VT 64 (2014): 640–53, shows how the close identification of the figure Jeremiah and the city Jerusalem in these verses is found throughout the book of Jeremiah.

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In both contexts, the text of the doublet serves to articulate how the prophet will be able to fulfill his vocation and why perseverance is possible: Yhwh will fortify Jeremiah and bless him with his presence so that none will be able to overpower him. Taken together, these lexical and thematic links invited the scribe to create the duplicate. Inserted into chap. 1, the doublet serves to address unresolved questions tacitly raised by the first chapter. First, in chap. 1, Yhwh twice tells the prophet not to fear (vv. 8 and 17). Specifically, Yhwh orders his servant not to fear “them”— ‫ אל־תירא מפניהם‬in v. 8 and ‫ אל־תחת מפניהם‬in v. 17—yet, the antecedent of “them” is ambiguous.167 Second, it is unclear why Jeremiah should not be afraid of them, whomever they are. The scribe answers both of these questions with the modified text of the doublet. First through vertical reading, the doublet reveals the identity of Jeremiah’s opponents, i.e., the antecedent of “them.” The text of 15:20 that the scribe copied originally described Jeremiah’s opponents vaguely as “this people” (‫ )לעם הזה‬who “will fight against [Jeremiah]” (‫נלחמו‬ ‫( )אליך‬15:20).168 The scribe, replaced this vague reference with ‫למלכי יהודה‬ ‫“ לׂשריה ולעם הארץ‬the kings of Judah, its princes, and the people of the land.” At a later date, another scribe added Jerusalem’s “priests” to this list (see textual analysis below). Note that these modifications to the doublet’s text also amplify the first chapter’s meaning, intensifying why the prophet has reason for fear. Apart from the doublet, the opening chapter describes the prophet’s difficult task of being a “prophet to the nations” (vv. 5, 10) and implicitly hands Jeremiah the daunting task of prophesying the doom of his city and country (vv. 15–16). Both of these assignments are perhaps reason enough for fear, hence the repeated command in v. 8 and v. 17 to fear not. With the insertion of the doublet in its modified form, cause for fear is increased: the prophet must now anticipate opposition from crown and town. Second, through vertical reading, the text of the doublet answers the question why the prophet’s fear can be alleviated. Early in chap. 1, Yhwh offers his servant grounds for confidence: “I am with you to deliver you, says Yhwh” (v. 8). Then in vv. 15–17, as mentioned, Jeremiah is handed the daunting task of announcing judgment to his own people. Following the description of this

167 At most, from 1:15 one could infer that the antecedent of “them” in v. 17 is Jerusalem and the cities of Judah. 168 From context, one might identify “this people” as those who persecute Jeremiah (‫)רדפי‬ in v. 15 and who curse him (‫ )מקללוני‬in v. 10. Yet, the identity of this people would remain unclear.

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unnerving task, more divine encouragement would not be out of order.169 The text of the doublet offers such encouragement, repeating the promise of divine Mitsein from v. 8 “I am with you to deliver you.”170 Furthermore, through vertical reading, the doublet’s modified text specifies that Jeremiah need not be afraid because Yhwh will make Jeremiah to be a “fortified wall of bronze” (‫חומת‬ ‫ )נחׁשת בצורה‬and a fortified city (‫)מבצר עיר‬. These modifications invite a comparison between Jerusalem (the walled city of v. 15) and Jeremiah.171 Unlike Jerusalem—whose fall is inevitable—Jeremiah, though besieged by his country folk, is unassailable. The walls of Jerusalem will be breeched; Jeremiah will stand firm. A later scribe solidified Jeremiah’s position further, buttressing the metaphors of wall and city with the third metaphor of an “iron pillar” (‫)עמוד ברזל‬.172 To smooth over the insertion of the doublet, the scribe harmonized the doublet’s text with its new context in two ways.173 The scribe replaced the future tense “and I will make you” with the perfect tense “I have made you,” (‫)נתתיך‬ thereby aligning the verb with the form found in v. 5. Simultaneously, he or she inserted the adverb “today” (‫ )היום‬drawn from v. 10. Both alterations harmonize the doublet’s text with the present-focused temporality of chap. 1. The scribe thereby underscores the reality that there is never a moment when Jeremiah 169 The threat in v. 17, that Yhwh would break the prophet should he falter, is very unsettling. Ending the introduction on this note seems unsatisfying and alarming. Some scholars (e.g., Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 43) believe v. 17 was added to chap. 1 in conjunction with the inclusion of vv. 18–19. Even so, ending the chapter with vv. 14–16, which describes Jeremiah’s daunting task, would not be any less troubling. 170 With the insertion of the doublet’s text into chap. 1, the promise of v. 8—that Yhwh “will be with you to deliver you”—is transformed into a refrain. Allen, Jeremiah, 31, assigns the repeated line a “resumptive function.” As G attests (1:17), another later scribe tripled the refrain. 171 Carroll, Jeremiah, 109; Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 44; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 38. 172 It seems probable that this iron pillar was added not just to reinforce Jeremiah’s status, but to create a further literary contrast between iron-clad Jeremiah—who survives 587 BCE— and the more fragile bronze pillars of the Jerusalem temple mentioned in Jer 52:17 which were torn down in the Babylonian onslaught. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 38, wonders whether two of the pluses in 1:18 (“iron pillar” and “[Jerusalem’s] priests”) reflect the same anti-priestly bias. Cf. Fischer, “Ich mache dich … zur eisernen Säule,” 449–50. 173 A third minor variation entered the text of 1:18 after the point of Jer+n: the insertion of the pronoun “I.” As noted in the textual analysis below, this 1st person pronoun balances out the 2nd person pronoun “you” in v. 17; cf. Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 43; Georg Fischer, Jeremia 1–25, HTKAT (Freiburg im Breisgau: Herder, 2005), 141. In this way, emphasis is placed on the thematic shift from Jeremiah’s responsibility in vv. 15–17 to Yhwh’s action in vv. 18–19.

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is not suited for his daunting task. These two minor adaptations work with the larger additions just discussed to amplify the chapter’s meaning and address interpretive issues of chap. 1. Moreover, they testify to the duplicating scribe’s use of vertical reading and intra-Jeremianic harmonization to enhance and prolong the meaning of existing revelatory texts. The text of the duplicate also heightens the coherence of the book (cf. 6:13– 15 // 8:10b–12). Stitched onto the end of Jeremiah’s opening chapter (1:1–17), the duplicate enhances the chapter’s introductory function. Like the exposition of a symphony, the first chapter introduces several major themes of the book of Jeremiah. Apart from the words of the doublet, however, the chapter does not prepare the reader/hearer for the motif of the suffering prophet found in the book’s confession and B material. Perhaps an early form of the book’s introduction (lacking the insertion of vv. 18–19) reflects a version of Jeremiah that did not yet contain the confession and B material. In any case, the absence of the motif of the suffering prophet in the introductory chapter was a gap needing filling. The lines of 15:20—drawn from Yhwh’s response to one of Jeremiah’s confessions—met this need elegantly.174 6.2 Duplication Technique The duplicating scribe created a paraphrase with minor adaptation. The duplicate contains three instances of minor synonymous variation (boldface) including a small transposition, four occasions of synonymous variation (bold and italics) including a larger transposition, as well as two minor innovations (in small caps). These innovations (1) identify Jeremiah’s adversaries and (2) describe Jeremiah as a “fortified city” which invites a comparison of the prophet with the city of Jerusalem mentioned in 1:15. While these innovations introduce new content to the doublet’s text, they do not radically alter the function of the doublet. The duplicate continues the purpose of original portraying Yhwh’s support of his prophet in the face of hostility. Thus, the duplicate remains a minor, as opposed to, major adaptation. And     I     will make you, against this people, to be a fortified wall of bronze.

And Look! I [myself] have made you this day to be a fortified city [and to be an iron pillar]175 and to be a fortified wall of bronze

174 Cf. Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 25. 175 Words in brackets were added after the moment of duplication.

Doublets and Textual Divination in Jeremiah

They will fight against you, but they will not overpower you, for I am with you, to save you and to deliver you, says Yhwh. Jer 15:20

6.3

145

Against all [the land, against] the kings of Judah, its princes, [its priests] and against the people of the land. They will fight against you, but they will not overpower you, for I am with you, says Yhwh, to deliver you. Jer 1:18–19

Textual Analysis

Jer 15:20–21a G ²⁰ a…a bκαὶ δώσω σεb c…c d τῷ λαῷ τούτῳ e…e f…f g h…h ὡς iτεῖχος ὀχυρὸν χαλκοῦνi g καὶ πολεμήσουσι jπρὸς σὲ καὶ οὐ μὴ δύνωνται πρὸς σέ διότι μετὰ σοῦ εἰμι kτοῦ σῴζειν σεk ²¹ lκαὶ ἐξαιρεῖσθαί σεl ἐκ χειρὸς πονηρῶν …

Jer 15:20–21a M a…a ²⁰ b‫ונתתיך‬b c…c ‫ לעם הזה‬d e…e f…f g ‫חומת נחׁשת‬i‫ל‬h…h g i‫בצורה‬

‫ונלחמו‬ ‫אליך‬j ‫ולא־יוכלו לך‬ ‫כי־אתך אני‬ k‫להוׁשיעך‬k l‫ולהצילך נאם־יהוה‬l ‫ והצלתיך מיד‬²¹ … ‫רעים‬

Jer 1:18–19 G ¹⁸ a ἰδοὺa bτέθεικά σεb cἐν τῇ σήμερον ἡμέρᾳc

gὡς πόλιν ὀχυρὰν h…h καὶ ὡς iτεῖχος χαλκοῦν ὀχυρὸνi g d eπᾶσι e τοῖς βασιλεῦσιν Ιουδα καὶ τοῖς ἄρχουσιν αὐτοῦ f…f καὶ τῷ λαῷ τῆς γῆς ¹⁹ καὶ πολεμήσουσί j σε καὶ οὐ μὴ δύνωνται πρὸς σέ διότι μετὰ σοῦ ἐγώ εἰμι k…k lτοῦ ἐξαιρεῖσθαί σε λέγει κύριοςl

Jer 1:18–19 M b‫נתתיך‬b a‫ואני הנה‬a ¹⁸ c‫היום‬c

‫לעיר מבצר‬g h‫ולעמוד ברזל‬h g i‫חמות נחׁשת‬i‫ול‬

e‫על־כל־הארץ‬e d ‫למלכי יהודה‬ ‫לׂשריה‬ f‫לכהניה‬f ‫ולעם הארץ‬

‫ ונלחמו‬¹⁹ ‫אליך‬j ‫ולא־יוכלו לך‬ ‫כי־אתך אני‬

k…k l‫נאם־יהוה להצילך‬l

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a…a Minor synonymous variations (+/− pronoun [post-duplication]; +/− ‫הנה‬ “look”); the post-duplication inclusion of the pronoun ‫אני‬, “I,” in 1:18 (absent in 15:20 M G and 1:18 G) balances the pronoun ‫אתה‬, “you,” in 1:17.176 b…b Minor synonymous variation (different verb form); ‫ונתתיך‬, “And I will make you” (perfect with converting vav; 15:20 M G) / ‫נתתיך‬, “I have made you” (perfect; 1:18 M G); the change in tense does not significantly change the meaning of this text; though with c…c below it temporally harmonizes the doublet with its secondary context. Also, note the different Greek words used to translate this word: δώσω (15:20) / τέθεικά (1:18). c…c Synonymous variation (intra-Jeremianic addition; +/− ‫“ היום‬today”); this addition to 1:18 harmonizes the text of the duplicate temporally with 1:10 where the same word is used (cf. b…b). Ziegler considers the pleonastic rendering of ‫ היום‬in 1:18 G (ἐν τῇ σήμερον ἡμέρᾳ) to be a secondary development.177 d Synonymous variation (transposition and replacement) and minor innovation (intra-Jeremianic addition); the opponents against whom Jeremiah is fortified are listed at the beginning of 15:20 but in the middle of 1:18–19. The transposed elements are marked with a background screen in the synopsis above. The lists of opponents differ greatly between the twins. In 15:20 the opponents simply consist of ‫לעם הזה‬, “this people.” In 1:18, one finds more specificity: in addition to mentioning the ‫לעם הארץ‬, “people of the land” (itself a synonymous variant), the list includes two entities by name: ‫מלכי יהודה‬, “the kings of Judah,” and ‫ׂשריה‬, “its princes,” two groups found together in lists in Jeremiah many times (e.g. 2:26; 4:9; 8:1; 17:25; 24:1). This new specificity alters the meaning of the doublet’s text, naming in more detail who among the people of Judah are Jeremiah’s adversaries. e…e Synonymous variation (post-duplication addition); in addition to the pluses of 1:18–19 noted in d that are common to G and M, 1:18 M also uniquely includes the phrase ‫על־כל־הארץ‬, “upon the whole land” (G represents only ‫ כל‬with πᾶσι). Its absence in 1:18 G suggests the phrase is a post-duplication insertion. Moreover, some scholars judge the plus in M to be a poor fit and so omit it.178 The other entries in this list of opponents are marked with the preposition ‫ ;ל‬the use of ‫ על‬here appears awkward.

176 Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 43. 177 Ziegler, Beiträge zur Ieremias-Septuaginta, 89. 178 E.g., Paul Volz, Der Prophet Jeremia, 2nd ed., KAT (Leipzig: A. Deichertsche, 1928), 11; Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 23.

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Granted the phrase’s secondary status, at an earlier stage the list in 1:18 probably began with ‫ = לכל־מלכי‬πᾶσι τοῖς βασιλεῦσιν, “to all the kings of.” f…f Minor innovation (post-duplication, intra-Jeremianic addition); alongside e…e, M also uniquely includes the phrase ‫לכהניה‬, “against its priests.” The mentioning of priests without their usual counterpart “prophets” raises suspicion, since these two groups are quite frequently listed together (e.g., 2:8, 26; 4:9; 5:31; 6:13; 8:1; 13:13). Most scholars appreciate the inclusion of ‫ לכהניה‬as an intra-Jeremianic addition from similar lists of officials found throughout Jeremiah (e.g., 2:26; 32:32).179 Its absence in 1:18 G suggests it was added after the moment of duplication. g…g Minor innovation (intra-Jeremianic addition); in 15:20 (M and G) Jeremiah is made to be ‫חומת נחׁשת בצורה‬, “a fortified wall of bronze”; this phrase is more or less represented in 1:18 M and G (see i below). Additionally, in 1:18, one encounters the new, parallel image of Jeremiah being made to be ‫עיר מבצר‬, “a fortified city” a phrase not found in 15:20. While both readings convey the same sense, i.e., that the figure Jeremiah will be able to withstand the assaults of his enemies, the identification of Jeremiah as a fortified city creates a contrast between the prophet and the city of Jerusalem mentioned in 1:15. h…h Minor innovation (post-duplication addition); in addition to the parallel plus of 1:18 described in g…g, M uniquely includes the parallel phrase ‫ולעמוד ברזל‬, “and to be an iron pillar.” For several reasons, many see this plus as secondary: (1) an iron pillar does not fit with the defensive imagery of fortress and wall; (2) iron and bronze are paired in the Old Testament thirty times, and so the occurrence of the word bronze in the phrase of 1:18 may have invited the insertion of a parallel phrase containing the word iron; (3) the phrase is missing in G.180 Parke-Taylor believes the phrase was added in response to the description in Jer 52:17 of the destruction of the bronze pillars of the temple; Jeremiah, an “iron pillar,” will outlast even the temple.181 If so, and this seems to me to be the best 179 Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 36; Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 23; however, Jüngling, “Ich mache dich zu einer ehernen Mauer,” 5, disagrees though without citing his reasoning. 180 Francis S. North, “Textual Variants in the Hebrew Bible Significant for Critical Analysis,” JQR 47 (1956): 78; John Maclennan Berridge, Prophet, People, and the Word of Yahweh: An Examination of Form and Content in the Proclamation of the Prophet Jeremiah, BST (Zurich: EVZ, 1970), 199, n. 82; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 38; cf. Jüngling, “Ich mache dich zu einer ehernen Mauer,” 4, n. 3. The efforts of Shemaryahu Talmon, “An Apparently Redundant MT Reading: Jer. 1:18,” Text 8 (1973): 160–3, to find a defensive meaning for “iron pillar” do not have linguistic support. 181 Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 38; cf. Georg Fischer, “‘Ich mache dich … zu eisernen Säule’ (Jer 1,18): Der Prophet als besserer Ersatz für den untergegangenen

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explanation, the gloss in 1:18 reflects a version of Jeremiah already containing the historical appendix of Jer 52. i…i Synonymous variant (post-duplication omission); ‫חומת נחׁשת בצורה‬, “a fortified wall of bronze” (15:20 M and G; 1:18 G) / ‫נחׁשת חמות‬, “walls of bronze” (1:18 M); the agreement of 1:18 G with 15:20 M and G against 1:18 M suggests the word “fortified” was dropped after the moment of duplication. It may have been viewed as a redundancy—following after ‫—עיר מבצר‬and intentionally omitted by a scribe to balance the parallel phrases (‫ לעיר מבצר‬// ‫ ולעמוד ברזל‬// ‫ )ולחמות נחׁשת‬into two-word cola.182 In the Masoretic pointing, one also encounters a variation in number (s./ pl.), namely ‫“ חֹמֹות‬walls of” in 1:18 and ‫חֹומת‬ ַ “wall of” in 15:20. Yet, since this vocalization is late, this variation is artificial; ‫ חמת‬could be vocalized as ‫ ח ַֹמת‬or ‫חֹמֹת‬. There is no need for more involved explanations such as the suggestion that the plural form in 1:18 has an “intensifying” function.183 j Copying error (omission of preposition in 1:19 G) k…k Synonymous variation (+/− ‫להוׁשיעך‬, “to save you”); 15:20 preserves a double reading that is not found in 1:19 (‫ להוׁשיעך‬// ‫)להצילך‬. The larger phrase, in which these readings are nested (“For I am with you, says Yhwh, to save / to deliver you”), is found in various places in Jeremiah (1:8, 17 [G]; 30:11; 42:11). The various instances of the phrase display both readings, with ‫ להצילך‬found in 1:8 and 1:17 (G), ‫ להוׁשיעך‬in 30:11, and both readings in 42:11. This phrase is an example of traditional material whose written form was not entirely fixed (cf. variation in l…l below). For this reason, one cannot determine whether the double reading was omitted in the duplicate, perhaps unconsciously at the moment of duplication, or added to 15:20 after the moment of duplication. l…l Copying error and minor synonymous variation (transposition); ‫ולהצילך‬ ‫נאם־יהוה‬, “and to deliver you, says Yhwh.” (15:20 M, 1:19 G and M [with transposition of the divine speech formula]) / καὶ ἐξαιρεῖσθαί σε ἐκ χειρὸς… (= …‫“ )ולהצילך מיד‬And to save you out of the hand …” (15:21 V G). The shorter reading in 15:21 G is best explained as resulting from haplography; after writing ‫( ולהצילך‬v. 20) the scribe’s eye inadvertently skipped three Tempel,” ZKT 116 (1994): 449–50; Fischer, Jeremia 1–25, 141–2; Maier, “Jeremiah as YHWH’s Stronghold (Jer 1:18),” 652–3. 182 Against the potential counter argument that the agreement of 1:18 G with 15:20 M and G is due to the PDHarm of the Greek text, I note that in the doublet twins in G the word ὀχυρὸν (a Greek equivalent to “fortified”) is not found in the same position, coming after χαλκοῦν “bronze” in 1:18 (and 15:20 M) but before this word in 15:20 G. If harmonization was the goal, the responsible scribe would surely have standardized the word order. 183 Cf. Volz, Der Prophet Jeremia, 11, understands the plural here “um das Massige, Intensive u. a. auszudrücken.”

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words to the similar looking ‫ והצלתיך‬at the start of v. 21. The transposition of ‫ נאם־יהוה‬in M of 1:19 has no bearing on the larger phrase’s meaning. The phrase occurs several times in Jeremiah, and the position of the divine speech formula therein is not set (cf. 30:11).184 The variation observed here and in k…k suggests that this phrase was part of the scribes’ memorized repertoire of traditional phrases whose expression in writing could take many forms. 7

Text #7: Shall I Not Punish for These Things? (Jer 5:9 // Jer 5:29 // Jer 9:8)

7.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function The texts of Jer 5:9, 5:29, and 9:8 are virtually identical. The three texts contain the same pair of rhetorical questions, with no significant variation. For this reason, I am unable on textual grounds to determine which triplet is original. Yet, without determining which triplet came first, one can assert that two of the three were created as secondary applications. For, all three share the same rhetorical purpose of turning descriptions of Judah’s sin into justifications for divine punishment. Each follows a section relating Judah’s moral failings: Jer 5:9 follows verses describing the people’s idolatry (5:7) and lust (5:7–8); 5:29 comes after a description of exploitation and greed (5:26–28); and 9:8 follows references to lying (‫ ;ׁשקר‬9:2, 4), slander (‫ ;רכיל‬9:3), and deceitfulness (‫;מרמה‬ 9:2–5, 7; cf. 5:27). In each case, the description of moral failings is followed by the triplet’s initial rhetorical question: “Shall I not punish for these things?” Note that the words “these things” (‫ )אלה‬on their own lack a referent; they require context and vertical reading to be meaningful.185 Naturally, one of the three triplets came first. The other two were created on analogy to the first. If the pair of rhetorical questions (that make up the triplet) is applied to one description of Judah’s sin, the pair can be reapplied to other descriptions of Judah’s sin. Thus, the triplet illustrates the Jewish scribes’ use of secondary application to generate new revelation. Macchi proposes that the triplet plays a unifying function, tying together similar sections of Jeremiah’s poetry.186 This seems partially correct but does 184 Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 39–40. 185 Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 181–2, understands ‫ אלה‬to refer to Yhwh’s people, rendering the question, “Shall I not punish these [people].” 186 Macchi, “Les doublets dans le livre de Jérémie,” 121. He counts the repetitions of this phrase as one example of a text duplicated into “un cadre thématique quasi identique” which—along with several other examples—reflects “… une volonté éditoriale de placer des points de repères recurrents.” Such “markers” serve to emphasize the coherence and

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not explain why these three sections in particular received the repeated refrain; comparable descriptions of moral deviation are featured in many places in the early chapters of Jeremiah’s poetry: i.e., idolatry in 2:20, 26–28; 9:13–14; exploitation and greed in 6:13, not to mention lying (‫ )ׁשקר‬in 6:13, slander (‫ )רכיל‬in 6:28 and deceit (‫ )תרמית‬in 8:5. More explanation is needed. On two occasions (5:9, 9:8), a scribe used the refrain structurally to mark the end of a poetic unit. Chapter 5 may be neatly broken into three units—5:1–9, 10–19, and 20–31—each one of which begins with a new plural imperative.187 The occurrence of the triplet in 5:9 works well as a conclusion to the chapter’s first unit. It smooths over what would otherwise be a rough transition from v. 8—describing Judah’s sexual brokenness—to v. 10—which opens a new section unconcerned with such brokenness. Furthermore, it reinforces the impression that Judah’s punishment is a natural and inevitable outcome of their sin. As Brueggemann explains, the triplet exemplifies a literary device drawn from the sapiential tradition and which is used throughout Jeremiah.188 Each occurrence of this device consists of two questions—the first beginning with the interrogative ‫ ה‬and the second with the conjunction ‫—אם‬both of which imply either an affirmative or negative answer. The effect of this literary device is to impress upon the reader the naturalness of the implied answers to the given questions. The text asks, “Shall I not punish for these things (‫”?)אלה‬ The expected answer in all three contexts is, “Yes, most naturally.” In the case of 9:8 (9 Eng.), the triplet again works well as the conclusion of a poetic unit, namely Jer 9:1–8, which offers an extended description of Judah’s deceitfulness. The following verses—vv. 9–10 (10–11 Eng.)—begin a new section imagining the country’s punishment. The text of the triplet, standing between these two sections, provides a logic for this transition: Judah’s punishment is a consequence for their sin. Brueggemann, however, considers the refrain in 9:8 to be redundant after v. 6 (7 Eng.)—which pronounces judgment on Judah—and concludes that it was inserted here accidentally.189 Instead, as I argue, one should view v. 6 as the disjunctive element. This verse breaks up an otherwise continuous litany of charges against Judah’s falsehood (vv. 1–5, 7). Additionally, v. 8 (our triplet) occupies the correct hinge between the poetic structure of the book. While each triplet does follow a depiction of “déviations morales populaires”—as Macchi maintains—it would be a stretch to describe the three contexts as almost identical. The contexts of 5:29 and 9:8 are somewhat similar—both speak of the people’s deceitfulness (‫ ;מרמה‬cf. 5:27 and 9:2–5, 7)—but the emphasis of the two contexts is notably different. 187 Allen, Jeremiah, 72. 188 Walter Brueggemann, “Jeremiah’s Use of Rhetorical Questions,” JBL 92 (1973): 358–74. 189 Brueggemann, “Jeremiah’s Use of Rhetorical Questions,” 366.

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units just described. In short, in both 5:9 and 9:8 a scribe used the triplet to mark the end of a poetic unit. Turning to 5:29, this triplet serves a different function than the other two. It does not mark the end of a unit, but stands a few verses shy of it.190 A new poetic unit—introduced by another plural imperative—begins at 6:1. Yet, the triplet’s double rhetorical questions do serve another structural purpose, namely balancing another set of double questions found in v. 22.191 These rhetorical questions (in v. 22) ask if the people of Judah fear Yhwh. The questions are fishing for the obvious answer: “Yes, of course! What could be more natural?” The following verses, however, itemize a heap of evidence to the contrary: the people show no sign of the expected reverence (vv. 23–28). At this juncture, v. 29 raises a new set of rhetorical questions—those of the triplet—which form an opposing pair with the questions of v. 22. Once again, the text emphasizes the naturalness of divine punishment. Yet, in this context—following vv. 23–28, where Judah perversely rejects the natural and expected fear of Yhwh—the reasonableness of punishment is heightened. As Brueggemann writes, “… the intent of the rhetorical question [in v. 29] is to establish the normalcy and naturalness of punishment after the normalcy and naturalness of fear of Yahweh is rejected in vs. 22 [and the verses that follow].”192 Thus, while the refrain in 5:29 does not have the same structural function as it has in 5:9 and 9:8, it does play a structurally significant role within its literary unit. In summary, scribes placed the rhetorical questions of this triplet after descriptions of Judah’s sin to transform these descriptions into legitimations of divine judgement, and in two cases (5:9 and 9:8) to mark the end of a poetic unit. 7.2 Textual Analysis / Duplication Technique The triplet’s brevity makes it economical to combine the textual analysis with the translation and description of the duplication technique. Of the three variants noted below, the first is likely a post-duplication development, the second is non-significant, and the third is simply a synonymous translation. Thus, here one encounters an example of verbatim repetition. Since the triplets are virtually identical, one column of text is sufficient for analyzing the triplet’s text.

190 As it stands, the text comes between an incrimination of the wealthy (vv. 26–28) and an indictment of the prophets and priests (vv. 30–31). As Carroll, Jeremiah, 189, notes, following this incrimination against the wealthy, one would expect a pronouncement of judgment against these unjust individuals in particular. Instead, the triplet delivers a universal rebuke; the nation as a whole is worthy of condemnation. 191 See discussion in Brueggemann, “Jeremiah’s Use of Rhetorical Questions,” 365. 192 Ibid.

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‫ אׁשר־כזה לא תתנקם נפׁשי‬c‫בגוי‬c ‫ואם‬b ‫אפקד נאם־יהוה‬a‫העל־אלה לוא־‬

“Shall I not punish them for these things?” says Yhwh; “and shall I not bring retribution on a nation such as this?”193 Jer 5:9 // Jer 5:29 // Jer 9:8

a

Minor synonymous variation (+/− preposition and pronoun): ‫אפקד‬, “I will punish” (5:9 M G; 5:29 M G; 9:8 G) / ‫אפקד־בם‬, “I will punish them” (9:8 M)— The preposition + pronoun ‫בם‬, may have been added to 9:8 M after the moment of duplication since it is missing in G. The alternative possibility that G has been harmonized toward 5:9, 29 is doubtful because of c…c below. b Non-significant variant (+/− conjunction). c…c Synonymous translation: the Hebrew phrase ‫בגוי‬, “with a nation,” is rendered in G ἐν ἔθνει, “with a nation,” in 5:9 and 5:29 but ἐν λαῷ, “with a people,” in 9:8—the variant translations are synonymous. This difference casts doubt on the hypothesis that the Greek translation of 9:8 was harmonized toward that of 5:9 and 5:29. 8

Text #8: Look! A People from the North (Jer 6:22–24 // Jer 50:41–43)

8.1 The Duplicate’s Interpretive Function The last doublet considered is this chapter—6:22–24 // 50:41–43—offers a final illustration of secondary application. The consensus of scholarship identifies 50:41–43 as a duplicate of 6:22–24.194 This earlier text describes the advent of 193 NRSV. 194 This consensus is built on two pillars: first, the extensive oracles against Babylon in which the duplicate twin is situated (50:2–51:58) are a tapestry stitched together out of language and themes threaded elsewhere in Jeremiah’s book; thus, it is not unreasonable to assume the present doublet is also secondarily woven into chap. 50. Second, it makes chronological and theological sense to view the second occurrence of the doublet (50:41–43)— which imagines the punishment of Babylon for its violence—as a response to the first occurrence (6:22–24)—where Babylon’s violence is anticipated (the motif of punishing a nation after it has been employed as an agent of punishment is found outside of Jeremiah; e.g., Isa 10:5–18). Third, such a response fits thematically within chaps. 50–51, chapters which feature the reversal of Babylon’s fate prominently. Cf., Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 395; Allen, Jeremiah, 516; Martin Kessler, Battle of the Gods: The God of Israel Versus Marduk of Babylon: A Literary/Theological Interpretation of Jeremiah 50–51 (Assen: Van Gorcum, 2003), 101; Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 177; Alice Ogden Bellis, The Structure and Composition of Jeremiah 50:2–51:58 (Lewiston, NY: Mellen Biblical Press, 1995), 99; John Hill, Friend or Foe: The Figure of Babylon in the Book of Jeremiah MT (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 177.

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an army from the north who will destroy Zion. The duplicating scribe discovered a fresh application of this description. With a few modifications, the text could become a theologically potent description of Babylon’s destruction to be fitted into the oracles against Babylon (chaps. 50–51). The scribe selected this text from chap. 6 for duplication in the oracles against Babylon in part because much of the language of 6:22–24 reverberates in the latter.195 Once inserted into the oracles against Babylon, the text of the doublet interprets this secondary context in at least three ways: (1) through 195 For example, the image of a foreboding people coming from the north in 6:22 is found in 50:3, 9, and 51:48. The language of 50:9 in particular has many verbal links with the doublet’s text: both speak of a nation (or nations) ([‫ )גוי]ם‬being stirred up (‫ )עור‬by Yhwh and of that nation being arrayed (‫ )ערך‬for battle and armed with weapons (bow and spear in 6:23; arrows in 50:9). Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 401, sees 50:9 as being directly inspired by 6:22–23. Additionally, the duplicate and its environs in chap. 50 are linked by the repeated use of the verbal root ‫“( חזק‬to be strong,” “to wield”) in 50:42, 43 (= 6:23, 24) and in 50:33, 34; cf. Kessler, Battle of the Gods, 102, 154. The terminus of the doublet is also readily explainable: Jer 6:24 is the logical end of the doublet’s thought unit, and, as Kessler suggests, the contents of v. 25—an imperative to avoid open places—if carried over into chap. 50 would contradict the urgent motif of fleeing the city that recurs frequently in the Babylonian oracle (50:3, 8, 16, 28; 51:6); cf., Kessler, Battle of the Gods, 101. Thus, the duplicating scribe limited the doublet to vv. 22–24. Less certain is the reason why the text of the doublet was inserted in its particular location—toward the end of chap. 50—splitting in two another doublet borrowed from the oracles against Edom (49:18–21 // 50:40, 44–46). Bellis, The Structure and Composition of Jeremiah 50:2–51:58, 101–3, finds the insertion of the doublet’s text at this point in chap. 50 to be logical, a necessary structural element in the readily-outlined literary architecture of vv. 33–46. The insertion of the doublet, she argues, addresses an implied question raised by the description of Babylon as a wilderness in vv. 39–40, namely, “what events will lead up to Babylon’s desertion?” Additionally, she explains, placing the doublet before v. 44 allows the content of v. 44—i.e., a disclosure of Yhwh’s participation in the attack of Babylon—to stand as the culmination of the chapter’s progression . While perhaps illuminative as a synchronic description of vv. 33–46, Bellis’s suggestions are not entirely satisfying as a diachronic explanation of the text’s formation. The structure of these verses, as outlined by Bellis, hardly seems necessary. For instance, if placed after either v. 44 or v. 45a, the doublet twin would work just as well if not better. Placed after v. 44—in which Yhwh declares that he may appoint against Babylon anyone he chooses—the doublet’s text, announcing the advent of the enemy from the North, would be fitting. Or again, if placed after v. 45a—which states that Yhwh has a “plan” for Babylon—the twin would serve as an illustration of that plan. As it stands now, the specifics of this plan are not clearly spelled out; and thus, one could describe the placement of vv. 41–43 before v. 45 as architecturally unsound. Also, the insistence that v. 44 serves as a culmination of the chapter needs qualification. Bellis, The Structure and Composition of Jeremiah 50:2–51:58, 102, acknowledges that the theme of divine involvement in the attack of Babylon is not unique to the v. 44 but finds emphasis in vv. 25 and 31–32 (one could also add vv. 13, 18, 24); but I cannot agree that “divine participation is nowhere as explicit as in 50:44.” The comparison in v. 40 of Babylon to Sodom and Gomorrah, cities which

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vertical reading it resolves interpretive tensions found in chap. 50 created by an earlier insertion of a different doublet extracted from the oracles against Edom (49:18–21 // 50:40, 44–46); (2) it embodies a major theme of these chapters, namely the reversal of Babylon’s fate; and (3), it strengthens a significant theological purpose of chaps. 50–51, i.e., the comparison of Babylon and Judah. First, the duplicate plays an important interpretive role in its particular location pressed between the verses borrowed from the oracles against Edom (49:18–21).196 Those verses seeded the end of chap. 50 with the images of the barrenness of Sodom and Gomorrah (v. 40) and of the thickets of the Jordan (v. 44)—images geographically apropos to Transjordan Edom but alien to Babylon. These toponyms introduce thematic and geographical incongruity to the Babylonian oracles. The duplicating scribe strategically placed the doublet’s text between these images to mitigate their incongruities through vertical reading. Consider the thematic tension created in chaps. 50–51 by the allusion to Sodom and Gomorrah. Babylon will be uninhabited: ‫כמהפכת אלהים את סדם‬ ‫“ ואת עמרה ואת שכניה נאם יהוה‬as when God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and their neighbors, says Yhwh …” (50:40 // 49:18).197 Everywhere else in the oracle the reader hears of a coming military invasion, a theme repeated like the steady beat of a war drum (vv. 3, 9, 14–15, 21–22, 29–30, 35–37); enter a reference to Sodom and Gomorrah—cities that met annihilation by an act of God—however, and the drumming threat of military invasion is drowned out by the higher pitch of supernatural intervention. Perhaps for this reason, the doublet—with its militaristic imagery—was enlisted at this point to reprise the theme of armed invasion. Lest the reader/hearer have any doubt, the aftermath of God’s leveling of Sodom and Gomorrah—and not the leveling itself—is the chief point of comparison between that horrific miracle and Babylon’s finale. Along the same lines, Jer 50:44—a verse also borrowed from the Edomite oracle—portrays Babylon’s foreboding threat as a lion lurking in the comparatively lush flora of the Jordan River. The leonine image works well in an oracle God (‫ )אלהים‬overthrew, seems a sufficiently explicit disclosure of divine involvement to counter Bellis’s proposal. A more cogent argument, though still speculative, is the suggestion in the following section that the duplicate found a home in the middle of vv. 40, 44–46—verses duplicated from the Edom oracle—in order to resolve tensions created when these earlier verses were inserted. 196 It is possible that the doublet of 49:18–21 // 50:40, 44–46 originated in the oracles against Babylon and is secondary in the oracles against Edom; cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 157. If so, the argument of this section would need to be adjusted only slightly, and one would still have to explain why the text of 6:22–24 was inserted in chap. 50 adjacent to references to Sodom and Gomorrah and to the Jordan. 197 NRSV.

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against Edom, which is situated not far from Jordan’s banks (49:20). Yet, in an oracle against Babylon, the metaphor creates some geographical incongruity. Babylon sits a great distance away from the Jordan on the opposite side of the Arabian Desert. The reference to the Jordan could be mistaken as an identification of the geographical origins of Babylon’s assailers. However, elsewhere in chaps. 50–51, the vanquishers of Babylon are identified as the Medes (51:11, 28) or at least said to arise from the north (50: 3, 9, 51:48).198 Either way, the Jordan lies in the wrong cardinal direction. Once more, the imagery duplicated from the Edom oracle hangs askew against the backdrop of chaps. 50–51. Perhaps also for this reason, a scribe drew upon the text of the doublet from 6:22–24. Through vertical reading, the doubled text reassures that out of northern lands—not the distant west—Babylon’s nemesis will descend. As was the case with the reference to Sodom and Gomorrah, the doublet clarifies the main point of the leonine image through vertical reading: this image depicts the vulnerability of Babylon and not the origins of its foe. Second, the doublet embodies a major theme of the Babylonian oracle, namely the great reversal of Babylon’s fate.199 First broached in 50:15, calls for vengeance against Babylon and for repaying her in due kind abound in chaps. 50–51: ‫ …“ כאשר עשתה עשו לה‬do to her as she has done” (50:15); ‫שלמו‬ ‫“ לה כפעלה ככל אשר עשתה עשו לה‬Repay her according to her deeds; just as she has done, do to her” (50:29); and, ‫“ כי אל גמלות יהוה שלם ישלם‬for [Yhwh] is a God of recompense, he will repay in full” (51:56).200 Within this milieu, the doublet—in its adapted form—answers the call to deal with Babylon as she has dealt. Originally, the text of the doublet served as a divine sanction of Babylon’s invasion of Judah. It announced the arrival of Nebuchadnezzar’s armed forces—agents of Yhwh’s wrath—who had come to execute Yhwh’s will. Yet, a later scribe co-opted this text rewriting it with Babylon no longer 198 The theory of Brevard S. Childs, “Enemy from the North and the Chaos Tradition,” JBL 78 (1959): 187–98, that biblical references to an enemy from the north develop a mythological as opposed to geographical significance, is not relevant here. Although Childs counts the reference in 50:41 as an example of the phrase used mythologically, there is no reason to suppose so. Childs counts 50:41 as such an example on the basis of the occurrence of the Hebrew root ‫רעׁש‬, “to shake,” in 50:46, a verse which Childs, ibid., 195, sees as a “conclusion” to the doublet, even though between them stand two intermittent verses and even though v. 46 is actually constituent of an entirely different doublet taken from the oracles against Edom (Jer 49:18–21 = 50:40, 44–46), into which the doublet of 50:41–43 (= 6:22–24) was inserted. Moreover, the insertion of the phrase “and many kings” in 50:41 at the moment of duplication may have been added to strengthen the identification of the people from the north with an actual historical referent, namely, the Medes. 199 Cf. Carroll, Jeremiah, 834; Walter Brueggemann, “At the Mercy of Babylon: A Subversive Rereading of the Empire,” JBL 110 (1991): 3–22. 200 NRSV; see also, 51:6, 11, 36.

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as the aggressor but as the helpless victim. In this way, the familiar words of the doublet were transformed into a divine sanction and announcement of Babylon’s undoing.201 The duplicating scribe, in reapplying the doublet’s text, enacted the themes of reversal and vengeance found in chaps. 50–51, treating Babylon in the same way that she treated others. The same bow and spear that Babylon wielded against others are now (in the duplicate) wielded against it. Third, the duplicating scribe utilized the doublet’s text to underscore a significant point of emphasis raised by the long read of Jeremiah, from beginning to end, namely a theological comparison of Babylon and Judah. The oracles against Babylon contain a plethora of words and phrases found earlier in oracles confronting Judah.202 For example, both Judah and Babylon are threatened by an enemy from the north;203 both lands are fated for desolation;204 and both face divine punishment.205 According to Hill, such repetition and reapplication of words from earlier oracles is one mechanism through which the book portrays Babylon, not as Judah’s enemy, but as Judah’s twin.206 The two nations stand guilty before the same God and are subject to the same divine punishment.207 Observe that the oracles against Babylon—like the oracles against Judah—describe the Chaldean nation’s wrongdoing in theological terms: Babylon has sinned against Yhwh (50:14 M), and is thus liable to Yhwh’s vengeance (50:15).208 Hill concludes that, through casting Babylon in Judah’s mold, the people of Judah—even in their moment of celebrating “the demise of Babylon”—must confront their own sinfulness and deserved punishment.209 The duplicating scribe reinforced the identification of Babylon as Judah’s twin through duplication: creating a nearly verbatim and oracle-length duplicate of 201 Cf. Brueggemann, “At the Mercy of Babylon,” 7–8; Bellis, The Structure and Composition of Jeremiah 50:2–51:58, 99. 202 E.g., Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 402–10. For his part, J.G. Amesz, “A God of Vengeance? Comparing YHWH’s Dealings with Judah and Babylon in the Book of Jeremiah,” in Reading the Book of Jeremiah: A Search for Coherence, ed. Martin Kessler (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2004), 99–116, offers a comparison of language from chaps. 50–51 and chaps. 4–6. 203 Judah in 1:14, 15; 4:6; 6:1, 22; 10:22; and Babylon in 50:3, 9, 41; 51:48 M. 204 Judah in 4:7, 27; 5:30; 6:8; 8:21; 9:10; 10:22, 25; 18:16; 19:8; and Babylon in 50:3, 13; 51:26, 29, 41, 43. 205 Judah in 5:9, 29; 6:6, 15; 8:12; 9:8; 11:22; 14:10; and Babylon in 50:18, 31, 44; 51:27, 44, 47 M, 52. 206 Hill, Friend or Foe, 172–80. With these comments, Hill has in mind the form of the oracles against Babylon in M. Yet, the references cited here and below are attested by G (and thus Jer+n), which indicates that Hill’s comments are largely illuminative of Jer+n as well as V M. Hill, ibid., 177–80, catalogues an extensive list of similar verbal repetitions that reinforce this perceived connection between Babylon and Judah. 207 Ibid., 173. 208 Judah’s wrongdoings are frequently described as “sin” (‫ )חטא‬committed “against Yhwh”: e.g., 3:25; 8:14; 16:10; 40:3, 44:23. 209 Hill, Friend or Foe, 180.

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a unit from the oracles against Judah.210 To extend Hill’s line of thought, upon encountering the duplicate’s description Babylon’s faltering hope in the face of invasion, the Judean reader/hearer was invited not to gloat over Babylon’s fall, but to ponder anew Judah’s own frailty before the invasion of 587 BCE. In this way, exulting over Babylon’s collapse is cooled by humble recognition of one’s own culpability and vulnerability. 8.2 Duplication Technique The duplicating scribe radically changed the meaning of the doublet’s text through one crucial major innovation: the reference to Zion is replaced with a reference to Babylon (italicized small caps), transforming the whole text from an oracle against Judah into an oracle against Babylon. Along with this innovation I count three related major innovations, one minor innovation (small caps), and a single synonymous variant (boldface); no instances of minor synonymous variation are detected. These characteristics mark the duplicate as a loose citation with major adaptation—though, aside from the innovations, it is copied nearly verbatim. Look! A people comes from the north and a    nation is stirred up from the ends of the earth. Bow and spear they wield. They are cruel and have no mercy. Their voice is like the roaring sea. And upon horses they ride. Arrayed like a man for battle against you, O Daughter Zion. We hear the report of it. Our hands fall helpless. Anguish seizes us, Pain like a woman in labor. Jer 6:22–24

Look! A people comes from the north and a great nation and many kings are stirred up from the ends of the earth. Bow and spear they wield. They are cruel and have no mercy. Their voice is like the roaring sea. And upon horses they ride. Arrayed like a man for battle against you, O Daughter Babylon. The king of Babylon hears their report. His hands fall helpless. Anguish seizes him, Pain like a woman in labor. Jer 50:41–43

210 The same can be said of the doublet 10:12–16 // 51:15–19.

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Textual Analysis

6:22–24 G 6:22–24 M 50[27]:41–43 G 50:41–43 M ²² ἰδοὺ λαὸς ἔρχεται ‫ הנה עם בא‬²² ⁴¹ ἰδοὺ λαὸς ἔρχεται ‫ הנה עם בא‬⁴¹ a ἀπὸ βορρᾶa a‫מארץ צפון‬a a ἀπὸ βορρᾶa a‫מצפון‬a bκαὶ ἔθνηb b‫וגוי גדול‬b bκαὶ ἔθνος μέγαb b‫וגוי גדול‬b c…c c…c cκαὶ βασιλεῖς πολλοὶc c‫ומלכים רבים‬c ἐξεγερθήσονται ‫ יעור מירכתי־ארץ‬ἐξεγερθήσονται ‫יערו מירכתי־ארץ‬ ἀπ᾽ ἐσχάτου τῆς γῆς ἀπ᾽ ἐσχάτου τῆς γῆς ²³ τόξον καὶ dζιβύνην ‫ קׁשת וכידון יחזיקו‬²³ ⁴² τόξον καὶ ‫ קׁשת וכידן יחזיקו‬⁴² dκρατήσουσιν dἐγχειρίδιον dἔχοντες ἰταμός eἐστι ‫הוא‬e ‫ אכזרי‬ἰταμός eἐστι ‫המה‬e ‫אכזרי‬ καὶ dοὐκ eἐλεήσειd ‫ירחמו‬e ‫ ולא‬καὶ dοὐ μὴ ἐλεήσῃd ‫ירחמו‬e ‫ולא‬ φωνὴ eαὐτοῦ ‫ם‬e‫ קול‬φωνὴ eαὐτῶν ‫ם‬e‫קול‬ ὡς θάλασσα ‫ כים יהמה‬ὡς θάλασσα ‫כים יהמה‬ dκυμαίνουσα ‫ ועל־סוסים‬dἠχήσει ‫ועל־סוסים‬ ἐφ᾽ ἵπποις ‫ ערוך‬f‫ירכבו‬f ἐφ᾽ ἵπποις ‫ ערוך‬f‫ירכבו‬f fκαὶ ἅρμασιf fἱππάσονταιf dπαρατάξεται dπαρεσκευασμένοι dὡς gπῦρ εἰς ‫איׁש למלחמה‬g‫ כ‬dὥσπερ gπῦρ εἰς ‫איׁש למלחמה‬g‫כ‬ πόλεμον πόλεμον πρὸς σέ θύγατερ ‫ עליך בת־‬πρὸς σέ θύγατερ ‫עליך בת־‬ hΣιων ‫ציון‬h hΒαβυλῶνος ‫בבל‬h ²⁴ iἠκούσαμεν ‫ׁשמענו‬i ²⁴ ⁴³ iἤκουσε βασιλεὺς ‫ׁשמע מלך־בבל‬i ⁴³ Βαβυλῶνος τὴν ἀκοὴν eαὐτῶν ‫ו‬e‫ את־ׁשמע‬τὴν ἀκοὴν eαὐτῶν ‫ם‬e‫את־ׁשמע‬ καὶ παρελύθησαν παρελύθησαν αἱ χεῖρες iἡμῶν ‫נו‬i‫ רפו ידי‬αἱ χεῖρες iαὐτοῦ ‫ו‬i‫ורפו ידי‬ θλῖψις dκατέσχεν ‫נו‬i‫ צרה החזיקת‬θλῖψις dκατεκράτησεν ‫הו‬i‫צרה החזיקת‬ iἡμᾶς iαὐτοῦ ὠδῖνες ὡς τικτούσης ‫ חיל כיולדה‬ὠδῖνες ὡς τικτούσης ‫חיל כיולדה‬ a

Synonymous variation (post-duplication intra-Jeremianic addition); ‫מצפון‬, “from the north” (6:22 G; 50:41 M G) / ‫מארץ צפון‬, “from the land of the north” (6:22 M); although both forms of this phrase are common to Jeremiah—the fuller form being found in 3:18, 10:22, 16:15, 31:8, and 50:9 and the more concise form in 1:14, 4:6, 6:1, 13:20, 15:12, 46:20, 47:2, 50:3, and 51:48—the fuller form, with one exception (Zech 2:10 [6 Eng.]), is characteristic of Jeremiah alone. In contrast, the shorter form ‫ מצפון‬occurs throughout Hebrew scripture over thirty times. To a certain degree, the

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two forms are interchangeable, for in addition to 6:22—where both forms are attested—both forms also occur in 31:8; M has the long form while G has the short form. The agreement of 6:22 G with 50:41 M and G suggest that the phrase in 6:22 M was expanded after the moment of duplication. Alternatively, the Greek text of 6:22 may betray intentional PDHarm with 50:41 G, but this contention is unlikely on the basis of d below. b…b Synonymous variation, PDHarm, and non-significant variant (s./pl.); ‫*וגוים‬ “and nations” (= καὶ ἔθνη; 6:22 G) / ‫וגוי גדול‬, “and a great nation” (6:22 M; 50:41 M G). The absence of the adjective “great” in 6:22 G suggests that this adjective is not original to 6:22, and that the adjective was added to the duplicate in 50:41 at the moment of duplication to intensify the doublet’s text. If so, its presence in 6:22 M reflects PDHarm. Note that the presence of ‫ גדול‬in 50:41 may have invited a later scribe to add the plural form of this adjective to 50:9 where a line very similar to 6:22 already stood in 50:9 M, one reads of ‫קהל־גוים גדלים מארץ צפון‬, “an assembly of great nations from the land of the north,” who, like the nation and people of this passage are stirred up (‫ )עור‬by Yhwh against Babylon. The adjective ‫ גדלים‬is missing in 50:9 G, and thus may have been inserted into 50:9 from 50:41 after the moment of duplication.211 The variant plural form ἔθνη found in G of 6:22 probably arose from a copying error after the moment of duplication; the singular form found in M is more appropriate since in 6:22 the word references Babylon. The different readings are synonymous. c…c Minor innovation (addition); 50:41 (M G) includes ‫ומלכים רבים‬, “and many kings” against 6:22 (M G). Bellis supposes that this insertion reflects the view that the Medes would conquer Babylon: the Medes were “an empire composed of many peoples, each of which had its own ruler or king.”212 If so, this addition would tether the moment of duplication to around 550 BCE, when Cyrus conquered the Medes and thereby eliminated the Medes as a threat to Babylon. With h below, this addition dramatically alters the meaning of the doublet.213 Along with this innovation, the following verb in 50:41 was updated from 3rd m. s. (‫“ יעור‬it is stirred”) to 3rd m. pl. (‫“ יערו‬they are stirred”). 211 Cf. Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 60. Alternatively, the adjective may also have been lost in 50:9 through haplography (homoeoteleuton: ‫ ים‬of ‫ ים → גוים‬of ‫ )גדלים‬in which case the influence may have gone the other direction, from 50:9 to 50:41 (i.e., the presence of ‫ גדול‬in the duplicate may have been inspired by ‫ גדלים‬in 50:9). 212 Bellis, The Structure and Composition of Jeremiah 50:2–51:58, 100. 213 At a later point, after the moment of duplication, the gloss “and many kings” was also added to 6:22 in order to harmonize this verse with 50:41. This evidence of post-duplication

160 d

e

f g

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Synonymous translations; in seven places one encounters different but synonymous Greek translations of the same Hebrew text. These differences do not change the meaning of the text. For my purposes, these differences undermine the possibility that the Greek texts of the doublet have been intentionally harmonized toward each other. They do not eliminate the possibility of unintended harmonization due to the interference of a mental text. Non-significant variants (singular/plural); in four places one finds singular and plural forms freely interchanged across the doublet’s versions. Such diversity is only compounded when one considers the variant readings of other Hebrew manuscripts.214 This confusion in forms reflects the fact that the antecedent of these words—i.e., the people from the north—may be described either collectively—as a singular group—or individually as many persons.215 These differences are not counted as significant. Copying error; ‫ירכבו‬, “they ride” (6:23 M; 50:42 M G) / καὶ ἅρμασιν, “and chariots” (6:23 G); the reading in Greek probably arose by error: the verb ‫ ירכבו‬was misread as the noun ‫“ ֶר ֶכב‬chariot.” Copying error; ‫ ִאיׁש‬, “man” (M of 6:23 and 50:42) / πῦρ = ‫ ֵאׁש‬, “fire” (G of 6:23 and 50:42). Twice the Greek text represents a misreading of the Hebrew. The possibility that both misreadings happened independently seems low. One could argue that the mistake happened once and from there influenced the reading of the other. Yet, on the basis of d above, it appears deliberate harmonization of the Greek texts was not a factor. The influence must have been unconscious. One finds the reading ‫ ְּכ ֵאׁש‬in Jer 4:4; this verse may have encouraged the misreading in 6:23. Otherwise the misreading simply attests to the loss of a yod. Emerton’s suggestion that the kaph in ‫ כאיׁש‬should be deleted is unnecessary and is contradicted by the presence of the kaph in V G (ὡς = ‫)כ‬.216

harmonization opens up the possibility that the doublet twins have been harmonized after the moment of duplication in other ways; e.g., see b…b above. The Hexaplaric recensions witness to the addition of the phrase μεγα και βασιλεις πολλοι in 6:22; ms 86 marks the phrase with ※ attesting to a later Hebrew manuscript that also contains this phrase in 6:22; cf. Ziegler, Jeremias, 181. 214 Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 219. 215 Cf. ibid. 216 John A. Emerton, “A Problem in the Hebrew Text of Jeremiah 6:23 and 50:42,” JTS 23 (1972): 106–13; See critique in Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 225; Allen, Jeremiah, 90.

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h

i

9

161

Major innovation; ‫ציון‬, “Zion” (6:23 M G) / ‫בבל‬, “Babylon” (50:42 M G); with one word, the entire meaning of the doublet is altered. The replacement word “Babylon” harmonizes the doublet’s text with its new context, a long oracle directed against Babylon. Major innovations; along with the replacement of h and the addition of c…c above, one verb form and three pronouns have been replaced to reflect new antecedents: ‫“ ׁשמע מלך־בבל‬The king of Babylon heard” replaces ‫“ ׁשמענו‬We have heard”; ‫“ ידינו‬our hands” is replaced by ‫“ ידיו‬his hands”; and ‫[“ החזיקתנו‬anguish] seizes us” by ‫[“ החזיקתהו‬anguish] seizes him”—the last two referring again to the king of Babylon. Conclusions about Jeremiah’s Doublets

On the basis of the above analyses of doublets from Jeremiah, I offer a few concluding observations that I will expand upon in the following chapter. First, duplication afforded ancient Jewish scribes a powerful and flexible tool for expanding the text of Jeremiah and prolonging the divinatory significance of the book’s oracles. Through duplication, scribes addressed interpretive problems of the text of Jeremiah, filled gaps perceived to be missing, and heightened the structural coherence of the book. Duplication is thus an overlooked and underappreciated characteristic of the book of Jeremiah. Giving more attention to Jeremiah’s doublets would be fruitful. Second, my analyses of Jeremiah’s doublets reveal that scribes enjoyed a wide range of creative license when creating duplicates. The doublets of Jeremiah were created through a variety of duplication techniques ranging from verbatim repetition (5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8) to loose citation with major adaptation (6:22–24 // 50:41–43) to paraphrase with minor adaptation (1:18–19 // 15:20). Duplication also provided occasion for creative adaptation. In this chapter, one encounters three occasions when the scribe radically adapted a doublet’s text so that it would address an entirely new subject (23:5–6 // 33:14–16; 48:40b, 41b // 49:22; 6:22–24 // 50:41–43). This evidence confirms that ancient Jewish scribes were not mere copyists but creative contributors to the formation of scriptural books. Third, in many of these instances, the art of duplication resembles the divinatory techniques of scribal scholars in the ancient Near East. In particular, duplication frequently marks occasions of literary generation, when through re-contextualization new divinatory meaning is generated out of existing omens. As was the case for various genres of literary divination in the ancient Near Eastern, the prophetic book, as a genre, allows scribes to present multiple

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oracles and other literary forms (e.g., poetry, confessions, etc.) as a single text with a united message that is greater than its parts. Though I have considered only a sampling of the doublets found in the book, I have gathered overwhelming evidence that duplicating scribes intentionally arranged their texts to generate new meaning through vertical reading. The duplicate of 17:1–4 (// 15:12–14), to give one example, interprets its context (chap. 16), specifying the “Canaanite” nature of Judah’s idolatry, the indelibility of its sin, and the eternality of Yhwh’s wrath, and clarifies the logic of exile as a just punishment—and all this through vertical reading. Additionally, duplication frequently marks occasions of secondary application, when the scribe extrapolated from existing omens a new interpretation tacitly implied by the first (cf. the reapplication of Jer 49:22 in 48:40b and 41b). Fourth, duplication also played a structural role, reinforcing the architectural coherence of the book of Jeremiah. In a few places, the doublet heightens the similitude of already similar contexts (6:13–15 // 8:10b–12; 5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8). The creation of two doublets (23:5–6 // 33:14–16; 30:10–11 // 46:27–28) seems to reflect a scribal effort to collate all hopeful oracles from the Jeremiah tradition into the Book of Consolation. Furthermore, the duplicate of 1:18–19 (// 15:20) helps complete the introductory purpose of chap. 1. On the basis of older models of scribes and divination some of the work accomplished by scribes through duplication could be distinguished from divination. The examples of vertical reading, listed above, could be described as mere exegesis. In the same vein, the structural role performed by duplication could be set aside as mere editing or literary development. Here I want to push back. Considering our fresh perspective on scribes and divination (discussed in chap. 2), it would be misguided to count such examples as mere exegesis or mere editing. That move relies on earlier, modernist dichotomies that cannot account for more recent evidence about ancient scribes. It is no longer helpful to distinguish, for example, prophecy from divination, or “inspired” author from scribe, or again secular “scribal tasks” from sacred writing. Given the divinatory status of Jeremiah, scribal exegesis and even “literary tasks” like augmenting the structural coherence of the book are potentially relevant for understanding the practice of divination. I explore this argument in more depth in the following chapter. Lastly, my work on Jeremiah’s doublets confirms the hypothesis that Jeremiah was formed through a long literary process involving both large-scale and small-scale revisions and that the two forms of Jeremiah witnessed by G and M are not monolithic editions of the book but snapshots of an ongoing, incremental development. It is not immediately obvious that all of the doublets unique to V M should be attributed to the same scribal hand, nor those

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of Jer+n to a single reviser. Instead, the diversity of duplication technique (noted above) and Tendenzen invites a different conclusion, namely that multiple scribal hands were involved in the creation of both Jer+n and V M. A clear example is the tension between the pessimistic tone of 17:1–4 and the optimism of 30:10–11. Also recall the observation that in two cases a duplicate that is part of a larger plus of V M can be distinguished from the remainder of this plus on the basis of differences in function and Tendenz (not to mention differences in duplication technique). The duplicate of 33:14–16 (// 23:5–6) and that of 48:40b, 41b (// 49:22) both serve an interpretive function that sits in tension with other verses added to their respective contexts in V M (33:17–26 and 48:45–47, respectively). This observation strongly suggests that in both cases the hand responsible for the duplicate was not responsible for the other secondary additions of the duplicate’s context. In sum, Jeremiah is the end result of the divinatory efforts of several generations of scribes.

chapter 6

The Divinatory Role and Status of Ancient Jewish Scribes The scribes who formed the book of Jeremiah in the exilic and post-exilic period used the technique of duplication to create fresh revelation out of existing prophetic texts. While these scribes were anonymous, and while we know very little about them, their employment of duplication tells us something about their training and their role in ancient Jewish society. The dearth of epigraphical evidence for scribal training and scholarship, however, permits me to reach only tentative conclusions. In this chapter I will explore two likely possibilities suggested by my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets: first, the scribes of Jeremiah are the ancient Jewish equivalent to the divining scholarly scribes of the Near East; and second, their practice of duplication is a technique of textual divination. These tentative conclusions cohere with and support recent scholarship on ancient Jewish scribes that finds several points of similarity between these scribes and scribes in the ancient Near East. Specifically, it is proposed that at least some ancient Jewish scribes, like their Near Eastern counterparts, (1) trained as scholars undergoing a rigorous education whose goal was the memorization and internalization of an extensive corpus of traditional texts; (2) approached the task of writing with an oral mentality; and consequently, (3) created texts that are highly self-referential and abound in synonymous variation. My analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets reinforces this emerging scholarly perspective. The doublets of Jeremiah abound in synonymous variation, intraJeremianic links that contribute to Jeremiah’s highly self-referential character, and—to a more limited degree—intra-scriptural links that interweave Jeremiah with an emerging canon of Jewish scripture. These observations suggest that Jeremiah’s scribes approached the writing of Jeremiah with an oral mentality and made use of a memorized corpus of traditional Hebrew texts ingested during their schooling. Moreover, their liberty to expand and adapt the text of Jeremiah through duplication suggests these Jewish scribes were trained to be scholars and not simply copyists. Taken together, the scribal training of these scribes must have been at least somewhat similar to that of ancient Near Eastern scribes. Granted this inference, one might expect to find in ancient Judea a Jewish equivalent to the divining scribal scholar of the Near East. It is my conclusion that the duplicating scribes of Jeremiah should be so identified. Duplication

© Justus Theodore Ghormley, 2022 | doi:10.1163/97890

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frequently marks occasions of textual divination, when scribes created new revelation through secondary application, vertical reading, and harmonization. For this reason, an examination of Jeremiah’s doublets illuminates the mechanics of “inspiration” through which ancient Jewish scribes generated their scripture. This chapter begins with a synthesis of several significant features of ancient Jewish scribal practice uncovered in my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets: namely, duplication technique, synonymity, innovation, intra-Jeremianic and intrascriptural traditioning, and post-duplication textual developments such as post-duplication harmonization. The second half of the chapter takes up the argument that duplicating scribes are best understood as diviners who employed duplication as a method of textual divination. 1

Duplication Technique

Doublets provide scholars with an opportunity to study the various ways Jewish scribes “copied” their master texts. My analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets supports the scholarly conclusion that for ancient Jewish scribes the task of copying a text was frequently an opportunity for creative rewriting. As depicted in Table 2, the eight doublets analyzed in chap. 5 reflect a diversity of duplication techniques. In the table, the later doublets (those found in V M alone) are italicized. The scribes who composed Jer+n as well as those who composed V M enjoyed a wide range of creative license when composing doublets, occasionally creating exact copies, sometimes paraphrasing, and sometimes introducing major innovations into the doublet’s text. Two further observations can be made. First, verbatim repetition is the exception; in every case but one, scribes did table 2

Duplication technique in Jeremiaha

Repetition

Minor adaptation

Verbatim repetition Loose citation

5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8 6:13–15 // 8:10b–12

15:12–14 // 17:1–4*

Paraphrase

30:10–11 // 46:27–28

1:18–19 // 15:20

Major adaptation 23:5–6 // 33:14–16 6:22–24 // 50:41–43 48:40b, 41b // 49:22

a The doublet of 15:12–14 // 17:1–4 is marked with an asterisk since copying error may account for the absence of 17:1–4 in G, though I find this possibility highly unlikely; see chap. 5, §2.1.

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not simply copy their source text but either rephrased the doublet in synonymous language or adapted it to address a new concern. Second, the wide range of creative license taken by scribes when creating duplicates remains constant throughout the formation of Jer+n and V M. These two observations are reinforced when one considers the duplication technique of the twentyeight remaining internal doublets of Jeremiah. In Table 3, I offer a preliminary assessment of these doublets alongside those analyzed in chap. 5 (which are bolded). Once more, later doublets are italicized. table 3

Duplication technique in Jeremiaha

Repetition

Minor adaptation

Verbatim repetition

2:26b, 27b // 4:4b // 21:12b 32:32b–33a 5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8 8:15 // 14:19b 10:12–16 // 51:15–19

Loose citation

6:13–15 // 8:10b–12 11:20 // 20:12 32:44 // 33:13 (// 17:26 = paraphrase) 50:23b // 51:41b

Paraphrase

7:6 // 22:3 7:16 // 11:14 7:34 // 16:9 // 25:10 (// 33:10a, 11a = major adaptation) 16:14–15 // 23:7–8 26:3 // 36:3 30:10–11 // 46:27–28

Major adaptation

8:2b // 16:4a (// 25:33 = loose cit. + maj. adapt.) 9:14 // 23:15a 23:5–6 // 33:14–16 17:25 // 22:4 21:14b // 50:32b 15:12–14 // 17:1–4* 6:22–24 // 50:41–43 11:23b // 23:12b // 21:9 // 38:2 48:44b 34:22a // 37:8 18:16 // 19:8 // 49:17 // 50:13 48:40b, 41b // 49:22 49:18 // 50:40 49:19–21 // 50:44–46 49:26 // 50:30 23:19–20 // 30:23–24 1:18–19 // 15:20 39:4–10 // 52:7–16 7:30–32 // 19:5– 6,11 // 32:34–35 24:8–10 // 29:16–20* 32:4 // 34:3

a While the two doublets marked with an asterisk (15:12–14 // 17:1–4; 24:8–10 // 29:16–20) are found in M only, and thus are presumably later doublets, their absence in G could be due to haplography.

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As this table indicates, the diversity of duplication technique observed in the eight doublets examined in chap. 5 typifies the diversity and distribution of duplication technique found in Jeremiah generally. In the vast majority of cases (32/36; 89%) when creating a doublet, scribes did not produce verbatim repetitions; they either paraphrased their source or, more frequently, adapted it in light of a new concern. Moreover, the creative license taken by duplicating scribes neither waxes nor wanes during the final stages of Jeremiah’s composition; Jer+n and V M show the same degree of creativity. One does not see, for example, a trend towards verbatim copying or away from major adaptation. Traditional Jeremianic material remained a fertile source of new revelation throughout the formation of the book. This observation confirms the assessment of chap. 4, that Jer+n and V M are simply snapshots of an ongoing process of textual development. The examples of verbatim repetition—including verbatim repetition with minor or major adaptation—demonstrate the careful precision with which scribes could reproduce a text. When called for, exact copies of texts could be produced. Although duplication (i.e., copying one or two verses) is categorically different from copying an entire text, instances of verbatim repetition speak to the scribes’ ability to transmit a text over many manuscript generations without introducing changes. In many cases, one encounters a four-fold agreement of a doublet’s wording in M and G for both doublet twins. This observation highlights the potential fixity of Jeremiah’s text—when not subject to revision or to copying error—and agrees with the more global observation that the base text of Jeremiah—while significantly expanded, adapted, and reordered—remains unchanged from Jer+n to V M. The general fixity of Jeremiah’s text gives us confidence that occasions of synonymity and innovation observed in the text of a given doublet largely stem from the moment of duplication and not from the subsequent period of the text’s transmission (though see below for post-duplication developments). Returning to Table 3, note as well the pervasiveness of paraphrase. In some moments, scribes were at liberty to copy a text without concern for the text’s exact wording. The presence of sizable amounts of synonymous variation in these paraphrastic doublets could indicate that scribes often gave precedence to a memorized mental text rather than to a written exemplar when producing such doublets. This suggestion in turn raises the possibility that some instances of synonymous variation were not intentional but a consequence of the more fluid nature of mental texts. The likelihood of this possibility is readily illustrated. Take the doublet of Jer 30:10–11 // 46:27–28. As discussed in chap. 5, the text of the doublet was attracted to its secondary context of chap. 30 by the presence of common

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lexemes and imagery; and the duplicate was expanded and harmonized with chap. 30 by the inclusion of the verb ‫“ להוׁשיעך‬to save you” which matched the use of the root ‫ יׁשע‬in 30:7. This moment of harmonization suggests that the duplicator was able and willing to rewrite the doublet’s text in light of its new context. This conscious textual change contrasts with another change that appears to have been unconscious. In 30:11, the scribe—seemingly inadvertently—replaced the verbal phrase ‫“ הדחתיך‬I have driven you” from 46:28 with the synonymous variant ‫“ הפצותיך‬I have scattered you.” In doing so, the scribe overlooked a potential lexical connection with 30:17, where Judah’s enemies are said to consider Judah to be ‫“ נִ ָּד ָחה‬the one driven away.” Since the scribe was concerned with uniting the duplicate with its context and intended the duplicate to interpret its surroundings via vertical reading, it seems unlikely that the scribe would have replaced ‫ הדחתיך‬with a synonymous variant on purpose. Instead, this substitution probably occurred unconsciously and as a consequence of the scribe’s reliance on a mental text in which the exact wording of the verbal phrase was not fixed.1 2

Synonymity

As Jeremiah’s doublets illustrate, synonymity is a common feature of ancient Jewish scribal practice. The presence of synonymity in Jeremiah’s doublets supports the emerging scholarly consensus that when writing texts—whether copying or composing—scribes relied to various degrees upon a mental text and utilized a memorized repertoire of verbal flourishes and formulaic phrasing.2 This feature, taken together with intra-Jeremianic and intrascriptural traditioning (discussed below), suggests that the ancient Jewish scribes who created Jeremiah’s doublets underwent a scribal training at least partially similar to scribal education in the ancient Near East. The analyses of the eight doublets in chap. 5 uncovered about fifteen instances of major synonymous variation, these being concentrated in the six non-verbatim doublets.3 Such synonymity may involve the addition, omission, 1 Perhaps this unconscious synonymous variant is an example of what David M. Carr, The Formation of the Hebrew Bible: A New Reconstruction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 17, refers to as a “memory variant” and thus offers the kind of confirming evidence sought by Laura Quick, “Recent Research on Ancient Israelite Education: A Bibliographic Essay,” CurBR 13 (2014): 29. 2 See chap. 2, §1. 3 One also finds minor synonymous variation in three doublets (1:18–19 // 15:20; 6:13–15 // 8:10b–12; 15:12–14 // 17:1–4) and possible a fourth (48:40b, 41b // 49:22), which collectively

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replacement, or transposition of the original text.4 In about half of the cases (around eight out of fifteen), synonymity led to the expansion of the text, consisting of additions of one to three words.5 Four occasions of synonymous variation occurred after the moment of duplication, which indicates that synonymity occasionally affected the text of Jeremiah in the process of transmission.6 Synonymous variation can be quite dense. The doublets of 30:10–11 // 46:27– 28 and 1:18–19 // 15:20—the two paraphrases examined in detail in chap. 5— each contain four instances of synonymous variation. An even greater density of synonymous variation is witnessed in other doublets of Jeremiah not analyzed in chap. 5. Consider the doublet of 32:4 // 34:3 presented in the following:7

Jer 32:4

[‫וצדקיהו ]מלך יהודה‬ ‫לא ימלט מיד הכׂשדים‬ ‫כי‬ ‫הנתן ינתן ביד‬ ‫מלך־בבל ודבר־פיו עם־פיו‬ ‫עיניו תראינה‬8 ‫ועיניו את־‬

‫ואתה‬

‫לא תמלט מידו‬ ‫כי תפׂש תתפׂש‬ ‫ובידו תנתן‬ ‫ועיניך את־עיני ]מלך־בבל[ תראינה‬ [‫]ופיהו את־פיך ידבר‬

Jer 34:3

4

5 6 7

8

contain between ten and fourteen instances total. Four doublets (5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8; 6:22–24 // 50:41–43; 23:5–6 // 33:14–16; 30:10–11 // 46:27–28) do not display any minor synonymous variation; the only instance of minor synonymous variation detected in 5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8—‫אפקד‬ (5:9 M G; 5:29 M G; 9:8 G) / ‫( אפקד־בם‬9:8 M)—is a post-duplication phenomenon. Synonymous additions to duplicates are found in 1:18 (+ ‫ ;)היום‬8:11 (+ ‫ ;)בת‬30:10 (+ ‫)נאם־יהוה‬, 11 (+ ‫ ;)נאם־יהוה להוׁשיעך‬50:41 (+ ‫ ;)גדול‬synonymous omissions are limited to 30:10 (− ‫אתה‬ ‫ )אל־תירא עבדי יעקב נאם־יהוה‬and possibly 17:4 (− ‫ = *סביב‬κύκλ); synonymous replacements occur in 1:18 (‫ לעם הארץ‬/ ‫ לעם הזה‬15:20) and 30:11 (‫ הפצותיך‬/ ‫ הדחתיך‬46:28); and, a synonymous transposition is found in 1:18 (‫ לעם‬and a list of Jeremiah’s opponents). In one final case, in 1:19, it is unclear whether the duplicate’s minus is an omission in the duplicate or a postduplication addition in the original (+/− ‫)להוׁשיעך‬. See discussion of the expansionist tendency of duplication in the following section on innovation (§3). The four examples of post-duplication synonymity are found in 1:18 (+ ‫ על־…־הארץ‬and ‫חמות‬ ‫ נחׁשת‬/ ‫)חומת נחׁשת בצורה‬, 6:22 (+ ‫)ארץ‬, and 49:22 (+ ‫)יעלה‬. The synonymous plus of 15:14 G (+ κύκλῳ) may also be post-duplication. Post-duplication additions—i.e., readings not found in G and not likely lost by copying error—are placed in brackets. For a discussion of this doublet see: Geoffrey H. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah: Doublets and Recurring Phrases (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000), 205–8. Thus the qere’.

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In addition to being a minor adaptation (32:4 is written in 3rd per. s. while 34:3 is written in 2nd per. s.), this doublet displays four occasions of synonymous variation (in sans serif typeface), and some minor synonymous variation (light typeface): the interchange of ‫ הנתן ינתן‬and ‫ תנתן‬as well as the transposition of this element with ‫ביד‬/‫ובידו‬. The occasions of synonymous variation involve the addition, subtraction, or transposition of eleven words. When one considers that the doublet twins share only ten words in common, the doublet’s high density of synonymity can be more fully appreciated. In spite of such synonymity, the gist of the doublet remains the same; in both twins, Zedekiah’s capture by Nebuchadnezzar is guaranteed by Yhwh. Moreover, the similitude of the twins is still strong enough to establish a genetic dependence of one twin on the other: in both, Zedekiah’s hope of escape (‫ )מלט‬is ruled out; he will be “handed over” (‫ ;)נתן‬and he will meet his pursuer face to face or, more literally, “eye to eye” (‫)עיניו את־עיניו‬. This example confirms the recent scholarly perspective that scribes could approach the task of creating a copy of a text with a considerable degree of creativity.9 To return to an image pictured by D. Carr, as a jazz musician may improvise the melody of a song—adding chromatic passing notes, embellishing its phrasing, and varying its rhythm—without compromising the tune’s integrity and recognizably, so scholarly Jewish scribes could re-perform a divinatory text with new verbal embellishments and turns of phrase without altering the essence of the text’s meaning.10 At the same time, synonymity is inherently conservative; synonymity by itself does not alter the sense of a text but sticks close to its established meaning. Synonymity perhaps reflects the scribes’ reluctance to change the meaning of a received text. In the case of Jeremiah, this reluctance may be rooted in a sense of Jeremiah’s sacredness as confirmed divine revelation. 3

Innovation

Alongside synonymity, Jeremiah’s doublets indicate that innovation is a regular feature of ancient Jewish scribal practice. Innovation illustrates the duplicating scribe’s liberty to reimagine the meaning of an existing unit of textual revelation and to apply it to a new context. As recorded in Table 3 above, 9 10

See chap. 2, §1. David M. Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart: Origins of Scripture and Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 41.

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eight of Jeremiah’s doublets are minor adaptations (22%); another fourteen are major adaptations (39%). Each adaptation, minor or major, contains at least one innovation. Within the five doublets classified as adaptations in chap. 5, one encounters twelve minor innovations and ten major innovations.11 All ten major innovations are replacements. In each case, a reference to an original addressee is supplanted by a reference to a new addressee. Of the minor innovations, two (both in 1:18) are post-duplication additions.12 The rest, arising from occasions of duplication, include three replacements (17:3, 4; 33:16), one omission of three words (33:15), and six additions of varying length. Three of these additions are relatively short, consisting of two (1:18; 50:41) or three words (1:18). One is six words long (17:4), and two are substantial: the innovative addition of 17:1–3a is twenty-five words long, and that of 33:14–15a is sixteen words in length. This is to say, innovation, like synonymity, frequently contributes to the expansion of the doublet’s text. For doublets displaying synonymity and especially innovation the duplicate twin is usually more expansive than the original twin. Table 5 charts the net growth of the text of each doublet. In five out of eight cases, the duplicate is longer than its original. This observation lends credence to the general rule that texts tend to grow over time.13 A more exhaustive survey of Jeremiah’s doublets would need to be undertaken, however, before one could draw more definite conclusions about the correlation of synonymity and innovation with the textual growth of doublets.

Minor innovations are found in 1:18 (+ ‫ ;עיר מבצר‬+ ‫ ;)למלכי יהודה לׂשריה‬17:1–3a (+ ‫חטאת‬ ‫יהודה כתובה בעט ברזל בצפרן ׁשמיר חרוׁשה על־לוח לבם ולקרנות מזבחותיכם כזכר‬ ‫ ;)בניהם מזבחותם ואׁשריהם על־עץ רענן על גבעות הגבהות הררי בׂשדה‬17:3b (‫ במתיך‬/ ‫לא‬ ‫ במחיר‬15:13); 17:4 (+ ‫ עד־עולם ;וׁשמטתה ובך מנחלתך אׁשר נתתי לך‬/ ‫ עליכם‬15:14); 33:14–15a (+ ‫את־הדבר הטוב אׁשר דברתי אל־בית יׂשראל ועל־בית יהודה בימים ההם ובעת ההיא‬ ‫ ;)אצמיח‬33:15b (− ‫ ;)ומלך מלך והׂשכיל‬33:16 (‫ בימים ההם‬/‫ בימיו‬23:6); 50:41 (+ ‫)ומלכים רבים‬. Two post-duplication minor innovations are found in 1:18 (+ ‫ ;לכהניה‬+ ‫)ולעמוד ברזל‬. Major innovations (all replacements) are seen in 33:15 (‫ צמח צדקה‬/ ‫ צמח צדיק‬23:5); 33:16 (‫ ירוׁשלם תׁשכון‬/ ‫ יׂשראל יׁשכן‬23:6; ‫ וזה אׁשר־יקרא־לה‬/ ‫ וזה־ׁשמו אׁשר־יקראו‬23:6; ‫יהוה‬ ‫ צדקנו‬/ Ιωσεδεκ = ‫ *יוצדק‬23:6); 48:40b (‫ מואב‬/ ‫ בצרה‬49:22); 48:41b (‫ מואב‬/ ‫ אדום‬49:22); 50:42 (‫ בבל‬/ ‫ ציון‬6:23), 50:43 (‫ ׁשמע מלך־בבל‬/ ‫ ׁשמענו‬6:24; ‫ ידיו‬/ ‫ ידינו‬6:24; ‫ החזיקתהו‬/ ‫ החזיקתנו‬6:24). 12 See previous note. 13 See n. 28 in chap. 4. 11

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table 5

The expansion of duplicates in Jeremiah

Doublet

Duplication technique

Growth of duplicate compared to the original

1:18–19 // 15:20 5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8 6:13–15 // 8:10b–12 6:22–24 // 50:41–43 15:12–14 // 17:1–4 23:5–6 // 33:14–16 30:10–11 // 46:27–28 48:40b, 41b // 49:22

Paraphrase with minor adaptation Repetition Loose citation Loose citation with major adaptation Loose citation with minor adaptation Repetition with major adaptation Paraphrase Loose citation with major adaptation

+ 7 words Ø + 1 word + 5 words + 26 words + 15 words − 2 words Ø

4

Intra-Jeremianic and Intra-Scriptural Traditioning

Another important feature of scribal practice highlighted by my analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets is the creation of intra-Jeremianic and intra-scriptural links in the course of duplication, a process I refer to as traditioning. The traditioning of Jeremiah’s doublets typifies the general allusive and repetitive quality of Jeremiah as a whole. Indeed, doublets qua doublets are moments of intra-Jeremianic or intra-scriptural traditioning. As mentioned in chap. 4, the pluses of V M contain roughly two hundred and twenty-five instances of intra-textual traditioning.14 Jeremiah’s allusive and repetitious character likely reflects two developments: (1) a conception of Jeremiah as a coherent, selfreferential book; and (2) a conception of Jewish scripture as a unified corpus. Traditioning is a tool of coherence. For its part, intra-Jeremianic traditioning helps bring coherence to the collection of disparate texts found in Jeremiah. And intra-scriptural traditioning interweaves the book of Jeremiah with the larger emerging corpus of Jewish scripture. Most significantly, the abundance of intra-Jeremianic and intra-scriptural traditioning in Jeremiah—along with synonymity—is an indicator of how ancient Jewish scribes were educated. Such textual features confirm the recent impression of biblical scholarship that these scribes operated with an oral mentality, 14

Cf. chap. 4, §3.

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relied upon a memorized mental text, and utilized an extensive memorized corpus of traditional texts when writing divinatory texts like Jeremiah. Five of the eight duplicates surveyed in chap. 5 display at least one instance of intra-Jeremianic traditioning. Altogether, one finds twelve occasions of such traditioning.15 In four cases, the allusive element was borrowed from the duplicate’s immediate context, sometimes from only a few verses away;16 twice the allusive element reflects a verse a little farther afield, though still no more than a chapter away;17 and, in one case, a phrase is drawn from a context seventeen chapters away.18 Other allusive elements are not quarried from a specific text but, like some instances of synonymity, are simply echoes of language found throughout Jeremiah.19 These last examples bear witness to the existence of a memorized repertoire of stock Jeremianic language. Scribes could draw from this repertoire in the process of creating a duplicate. As noted above in the discussion on synonymity, these occasional borrowings from Jeremianic stock can be unconscious (see the discussion of ‫ הפצותיך‬in 30:11 above). Other borrowings from Jeremiah stock are clearly intentional (e.g., the insertion of ‫ להוׁשיעך‬in 30:11 and the insertion of ‫ אל־בית יׂשראל ועל־בית יהודה‬in 33:14). As chap. 5 demonstrates, paying attention to these instances of intentional intra-Jeremianic traditioning often gives insight into the given scribe’s motivations for duplicating. Intra-Jeremiah traditioning includes: ‫( היום‬Jer 1:18, cf. 1:10); ‫( לעיר‬Jer 1:18, cf. 1:15); ‫למלכי‬ ‫( יהודה לׂשריה‬Jer 1:18; traditional phrase, cf. 2:26); ‫( בת‬8:11, cf. 8:19); ‫( נחלה‬17:4, cf. 16:18); ‫( הדבר הטוב‬33:14, cf. 29:10, 32:42); ‫( אל־בית יׂשראל ועל־בית יהודה‬Jer 33:14; traditional phrase, cf. 31:31); ‫( בימים ההם ובעת ההיא‬Jer 33:15, cf. 50:4, 20); ‫וירוׁשלם תׁשכון לבטח‬ (Jer 33:16, cf. 32:37); ‫( כי־אתך אני נאם־יהוה להוׁשיעך‬Jer 30:11; traditional phrase, cf. 15:20); ‫( הפצותיך‬Jer 30:11; traditional diction, cf. 9:15); and possibly + κύκλῳ (= ‫( )*סביב‬15:14; traditional phrase, cf. 1:15). In addition to these twelve, one encounters three moments of post-duplication traditioning: ‫( לכהניה‬1:18; cf. 2:26); ‫( ארץ‬6:22; traditional diction, cf. 10:22); ‫( יעלה‬49:22 cf. 49:19). These illustrate the limited continuation of intra-Jeremianic traditioning throughout the transmission of the book of Jeremiah. 16 The mentioning of a fortified city in 1:18 echoes the reference to Jerusalem and its surrounding cities in 1:15, three verses earlier; the word “today” (‫ )היום‬in 1:18 comes from 1:10, eight verses earlier; the reference to “daughter of my people” in 8:11 anticipates the use of this title ten verses later in 8:21; and the concept of inheritance (‫ )נחלה‬in 17:4 echoes the reference to inheriting (‫ )נחל‬mentioned six verses earlier (16:19). 17 The reference to the “good word” (‫ )הדבר הטוב‬in 33:14 echoes the “good” (‫ )הטובה‬promised sixteen verses earlier in 32:42—though this could also be a reference to the “good word” of 29:10; similarly, the promise of Jerusalem dwelling in safety (‫ )בטח‬in 33:16 is anticipated by the same promise in 32:37, twenty-three verses earlier. 18 Jer 33:15 echoes a phrase used only twice in the Hebrew Bible, i.e., in Jer 50:4, 20. 19 ‫ למלכי יהודה לׂשריה‬in 1:18; ‫ *סביב‬15:14 G; ‫ להוׁשיעך‬and ‫ הפצותיך‬in 30:11; ‫אל־בית יׂשראל‬ ‫ ועל־בית יהודה‬in 33:14. 15

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Of the eight doublets analyzed in chap. 5, only one duplicate (17:1–4) exhibits intra-scriptural traditioning: three allusions to DtrH and/or D, which attest to the scribe’s awareness of the Deuteronomistic tradition.20 Determining whether intra-scriptural traditioning is a more wide-spread feature of Jeremiah’s duplicates would require further investigation. What is clear is that the doublets of Jeremiah contribute massively to the intra-scriptural character of the book: twenty-five of Jeremiah’s doublets are intra-scriptural in their entirety— that is, each doublet twin in Jeremiah finds its parallel in another scriptural book.21 These intra-scriptural links demonstrate the scribes’ awareness of not just the Deuteronomistic tradition but also the wider prophetic corpus, the Torah, and the book of Psalms. I will argue below that this broad awareness of ancient Jewish tradition is suggestive of how scribes were educated in ancient Judea. 5

Post-Duplication Textual Development

My analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets sheds light on the textual transmission of doublets following the moment of duplication. In several places, one encounters post-duplication harmonization, when—after the moment of duplication— later scribes rewrote one doublet twin in light of the other. The following list catalogues five instances of significant22 post-duplication harmonization (PDHarm) detected in the analyses of chap. 5: – 6:13 M: the ordering of ‫ כהן‬and ‫ = נביא‬8:10b M ≠ 6:13 G – 6:15 M: + ‫ = עׂשו‬8:12 M ≠ 6:15 G; 8:12 4Q70 (4QJera) – 6:22 M: + ‫ = גדול‬50:41 M G ≠ 6:22 G – 15:14 M: − ‫ = *סביב‬17:4 M ≠ 15:14 G (κύκλῳ) – 23:6 M: ‫ = יהוה צדקנו‬33:16 M ≠ 23:6 G (Ιωσεδεκ) 20 21

22

The additions ‫( )מזבחותם ואׁשריהם( על־עץ רענן על גבעות הגבהות‬17:2) and ‫( במתיך‬17:3) reflect the Deuteronomistic tradition: cf. Deut 7:5; 12:2–3; 1 Kgs 14:15, 23; 2 Kgs 17:10; 23:14; ‫( עד־עולם‬17:4) probably reflects Deut 32:22. See Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 213–42. Intra-scriptural doublets counted by Parke-Tyalor are: Jer 7:33 // Deut 28:26; Jer 10:25 // Ps 79:6–7; Jer 14:10b // Hos 8:13b; Jer 15:15d // Ps 69:8a; Jer 18:23b // Neh 3:37 (4:5 Eng.); Jer 19:3b // 2 Kgs 17:15b; Jer 19:9 // Deut 28:53; Jer 20:10a // Ps 31:14a; Jer 22:8–9 // Deut 29:23–25; Jer 26:18b // Mic 3:12; Jer 29:13 // Deut 4:29; Jer 29:14a s15:5bc; Jer 48:29–33 // Isa 16:6–10; Jer 48:34–39 // Isa 15:2–7; Jer 48:43–44 // Isa 24:17–18ab; Jer 48:45–46 // Num 21:27–29; 24:17c; Jer 49:9 // Obad 5; Jer 49:14–16 // Obad 1–4; Jer 50:16b // Isa 13:14b; Jer 50:39–40 // Isa 13:19–22; Jer 51:58d // Hab 2:13b. Instances of non-significant variation which could reflect PDHarm are not considered here. See chap. 5 for definitions of significant and non-significant variation.

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A preliminary survey of Jeremiah’s remaining doublets yields several more examples of PDHarm: – 7:16 M: the ordering of ‫ בעדם‬and ‫ = רנה‬11:14 M G ≠ 7:16 G – 7:16 M: ‫ = ותפלה‬11:14 M G ≠ 7:16 G (καὶ μὴ εὔχου) – 21:12b M: + ‫מעלליכם‬23 ‫ = מפני רע‬4:4b M G ≠ 21:12b G – 30:23 M: … ‫ =הנה סערת יהוה חמה יצאה סער‬23:19 M G ≠ 30[37]:23 G (ὅτι ὀργὴ κυρίου ἐξῆλθεν θυμώδης ἐξῆλθεν ὀργὴ…) – 34:3 M: + ‫ ≈ ופיהו את־פיך ידבר‬32[39]:4 M (‫ )ודבר־פיו עם־פיו‬G ≠ 34[41]:3 G – 49:17 M: ‫ =יׁשם ויׁשרק על־כל־מכותה‬19:8 M G; 50:13 M G ≠ 49[37]:17 G (συριεῖ) Taken together, these examples illustrate an important dynamic of text transmission. As time passes similar texts may be harmonized toward each so that their similitude is heightened. A duplicate that begins as a paraphrase may eventually, through PDHarm, become a loose citation or even a repetition of its original. Additionally, these examples—together with the moments of post-duplication synonymity and post-duplication innovation—illustrate that texts continued to develop even if minimally after moments of revision such as occasions of duplication. Post-duplication synonymity and harmonization, in particular, may be a further indication that scribes operated with an oral mentality and relied upon their memory when copying divinatory texts. They suggest that even the act of transcribing or recopying a written text was subject to the interference of a memorized mental text whose wording was not necessarily fixed. 6

Ancient Jewish Scribal Education

From my study of Jeremiah’s doublets, I have garnered a significant amount of data on the various ways ancient Jewish scribes created and copied texts. These scribes could produce exact copies of texts; often, however, they were at liberty to paraphrase and adapt their texts. Their liberty to paraphrase through synonymous variation and to adapt texts through innovation speaks to their authority and vocation as textual diviners—an aspect of their identity that I will discuss momentarily. This liberty also tells us something about their scribal training. The widespread presence of synonymous variation and intra-Jeremianic and intra-scriptural traditioning in the versions of Jeremiah

23

Following the qere’; the ketib reads ‫“ מעלליהם‬their deeds.”

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indicates that ancient Jewish scribes were educated in a similar manner as their Near Eastern counterparts.24 24

For recent scholarship on scribal education in pre-exilic Israel and Judah see: Quick, “Recent Research on Ancient Israelite Education: A Bibliographical Essay”; Raymond F. Person, “Education and the Transmission of Tradition,” in The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Ancient Israel, ed. Susan Niditch, WBCR (Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2016), 366–78; Christopher A. Rollston, “Scribal Curriculum during the First Temple Period: Epigraphic Hebrew and Biblical Evidence,” in Contextualizing Israel’s Sacred Writings: Ancient Literacy, Orality, and Literary Production, ed. Brian B. Schmidt, SBLAIL 22 (Atlanta, GA: SBL Press, 2015), 71–101; idem, “Inscriptional Evidence for the Writings of the Earliest Texts of the Bible: Intellectual Infrastructure in Tenth- and Ninth-Century Israel, Judah, and the Southern Levant,” in The Formation of the Pentateuch: Bridging the Academic Cultures of Europe, Israel, and North America, ed. J.C. Gertz et al., FAT 111 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016), 15–45; William M. Schniedewind, “Understanding Scribal Education in Ancient Israel: A View from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud,” Maarav 21 (2014): 271–93; idem, “Scribal Education in Ancient Israel and Judah into the Persian Period,” in Second Temple Jewish ‘Paideia’ in Context, ed. Jason M. Zurawski and Gabriele Boccaccini, BZNW 228 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2017), 11–28; Jacquline Vayntrub, “The Book of Proverbs and the Idea of Ancient Israelite Education.” ZAW 128 (2016): 96–114. Older, but important studies include: Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 111–73; James L. Crenshaw, Education in Ancient Israel: Across the Deadening Silence, ABRL (New York: Doubleday, 1998); Aaron Demsky, “The Education of Canaanite Scribes in the Mesopotamian Cuneiform Tradition,” in Bar-Ilan Studies in Assyriology: Dedicated to Pinḥas Artzi, ed. Jacob Klein and Aaron Jacob Skaist (Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1990), 157–70; Menahem Haran, “On the Diffusion of Literacy and Schools in Ancient Israel,” in Congress Volume: Jerusalem, 1986, ed. John A. Emerton, VTSup 40 (Leiden: Brill, 1988), 81–95; Andrè Lemaire, “Schools and Literacy in Ancient Israel and Early Judaism,” in The Blackwell Companion to the Hebrew Bible, ed. Leo G. Perdue (Oxford: Blackwell, 2001), 207–17; Christopher A. Rollston, “Scribal Education in Ancient Israel: The Old Hebrew Epigraphic Evidence,” BASOR 344 (2006): 47–74; Wolfgang Zwickel, “Kommunikation und Kommunikationsmöglichkeiten im Alten Israel aufgrund biblischer und ausserbiblischer Texte,” in Bote und Brief: Sprachliche Systeme der Informationsübermittlung im Spannungsfeld von Mündlichkeit und Schriftlichkeit, ed. Andreas Wagner, NWS 4 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2003), 113–23. For overview of scribal education in the Second Temple Period, see: Schniedewind, “Scribal Education in Ancient Israel and Judah into the Persian Period.” Note the word of caution in Samuel L. Adams, “The Social Location of the Scribe in the Second Temple Period,” in Sibyls, Scriptures, and Scrolls: John Collins at Seventy, ed. Joel Baden, Hindy Najman, and Eibert Tigchelaar, JSJSup 175 (Leiden: Brill, 2017), 22–37; Adams, ibid., is wary of earlier approaches that too readily equated all references to “scribes.” Perhaps a recent example of such equating is found in: Lester L. Grabbe, “Scribes, Writing, and Epigraphy in the Second Temple Period,” in “See, I Will Bring a Scroll Recounting What Befell Me” (Ps 40:8): Epigraphy and Daily Life from the Bible to the Talmud, Dedicated to the Memory of Professor Hanan Eshel, ed. Esti Eshel and Yigal Levin, JAJSup 12 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014), 105–21. For the purpose and character of Jewish education in Ben Sira, see: Frank Ueberschaer, “Jewish Education in Ben Sira,” in Second Temple Jewish ‘Paideia’ in Context, ed. Jason M. Zurawski and Gabriele Boccaccini, BZNW 228 (Berlin: Walter de

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As discussed in chap. 2, in the course of their training, ancient Near Eastern scribes put to memory great amounts of traditional material. This trove of memorized material—consisting of whole texts as well as traditional phrases and diction—was then utilized by scribes as raw material in their production and reproduction of texts. Moreover, the cultivation of and dependency upon memory prolonged the “oral” character of scribal practice. This is to say, even when consulting a written exemplum, scribes approached the literary task of writing with an oral mentality, relying upon mental copies of texts whose content and phrasing were not necessarily completely fixed. Moreover, the prominent role of memorization and memory in scribal training left its mark on texts in two major ways. First, it invited the creation of texts that are highly self-referential—both on the individual-text level and on the larger level of literary collection or canon, to use the latter term loosely. Second, the practice of writing from memory endows texts with a distinct “oral” character. Though existing in written form, texts copied from memory rely upon a mental text whose wording and phrasing are subject to the limitations and open to the possibilities of memory. Consequently, tradition-memorizing scribes often produce texts abounding in allusion and synonymous variation. All this to say, the extensive presence of synonymous variation as well as intra-Jeremianic and intra-scriptural links both in Jeremiah’s doublets and in the book as a whole suggest that memorization was an important component of scribal education in Second Temple Judea if not before. Certain advanced Gruyter, 2017), 29–46. For the “social preconditions” of the development of the Hebrew prophetic book, see Martti Nissinen, Ancient Prophecy: Near Eastern, Biblical, and Greek Perspectives (Oxford University: Oxford, 2017), 152–5. Similarly, Ehud Ben Zvi, “The Urban Center of Jerusalem and the Development of the Literature of the Hebrew Bible,” in Urbanism in Antiquity: From Mesopotamia to Crete, ed. Walter E. Aufrecht, Steven W. Gauley, and Neil A. Mirau, JSOTSup 244; (Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1997), 194–209, reflecting on the trend in biblical studies to locate much of the composition of the Hebrew Bible in the Persian period, considers what socio-political circumstances would be required to support the high literacy involved in such composition. For my purposes, I agree with the assessment of Ben Zvi, ibid., 200, that the project of composing the Hebrew Bible required a theology or ideology (of the importance of the Jerusalem temple and of the authority of the written word) justifying the deployment of the resources needed for educating and sustaining a scribal elite competent enough to produce the highly literary Hebrew Bible. I would argue that this same theology (or ideology) would also endow such scribes with tremendous religious authority, the authority to compose, interpret, and expand divinatory texts. Cf. John Kessler, “Reconstructing Haggai’s Jerusalem: Demographic and Sociological Considerations and the Search for an Adequate Methodological Point of Departure,” in “Every City shall be Forsaken”: Urbanism and Prophecy in Ancient Israel and the Near East, ed. Lester L. Grabbe and Robert D. Haak, JSOTSup 330 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 151–6.

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ancient Jewish scribes may have held in their memory the whole breadth of nascent Hebrew scripture. As mentioned above, from an examination of Jeremiah’s doublets, it seems certain that such scribes were conversant in multiple prophetic/divinatory traditions as well as the legal and narrative traditions of DtrH and D alongside those found in the book of Numbers, and the sapiential traditions. The breadth of traditional material familiar to ancient Jewish scribes resembles the broad scope of the ancient Near Eastern scribal education.25 This inferred similarity of ancient Jewish and Near Eastern scribal education lends support to my larger thesis that ancient Jewish scribes were trained and authorized to function as textual diviners akin to the scribal scholars of the ancient Near East. To a defense of this thesis, I will now turn. 7

Scribal Divination in the Book Jeremiah and in the Ancient Near East

The creative role played by Jewish scribes in the interpretation and writing of Jeremiah is undeniable. That their creativity sometimes amounted to textual divination requires further explanation.26 In chap. 2, divination was defined as “… any type of action culturally understood to allow acquisition of knowledge 25

26

See chap. 2, §1. For this reason, it is no longer expedient the divide and assign different genres of Hebrew literature to different competing “schools” as was commonly done in twentieth-century biblical scholarship: e.g., the “Deuteronomistic school,” the “priestly school,” and the “sapiential school.” This idea that scribal interventions are a form of prophecy is not new. For the concept of “prophecy by interpretation” see John J. Collins, “Jewish Apocalyptic against its Hellenistic Near Eastern Environment,” BASOR 220 (1975): 27–36. For “prophetische Prophetenauslegung,” see Odil Hannes Steck, Die Prophetenbücher und ihr theologisches Zeugnis: Wege der Nachfrage und Fährten zur Antwort (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr Paul Siebeck, 1996). See discussion in Martti Nissinen, “Pesharim as Divination: Qumran Exegesis, Omen Interpretation and Literary Prophecy,” in Prophecy after the Prophets? The Contribution of the Dead Sea Scrolls to the Understanding of Biblical and Extra-Biblical Prophecy, ed. Kristin De Troyer and Armin Lange, CBET 52 (Leuven: Peeters, 2010). Armin Lange, “Literary Prophecy and Oracle Collection: A Comparison Between Judah and Greece in Persian Times,” in Prophets, Prophecy, and Prophetic Texts in Second Temple Judaism, ed. Michael Floyd and Robert D. Haak, LHBOTS 427 (London: T & T Clark, 2006), 258, considers redactional interventions into prophetic texts to be “prophecies”—or, divination, to use my terminology—“regardless of their purely literary character.” George J. Brooke, “Prophecy and Prophets in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Looking Backwards and Forwards,” in Prophets, Prophecy, and Prophetic Texts in Second Temple Judaism, ed. Michael Floyd and Robert D. Haak, LHBOTS 427 (London: T & T Clark International, 2006), 164, counts “explicit” interpretation of prophetic texts in pesharim to be a form of “inspired revelation” in continuation with written prophecy.

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otherwise restricted to the divine realm.”27 To establish the presence of divination, one should look for one of the following indicators: (1) the intent to acquire such knowledge; (2) the act of interpretation (involving either “technical skill” or “divine inspiration”); or (3) the special status of the diviner (through “training” or “divine call”).28 With the remainder of the chapter, I will describe what can be known about the intent and status of the duplicating scribes of Jeremiah as well as their technical skill. Immediately one encounters a dilemma. The scribes who expanded Jeremiah were anonymous. For this reason, it is difficult to say anything definitive about these scribes’ intent and status. On the other hand, one can infer something of their intent and status on the basis of their interventions in the text of Jeremiah. Jeremiah is not a common or profane text. From its inception, the text of Jeremiah was sacred and functioned as a divinatory text.29 It began in part as a compilation of prose and poetic oracles associated with the historical prophet Jeremiah and grew as scribes interpreted this text and folded their interpretations into the text itself—notably through the creation of thirty-six intra-Jeremianic doublets (and/or triplets/quadruplets) alongside twenty-five intra-scriptural doublets.30 As described in chap. 2, it was standard practice for scribal scholars in the royal courts of the ancient Near East to collect divine utterances from prophets for later referral. A certain portion of the oracles in Jeremiah originated this way.31 With time, the authenticity of some of these

27 28 29

30

31

Esther J. Hamori, Women’s Divination in Biblical Literature, AYBRL (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2015), 4. Ibid., 5. On the status of the prophetic books, Ben Zvi, Ehud, “Introduction: Writings, Speeches, and the Prophetic Books—Setting an Agenda,” in Writings and Speech in Israelite and Ancient Near Eastern Prophecy, ed. Ehud Ben Zvi and Michael H. Floyd (Society of Biblical Literature, 2000), 7, writes that prophetic books “claim to be, and were considered to be, the word of YHWH.” For this reason, ibid., 12, the “material presence” of the written texts of scripture among the literati “was likely to communicate symbolically and metaphorically a sense of the divine presence among them.” Karel van der Toorn, “The Art of Compilation,” God in Context: Selected Essays on Society and Religion in the Early Middle East, FAT 123 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2018), 225, suggests that even the initial process of compiling oracles and ascribing them to particular prophets “amounted to a recognition of enduring validity,” and was a step toward forming “sacred scripture whose relevance transcends the time of its first enunciation.” For the transition from spoken prophecy and written records to scribal prophecy, see Nissinen, “Pesharim as Divination,” 58–60; Lange, “Literary Prophecy and Oracle Collection,” 251–2. For the production of prophetic books, see Martti Nissinen, “How Prophecy Became Literature,” SJOT 19 (2005): 153–72. E.g., see the discussion of the original meaning of Jer 23:5–6 in chap. 5, §3.1.

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oracles was confirmed by the unfolding of history.32 For example, the historical Jeremiah apparently foresaw the destruction of Jerusalem and the deportation of its inhabitants by the Babylonians. Consequently, Jeremiah’s oracle collection could be trusted as true divine revelation. It thus became a reservoir of divinatory potential, a source for further inquiry into the divine realm. All this to say, Jeremiah’s text, from its inception, carried divinatory and sacred status. For this reason, scribal interventions into text of Jeremiah are potentially categorically different from interventions into other kinds of texts, e.g., belletristic literature, lexical lists, administrative texts.33 When a scribe changes the wording of a text thought to be the words of God, the scribe is at least tacitly making a claim about what that God is saying. The intent of the scribe seems to be the intent of a diviner.34 One may want, however, to distinguish different kinds of intent for different degrees of intervention.35 Many scribal interventions have minimal consequences for the meaning of oracles in Jeremiah.36 To 32

33

34

35

36

Cf. Lange, “Literary Prophecy and Oracle Collection,” 259. Michael Floyd, “The Production of Prophetic Books in the Early Second Temple Period,” in Prophets, Prophecy and Prophetic Texts in Second Temple Judaism, ed. Michael H. Floyd and Robert D. Haak, LHBOTS 427 (New York: T & T Clark, 2006), 284, argues that prophecies were written down in part to enable the testing of their accuracy. For Lange, “Literary Prophecy and Oracle Collection,” 258, the large-scale “redactions” of prophetic literature should be understood as “literary prophecy,” or roughly what I would call textual divination. Such divination includes “both chapter-sized passages (see, e.g., Jer 49:7–22; 52) and whole new parts using older prophetic books and other materials were added to individual prophetic books (see, e.g., Trito-Isaiah [Isa 56–66], Deutero-Zechariah [Zech 9–11] and Trito-Zechariah [Zech 12–14]). In addition, even the composition of whole prophetic books was based on older prophetic traditions (see, e.g., Joel).” Such redactions, Lange explains, are produced by “revelatory exegesis”; see, idem, “Interpretation als Offenbarung: Zum Verhältnis von Schriftauslegung und Offenbarung in apokalyptischer und nichtapokalyptischer Literatur,” in Wisdom and Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Biblical Tradition, ed. Florentino Garcia Martínez, BETL 168 (Leuven: Peeters, 2003), 17–33. Similarly, Brooke, Prophecy and Prophets in the Dead Sea Scrolls, 156, considers the rewriting of prophetic books—whether the expansion of biblical books or the creation of “parabiblical” books—to be evidence of “ongoing prophetic activity.” For scribal divination in Hebrew prophetic books, see: Nissinen, “Pesharim as Divination,” 59: “Literary prophecy … is scribal divination where the text itself serves as the source of revelation and exegesis becomes a revelatory act”; cf. Lange, “Literary Prophecy and Oracle Collection.” Lester L. Grabbe, “Poets, Scribes, or Preachers? The Reality of Prophecy in the Second Temple Period,” SBLSP 37 (1998): 542, distinguishes “prophetic material” written by scribes “who may or may not be in a state of ‘inspiration’” and prophetic material which is the result of inspired interpretation. For example, one might include here the insertion of personal names and titles in V M. For a complete list of inserted names and titles, see John Gerald Janzen, Studies in the Text

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consider one example, the insertion of the divine speech formula, ‫כה אמר יהוה‬, reasserts the divine nature of Jeremiah’s text, but arguably does not change the text’s meaning.37 The intent here may not rise to the level of divination. On the other hand, scribes employing this formula in tandem with larger insertions appear to be claiming divine authority for their new compositions. A number of the doublets added to Jeremiah contain the divine speech formula.38 In each case, the duplicate—a scribal creation—is by this formula explicitly marked as divine speech. In the case of the duplicate of 30:10–11, the scribe even added to the doublet’s text a second divine speech formula in the duplicate (30:10). Consider as well the scribal creation of Jer 33:17–26 which contains three divine speech formulas (vv. 17, 20, 25).39 In all of these cases, the scribe presents his or her creation as divine speech. Thus, insertions of the divine speech formula are suggestive of the scribe’s divinatory intent. The scribal intent to create new divination seems more certain for other kinds of interventions. The creation of Jeremiah’s doublets in particular appears to reflect divinatory intent.40 The act of duplicating a text understood to be confirmed divine revelation is different from duplication in general. Duplication

37

38 39 40

of Jeremiah (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1973), “Appendix A,” 139–55. Janzen discusses this feature in ibid., 69–86; cf. Emanuel Tov, “Some Aspects of the Textual and Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah,” in Le livre de Jérémie. Le prophète et son milieu. Les oracles et leur transmission, ed. Pierre-Maurice Bogaert, BETL 54 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1981), 159–61. For a discussion of inconsequential scribal insertions into V M, see Hermann-Josef Stipp, Das masoretische und alexandrinische Sondergut des Jeremiabuches: Textgeschichtlicher Rang, Eigenarten, Triebkräfte, OBO 133 (Fribourg, Switzerland: Universitätsverlag, 1994), 94–99. Insertions of the divine speech formula in V M are discussed in Janzen, Studies in the Text of Jeremiah, 82–86; Tov, “Some Aspects of the Textual and Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah,” 163–4. See, Jer 11:22; 13:12; 18:11; 22:30; 29:25; 31:37; 35:19; possibly also 23:16; three more instances are a part of the large addition of 33:17–26, namely 33:17, 20, 25. Jer 6:13–15 // 8:10b–12; Jer 23:5–6 // 33:14–16; Jer 30:10–11 // 46:26–27; Jer 1:18–19 // 15:20. Cf. also the insertion of the divine speech formula in 17:5a which is arguably linked to the insertion of the duplicate in 17:1–4. This plus is discussed in chap. 5, §3.3. Nissinen, “Ancient Prophecy: Near Eastern, Biblical, and Greek Perspectives,” 152, recognizes the reuse and interpretation of older prophecies as a prolonging of the “prophetic process.” Similarly, Lange, “Literary Prophecy and Oracle Collection,” 250, argues that revisions to prophetic books amount to divination. While Lange does not have duplication in mind, his description of literary prophecy works well for Jeremiah’s doublets: Lange, ibid., writes that literary prophecy “entails the reapplication of a prophetic utterance to a later timeframe, i.e., a prophecy is taken from its original context and read instead in a new context (recontextualization). This recontextualization of a given prophecy resolves in a new understanding in light of its interpretation in a new context.”

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in general may amount to a literary device only; the duplication of a revelatory text, however, may be tantamount to divination. Consider what goes into the process of creating an intra-Jeremianic duplicate. The duplicating scribe determines that when a selection of Jeremiah’s text—an authoritative, revelatory text—is copied into a secondary context, it will generate new meaning.41 In some cases, that new meaning is a secondary application of the selected text’s original meaning.42 In other cases, the new meaning generated is independent of the selected text’s original meaning.43 In either case, the duplicate enjoys a twofold revelatory status. First, the authoritative, revelatory status of the original selection of text is transferred over to the duplicate.44 This is to say, the content of the duplicate, by definition, consists of revelatory material. Second, the duplicate is folded into a secondary context which also consists of authoritative, revelatory text. The secondary context of the duplicated text confers upon the duplicate an additional layer of authoritative status. Importantly, duplicates in Jeremiah are not marked off from the existing text as something separate from this text, as happens for example in textual commentaries where a comment is distinguished from the lemma it interprets.45 41

42 43 44

45

Though not having duplication in mind, Lange, ibid., 258–9, writes that by means of scribal interventions, existing revelation is “recontextualized into the frame of the redactor [i.e., the scribe]. By relating them to a new timeframe, the isolated elements gain new meaning.” For example, with 48:40b, 41b // 49:22, words of Yhwh against one of Judah’s enemies (Edom in 49:22) are reapplied to a second enemy of Judah (Moab in 48:40b, 41b). For example, 33:14–16, a text once addressing Zedekiah, is reapplied to address the restoration of Jerusalem. Brooke, “Prophecy and Prophets in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” 155, discussing the Second Temple practice of rewriting and reworking earlier prophetic traditions, observes that these rewritten and reworked forms do not need to claim “revelatory status” explaining, “Such status was inherent in the original authoritative prophetic text and was transmitted in some way in the relationship between the reworked composition and its base text.” Brooke has in mind the transfer of authoritative status from a prophetic text to a “rewritten” composition; I argue that a similar transference happens in the process of duplication. Brooke, ibid., himself recognizes that this practice of rewriting and reworking earlier prophetic traditions is nothing new but is already seen in the doublets found in certain prophetic books. For example, consider the pesharim found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, which offer authoritative comments on biblical prophetic texts. These comments, however, are marked off from the lemma on which they comment by a form of the Hebrew root ‫פׁשר‬, meaning “interpretation.” Though distinguished from the lemma, such comments still have the status of divination: see Nissinen, “Pesharim as Divination”; and Brooke, “Prophecy and Prophets in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” 156–8. If authoritative commentary on prophetic texts enjoys status as divine revelation, how much more should expansions to

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Duplication does not produce a comment on a lemma, but an expansion of the lemma itself. By surreptitiously folding their duplicates into the existing text, the scribes intended their expansions to be accepted as part of the original text and to have this text’s authority. And presumably, for the ancient Jews who received the expanding form of Jeremiah as scripture, the duplicates were no less authoritative than the originals.46 The scribes thus succeed in creating new authoritative revelation. For all of these reasons, one may infer that the scribes who created Jeremiah’s duplicates intended, at least some of the time, to create new revelation. In short, they had the intentions of textual diviners. A similar inference can be made regarding the status of the duplicating scribes. Once more, since they acted anonymously and since knowledge of scribal culture in the Second Temple period is limited, there is little one can say with regard to their status with absolute certainty.47 Still, one may conclude something of the scribes’ status by virtue of their intervention into the text of Jeremiah. In the first place, the duplicating scribes obviously felt at liberty to alter and expand authoritative, revelatory writing.48 The scribes involved must have had some kind of authority to do so.49 For M. Floyd, such scribes, prophetic texts—which are surreptitiously folded into the existing prophetic text—be considered divine revelation? For general studies on pesharim, see especially Maurya P. Horgan, Pesharim: Qumran Interpretations of Biblical Books, CBQMS 8 (Washington, DC: The Catholic Biblical Association of America, 1979); George J. Brooke, “Qumran Pesher: Towards a Redefinition of a Genre,” RevQ 10 (1979): 483–503; Timothy H. Lim, Pesharim, CQS 3 (London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002); Shani L. Benin, The Pesher Nahum Scroll from Qumran: An Exegetical Study of 4Q169, STDJ 53 (Leiden: Brill, 2004). Nissinen, “Pesharim as Divination,” considers pesharim to be a form of divination; cf. Brooke, “Prophecy and Prophets in the Dead Sea,” 156–8. 46 In contrast, modern Jeremiah scholars sometimes disparage or even delete duplicates from their critical text; e.g., Holladay, Jeremiah 1, 283. 47 For the developing role of scribes in the Second Temple period, see: Christine Schams, Jewish Scribes in the Second Temple Period, JSOTSup 291 (Sheffield, UK: Sheffield Academic, 1998). Leo G. Perdue, “Introduction to Scribes, Sages, and Seers,” in Scribes, Sages, and Seers: The Sage in the Eastern Mediterranean World, ed. Leo G. Perdue, FRLANT 219 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2009), 1–17, offers a survey of what can be known about scribal activity (and that of “sages”) in the Second Temple period from Second Temple texts. For a socio-historical profile of Judean scribes, see Ben Zvi, “Introduction,” 5–16. 48 On this point, Ben Zvi, “Introduction,” 14, remarks, “the process of composing, redacting, and editing prophetic books, along with the use of written sources for these purposes, would have had much to do with the literati’s [scribes’] self identification as animators of the prophets and [Yhwh], or in other words, with a quasi-prophetic status.” 49 For Floyd “The Production of Prophetic Books in the Early Second Temple Period,” 291, this authority came from the scribes’ “highly specialized training” and “their own prophetic insight”; such scribes felt free “to make the definitive reinterpretation of Israel’s prophetic

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when expanding prophetic books like Jeremiah, adopted the “persona” of the prophet and wrote as the prophet.50 They thus intended their words to be received as the words of the prophet. That the expanded form of Jeremiah was accepted as authoritative by later Jewish communities suggests that these communities recognized the scribes’ authority to expand Jeremiah.51 It appears then that the duplicating scribes’ status was at minimum on par with that of tradition. They controlled the prophetic ‘word of Yahweh’ by determining what form the text would take.” Though describing scribes in general—and not divining scribes specifically—Ben Zvi, “Introduction,” 8, notes that several socio-historical factors reinforce the high status of Judea’s scribal class: the belief that Yhwh’s word is “written discourse,” the extreme low rates of literacy, and the specialized training of the scribal class, and thus the marked inaccessibility of the word of Yhwh approachable “only to a few literati in each generation.” This gave the scribes tremendous power: (ibid., 10) “they … turned into absolutely necessary brokers of the knowledge of this divine word [the written word of Yhwh] who alone could disseminate the teaching associated with it for those who could not and were not required to read the text for themselves, that is, almost the entire population of Yehud [Judea].” 50 Floyd, “The Production of Prophetic Books in the Early Second Temple Period,” 289; having adopted the persona of the prophet, the scribe claimed the authority to “elaborate on whatever records there may be of what that prophet once said. In the name of the original prophet, and informed by studying the records of his oracles, the writer addresses his own prophecies to his readers” (ibid.). Similarly, Ben Zvi, “Introduction,” 14, addressing the tension between the belief in the permanence and immutability of the word of Yhwh and the apparent textual fluidity of this word, suggests that scribes—when changing the divine word—perhaps saw themselves as “writing in the spirit of someone” or “as ‘animators’ of the implied authors of the books.” Perhaps they even “identif[ied] themselves with [Yhwh]” (ibid.). In a similar vein, N.G. Cohen, “From Nabi to Mal’ak to ‘Ancient Figure’,” JSS 36 (1985): 22–23, considers the possibility that the authors of pseudepigraphy saw themselves as “‘possessed’ by ‘ancient figure’” in whose name they wrote. Ben Zvi, “Introduction,” 14, further argues that scribal status was also established through reciting the prophetic texts to an audience. In so doing, the reciting scribe adopts the divine voice of the text; they “voice the ‘I’ of the text, which is more often than not a godly ‘I,’ either human or divine.” And in this way, “they identify with that ‘I,’” making Yhwh and the prophets “present.” For his part, Nissinen, “Ancient Prophecy: Near Eastern, Biblical, and Greek Perspectives,” 154, highlighting the scribes’ role in the production, communication, and interpretation of authoritative, prophetic texts, describes the scribes as diviners: “Since most forms of technical divination seem to have been banned, and prophetic divination became an emphatically literary enterprise, the scribes assumed the role of principal diviners in Second Temple society.” 51 On the accepted status of the scribes by the people, Ben Zvi, “Introduction,” 10, writes, “Since the development and maintenance of these groups of literati [scribes] required social resources, and since these groups did exist, as the literature they created plainly shows, one has to assume that their role as brokers was, at least to some extent, partially accepted.”

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diviners. This characterization coheres with and supplements the growing appreciation of the authoritative role played by certain advanced scribes in the Second Temple period—scribes such as Ezra, Ben Sira, and perhaps the author of the pesharim.52 To recap, a plausible case can be made for considering occasions of duplication as potential moments of divination on the basis of the duplicating scribe’s tacit intent and status. The plausibility of this case is reinforced by an assessment of the interpretive technique of duplication. To such an assessment, I now turn. Literary Generation in Jeremiah and Ancient Near Eastern Divinatory Texts While describing the intent and status of the duplicating scribes of Jeremiah relies on inference, describing the interpretive technique of duplication is simply a matter of careful textual analysis. As demonstrated in chap. 5, moments of duplication mark occasions of literary generation, when oracles

7.1

52

For Ezra’s role as authoritative interpreter, see Perdue, “Introduction to Scribes, Sages, and Seers,” 7. The text of Nehemiah 8:13–17 attributes to Ezra the creative role of interpreting the Torah’s instructions for Sukkot; see Rubenstein, Jeffrey L., The History of Sukkot in the Second Temple and Rabbinic Periods (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995), 36–37 and works cited in n. 17. For the development of traditions about Ezra, see: Reinhold G. Kratz, “Ezra: Priest and Scribe,” in Scribes, Sages, and Seers: The Sage in the Eastern Mediterranean World, ed. Leo G. Perdue, FRLANT 219 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2009), 163–88; and Juha Pakkala, Ezra the Scribe: The Development of Ezra 7–10 and Nehemia 8, BZAW 347 (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2004). For the prophetic status of the wise scribes of Ben Sira, see Nissinen, “How Prophecy Became Literature,” 160, who explains that such a scribe “assumes a role closely related to prophecy: the inspired exercise of wisdom becomes an act of divination….” He points to Sir 24:33, where the scribe, filled with wisdom, states “I will again pour out doctrine like prophecy (ὡς προφητείαν) and bequeath it to future generations.” Cf. Nissinen, “Ancient Prophecy: Near Eastern, Biblical, and Greek Perspectives,” 154. Joseph Blenkinsopp, Sage, Priest, Prophet: Religious and Intellectual Leadership in Ancient Israel, LAI (Louisville, KY, Westminster John Knox 1995), 15–20, offers an older but succinct description of Ben Sira. For Jewish textuality and education reflected by the book of Ben Sira, see Carr, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart, 206–12. For the prophetic status of the scribe who wrote pesharim, see Nissinen “Pesharim as Divination,” 58: “Being now in charge of the prophetic tradition transmitted in written form, the scribes also assumed the role of prophets as their legitimate heirs.” For a cautious consideration of the possible “prophetic” status of the Teacher of Righteousness, see George J. Brooke, “Was the Teacher of Righteousness Considered to be a Prophet?” in Prophecy after the Prophets? The Contribution of the Dead Sea Scrolls to the Understanding of Biblical and Extra-Biblical Prophecy, ed. Kristen De Troyer and Armin Lange, CBET 52 (Leuven: Peeters, 2010), 77–97.

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are strategically arranged and presented as a single text thereby generating new revelation through vertical reading.53 Importantly, the interpretive work accomplished by the vertical reading resulting from duplication is similar to the divinatory tasks performed by oracle arrangement in literary prophecy from the ancient Near East. To offer a few notable examples, in both cases, the scribes involved used vertical reading to (1) specify details of the literary context otherwise left unclear, (2) fill perceived lacunae or gaps of the literary context, and (3) address new historical horizons beyond the purview of the original oracles. As an illustration of the first, in ARM 26 199, multiple oracles are presented together in a single letter. The contents of one oracle are clarified by the contents of another: the identity of the deceitful party (of whom Zimri-Lim should be aware) mentioned in an oracle from the prophetess of Dagan is specified through vertical reading by the reference to the man of Ešnunna in the preceding oracle of Lupaḫum. In a similar vein, several of the oracles collected together in SAA 9 no. 1 require vertical reading to be understood. Oracles 1.1, 1.4 and 1.8 (and possibly 1.7) refer to unnamed enemies of Esarhaddon. Details in 1.2 and 1.6 provide a specific historical context which identifies these enemies as Esarhaddon’s brothers and their supporters who contended with him for the throne. As is the case with ARM 26 199, it is vertical reading—facilitated by the intentional arrangement of oracles in a single text—that enables the reader to identify the otherwise unspecified opponent to the king. Faced with similar points of ambiguity in their base text, ancient Jewish scribes intentionally inserted duplicated oracles that clarify such ambiguities through vertical reading. To recall an example discussed in chap. 5, the duplicate of 8:10b–12 (// 6:13–15) disambiguates unspecified elements of Jeremiah 8. That chapter repeatedly references the gravity of Judah’s bad behavior but 53

To recall a few examples of vertical reading from chap. 5: the duplicate of 8:10b–12 (// 6:13– 15) offers concrete examples of Judah’s sin otherwise left unnamed in chap. 8. The duplicate of 17:1–4 (// 15:12–14) specifies the nature of Judah’s idolatry mentioned in chap. 16. For its part, the duplicate of 33:14–16 (// 23:5–6) provides an anticipated but absent vision of a restored and renamed Jerusalem rounding out the Book of Consolation. The duplicate of 30:10–11 (// 46:27–28) reinterprets the salvation imagined in 30:4–8 in light the destruction of Jerusalem. The couplet of 48:40b, 41b—duplicated from Jer 49:22— supplies vivid metaphors (protases) to be interpreted by existing verses of chap. 49 (apodoses). The duplicate of 1:18–19 (// 15:20), through vertical reading, both heightens the stakes of Jeremiah’s call and doubles down on divine assurance. The triplet of Jer 5:9 // Jer 5:29 // Jer 9:8 thrice transforms descriptions of Judah’s sin into justifications for divine punishment. And finally, the duplicate of 50:41–43 (// 6:22–24) disambiguates confusing images of chap. 50. In all of these cases, the new revelation is generated through vertical reading. Revelation is also generated occasionally through intra-textual harmonization. See §4 above for list of occurrences of intra-textual harmonization.

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never specifies what the behavior is. The duplicate provides clarity, describing the greed and deceitfulness of the Judeans. Similarly, the duplicate of 50:41–43 (// 6:22–24), woven into the oracles against Babylon, eliminates confusion created by the earlier insertion of material borrowed from the oracles against Edom (49:18–21). This Edomite material speaks of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and of a lion lying in wait along the Jordan River. Both images distract from the chapter’s major theme of Babylon’s military defeat at the hands of an enemy from the North. The militaristic words of the duplicate and its reference to the enemy from the north refocus the passage back onto this major theme. Thus, both ancient Near Eastern scribes and ancient Jewish scribes used oracle arrangement and the resulting vertical reading to clarify the meaning of divinatory texts. To consider an example of the second divinatory task, lacuna filling is witnessed in both the Mari Letters and the book of Jeremiah as well as in the Old Babylonian omen compendia. Consider the letter, ARM 26 237, discussed in chap. 3. The letter reports an enigmatic dream. On its own, the dream lacks a clear interpretation. Like an omen protasis, the dream requires an apodosis to be intelligible. The letter writer addresses this lacuna by supplying the dream with an oracle that interprets the dream through vertical reading. The two sit adjacent to each other in the letter and are linked through common diction, perhaps created via harmonization. Lacuna filling is also a feature of omen compendia. As noted in chap. 3, when scribal scholars arranged omens into compendia according to gradation paradigms, they would compose new, hypothetical omens to fill any gaps in the paradigms. For example, a record of a particular omen—say, a mark on the right side of a zone of a liver—would prompt the discovery of a complementary omen—i.e., one with the identical mark on the left side of the same zone. If the expected complementary omen did not exist, the literary form—omen compendia—would compel the scribe to create it to complete the paradigm. In a similar way, ancient Jewish scribes filled perceived gaps in the text of Jeremiah through duplication. To revisit two examples from chap. 5, the duplicate of Jer 33:14–16 (// 23:5–6) brings to the Book of Consolation an otherwiseabsent promise of the restoration of righteousness and justice by Yhwh. Without the words of the duplicate, the Book of Consolation would be incomplete. Likewise, the duplicate of Jer 1:18–19 (// 15:20) fills a lacuna of the introductory chapter of Jeremiah. That chapter aims to introduce the major themes of the book as a whole. Apart from the words of the doublet, however, the chapter lacks a clear reference to the motif of the suffering prophet, a motif central to Jeremiah’s “B” material and confessions. In both cases—Jer 33:14–16 and 1:18– 19—scribes addressed apparent gaps in the structure of Jeremiah by generating

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new verses through duplication. All this to say, scribes from the ancient Near East as well as those of ancient Judea used thoughtful omen/oracle arrangement to address perceived gaps or lacunae found in divination texts. Turning towards the third divinatory task, vertical reading can be used to prolong or extend the divinatory relevance of oracles so that they address new historical contexts. A clear example of this considered in chap. 3 is the reapplication of oracles addressing Esarhaddon for Assurbanipal in SAA 9 no. 1. Duplication in Jeremiah does the same work. In at least three cases, the divining scribe employed duplication to prolong the divinatory relevance of an existing Jeremianic text in light of the unfolding of history. (1) The duplicate of Jer 17:1–3 (// 15:12–14) addresses the problem of prolonged exile. While the duplicate’s context (chap. 16) is not overly optimistic—Yhwh will throw the people out of the land (16:13)—the sting of this eviction is dulled by the inclusion of the hopeful words of vv. 14–15 (a duplicate of 23:7–8). As the exile dragged on and new exodus delayed, a further word from Yhwh was needed. The scribe tacked onto the end of chap. 16 words from 15:12–14 that clarify the prolonged-nature of the exile.54 (2) The duplicate of Jer 33:14–16 (// 23:5–6)—sewn onto the end of the BOC—also addresses a new historical horizon, when after the Babylonian siege hope for the restoration of Jerusalem outpaced hope for a restored Davidic dynasty. At a later point, when restoring the Davidic dynasty seemed more urgent, another scribe appended to the BOC divine expectations of unending kingship (33:17–26)—an appendix stitched in part out of Jeremianic material. This chapter, like chap. 16, was recast on multiple occasions in light of changing historical circumstances. (3) The duplicate of Jer 30:10–11 (// 46:27–28) updates an early section of the Book of Consolation (30:4–8) in response to the exile. Oracles of that section expect Yhwh to save Judah from military conquest. When this does not happen, the potency of this section is extended through the insertion of the duplicate which clarifies that the salvation in view is specifically salvation from exile. As these three examples show, scribes used duplication to extend or prolong the divinatory potency of Jeremianic oracles. As history unfolded, existing revelation needed updating. The practice of duplication made this possible. In this regard, duplication completes a divinatory task comparable to the divinatory work accomplished by oracle arrangement in the ancient Near East. Both

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If the hopeful words of the doublet in 16:14–15 (// 23:7–8) are counted as an earlier insertion, the message of this chapter was reimagined at least twice in response to new historical horizons; and if the words were doubled from 23:7–8, then both reimaginings happened through duplication.

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made use of vertical reading to recast earlier oracles in the light of new historical circumstances. More occasions of vertical reading (and of literary generation in general) from ancient Near Eastern divinatory texts and from Jeremiah could be presented, but the examples offered above are sufficient for demonstrating that for all genres considered vertical reading accomplished comparable divinatory tasks. Through the intentional collecting and arrangement of oracles, the letter writers of Mari, the scribal scholars of Old Babylon and Neo-Assyria, and the scholarly Jewish scribes responsible for Jeremiah exploited the divinatory potential of their respective literary genres. Wherever multiple, disparate omens may be arranged and presented as a single text, the possibility of vertical reading and harmonization exists. Omen compendia, the letter format from Mari, the Neo-Assyrian oracle collection, and the Hebrew prophetic book all have this potential. In all cases, the literary form invites and enables the generation of new revelation, i.e., literary generation. Secondary Application in Jeremiah and Ancient Near Eastern Divinatory Texts In addition to enabling literary generation, duplication frequently is a vehicle for secondary application. In one sense, all occasions of duplication are moments of secondary application—or at least secondary interpretation— insofar as they are texts taken from one context and put to work in another. By secondary application, however, I have in mind a particular kind of secondary interpretation: an additional interpretation of an existing omen on the basis of the omen’s primary interpretation. In chap. 3, I discussed a few examples of secondary application from the ancient Near East. For instance, the protasis of the omen, OBE 1 ob. 6, describes a hole found on a certain section of the liver known as the “presence.” This protasis is paired with two apodoses: (1) a fully loaded boat will sink, and (2) a pregnant woman would die in labor. Though the two apodoses may seem disconnected, they are in fact linked hermeneutically. The second apodosis is derived out of the first on the basis of an established metaphor, i.e., a loaded boat represents a pregnant woman. To return to an example mentioned above, the oracle collection of SAA 9 no. 1 contains a series of oracles which, while originally referring to Esarhaddon’s rise to power, now serve to buttress his son Ashurbanipal’s claim to the throne. In this case the analogous life circumstances of the two rulers invited the reapplication of the series from father to son. Importantly, one sees comparable secondary application in the creation of doublets. For example, an oracle addressed to Judah (6:22–24) is reapplied to Babylon (50:41–43). This reapplication reflects a theological belief that both

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nations have an analogous relationship to Yhwh: both are answerable to the Judean deity and are judged by the same standard. If Yhwh punishes Judah for sin, Babylon by analogy will receive the same treatment. On the basis of this belief, it follows that an oracle of judgment originally addressed to Judah (i.e., 6:22–24) may be reapplied to Babylon (thus, 50:41–43). A similar rationale can explain the reuse of lines from the oracles against Edom in both the oracles against Moab and the oracles against Babylon. As seen in chap. 5, the text of 49:22 (referring to Edom) was redeployed in 48:40b, 41b to address Moab; and that of 49:18–21 and of 49:26 (both also referring to Edom) were likely reenlisted in 50:40, 44–46 and 50:30, respectively, to address Babylon.55 In both cases material addressing one foreign enemy of Judah is recycled for another foe. Such secondary application seems to be guided by the hermeneutical principle that an oracle pertaining to one national enemy may be applied to another. Edom, Moab, and Babylon each have an analogous relationship to Judah; all three are Judah’s enemies. An oracle addressed to one enemy, can, by analogy, be secondarily applied to another. In summary, duplication often marks occasions of secondary application.56 As ancient Near Eastern scribes found secondary applications for existing omens, so ancient Judean scribes duplicated texts when a secondary application for that text was discovered. In many cases, the hermeneutical principle guiding the secondary application is discernable. In other cases, such a principle is suspected even if remaining unclear. Future research could investigate such cases in further depth. To conclude the chapter, I have offered here an argument for considering the scribes who expanded Jeremiah through duplication as the ancient Jewish equivalent to the ancient Near Eastern scholarly scribes who practiced textual divination. First, I discussed the various textual features of Jeremiah’s doublets which suggest that ancient Jewish scribes underwent a scribal training similar to the education of ancient Near Eastern scribes. Like their Near 55

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The possibility that the both doublets are original to the oracle against Babylon and secondary to the oracle against Edom could also be considered; cf. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah, 157–8. Solving this question is not relevant for my purpose here: the same divinatory principle may explain the reapplication of these doublets regardless of which text is original. Alongside the examples mentioned here, I could include the triplet of Jer 5:9 // Jer 5:29 // Jer 9:8. While it is unclear which triplet is original, it is certain that original oracle transformed a description of Judah’s sin into justification for divine punishment. This oracle was subsequently duplicated twice, both times being inserted into contexts analogous to that of the original. The hermeneutical principle guiding these secondary applications is not immediately obvious. Any explanation would need to account for the fact that the secondary contexts are similar to the first.

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Eastern counterparts, ancient Jewish scribes apparently learned through memorization—ingesting a large corpus of traditional material—and were trained for scholarship and not simply for administrative tasks. This deduction allows for the possibility that scribal interventions into the text of Jeremiah, most notably, the practice of duplication, could be understood as textual divination. An investigation into the duplicating scribes’ status, intention, and technical skill supports this possibility. While the duplicating scribes are anonymous, one may infer, on the basis of their interventions, that these scribes enjoyed the status of diviners and intended to practice textual divination. These inferences remain speculative. However, their plausibility is reinforced by a textual analysis of Jeremiah’s doublets. Duplication and omen arrangement— as found in oracle-reporting Mari Letters, Neo-Assyrian oracle collections, and Old Babylonian omen compendia—involve comparable technical skills. In all cases, the scribes utilized similar modes of textual divination—namely literary generation and secondary application—to accomplish comparable divinatory task. By all counts then, the scribes who formed Jeremiah through duplication were the ancient Jewish equivalent to text-divining scribal scholars of the ancient Near East.

chapter 7

Conclusion: Inspiration as a Fruitful Category for Historical Reflection The doublets considered in this study are a peculiar feature of a perplexing book titled after a troubled prophet. The person Jeremiah, who inspired the book that bears his name, lived through the tumultuous years surrounding the collapse of Judean society. The effects of this collapse mar every column of Jeremiah’s scroll. The structure of the book is unwieldy. Narratives start, stop, and start again later. The chronology is jumbled. Unrefined poetry wails and rants at every turn. The book’s confession material presents the disturbed inner life of an unwilling and despised messenger. Many biblical scholars in years past approached the chaos of the book of Jeremiah as a textual and literary problem to be solved. Reconstruct the book’s textual history and sort out the literary layers and stages, and one might uncover a less-upending and more-presentable book. More recently, biblical scholars celebrate the chaos of Jeremiah as part of the book’s literary genius. Jeremiah’s doublets can be handled either way. They are a feature of the book’s unsystematic and enigmatic textual history. They are also a feature of its literary artistry. Both approaches capture something significant about the doublets. But these approaches leave perplexing questions unaddressed: Why are certain texts selected for duplication and others passed over? Why are duplicates inserted in some contexts and not elsewhere? Why, when wanting to expand the text of Jeremiah, do scribes sometimes expand through duplication but at other times through new composition? Why are some duplicates verbatim repetitions and others, paraphrases? Why are still others major adaptations? In writing this book, I have offered the beginning of an answer to these questions. A key to resolving the perplexities of the doublets lies in appreciating the divinatory and scriptural status of the book of Jeremiah for those who composed and preserved it. To study Jeremiah is more than an investigation of a historical text with a complicated development. It is more than a celebration of ancient artistic expression. To study Jeremiah is an encounter with an artifact of scribal divination, an encounter with a text written to reveal the deity’s will. Take this into consideration and many of the peculiarities of Jeremiah’s doublets begin to make sense. Certain texts are selected for duplication—while others are passed over—because in those selected texts scribes discerned further divinatory relevance and secondary application.

© Justus Theodore Ghormley, 2022 | doi:10.1163/97890

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Certain contexts receive duplicates because those contexts—to retain their revelatory potency—required clarification, updating, and reimagination. While scribes could create new oracles and content out of whole cloth, the technique of duplication—relying upon existing divine revelation—invested their creative work with authority. Various duplication techniques—from verbatim repetition to paraphrase to major adaptation—are employed according to the contextual needs of the duplicating scribe. Duplication is a flexible tool of divination used with great intentionality, not a mindless, copy-andpaste task of a secretary. Duplication showcases the divinatory scholarship of ancient Jewish scribes. Such conclusions provide preliminary, though significant, answers to these perplexing questions about Jeremiah’s doublets. Having only analyzed a fraction of Jeremiah’s internal doublets (eight out of thirty-six)—not to mention an additional twenty-five external doublets dealt with only sparingly—a more exhaustive examination of the divinatory nature of Jeremiah’s doublets is needed to test and refine my conclusions. These conclusions raise further questions—most notably the puzzle of why Jeremiah alone, among the other biblical prophetic books, experienced such prolific duplication. What is it about the book of Jeremiah and the socio-historical context of its formation that opened it to ongoing textual divination through duplication? Others will undoubtedly raise additional and important questions that I have overlooked. My hope is that this study will stimulate further examination of Jeremiah’s doublets, the divinatory nature of formation of the Bible’s prophetic books, and the mechanics of inspiration, the process through which scribes created what they hoped would be received as scripture. As for the scribes, this study invites a richer appreciation of their creative contribution to biblical texts and their religious significance for the communities that received their work as God’s word. That we, thousands of year later, respond to the book of Jeremiah with fascination and pathos proves their artistic mastery; that millions of people today still turn to the book for divine guidance and consolation testifies to the fruitfulness of their divinatory endeavors.

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Index of Names and Subjects adaptation, major and minor. See duplication technique “Book of Consolation” 109–10, 124–5, 128, 162, 186n, 187–8 Carr, David M. 12n17, n19, 15, 62n27, 168n1, 170 Deuteronomistic history / school / theology  10n10, 13, 56–8, 74, 92–3, 98–101, 174, 178n25 divination 20–6, 162, 178–85 Neo-Assyrian oracle collections 45–51, 186, 188, 189 Old-Babylonian omen compendia 33–6, 124, 134, 187–9 oracle reports in Mari Letters  36–45, 186, 187 textual divination 26–8, 51–2, 185–91 textualization of divination 19–20, 22–3 doublets 3–4, 59n16, 60, 77, 78–84, 161–3. See also Doublets in Jeremiah (Index of Ancient Texts) early and later doublets  3n5, n6, 60, 77, 78, 79 intra-Jeremianic doublets found in Jer+n 3n6, 78n1 intra-Jeremianic doublets unique to VM  3n5, 78n2 intra-scriptural doublets in Jeremiah 174n21 tables of doublets listed by duplication technique 165–6, cf. 172 duplication technique 81–3, 161, 165–8 adaptation, major and minor 82–3, 165–7 loose citation 82–3 paraphrase 82–3, 165–70 verbatim repetition 82, 165–7 Hamori, Esther J. 21, 178–9 harmonization. See intra-textual harmonization; post-duplication harmonization; traditioning

innovation, major and minor 81, 83, 170–2. See also textual variant inspiration / inspired scribes xi–xii, 1–2, 21, 23, 24–5, 162, 165, 178n26, 179, 185n, 192–3 intra-textual harmonization 5, 13n20, 31, 68–71. See also traditioning intra-textuality. See traditioning intertextuality 12n19. See also intra-textual harmonization; traditioning Janzen, John Gerald 53, 64–5, 67–9, 73, 74–7, 97n50, 126n126 Jeremiah, historical figure 2n3, 55 Jeremiah, textual development of book  2–3, 53–77, 93–7, 109–10, 110n80, 116–8, 125–7, 135–8, 154–5, 162–3. See also prämasoretischen Idiolekt Deutero-Jeremianic diction/style 56, 79n4 Two-Edition Theory  74–7, 162 literary generation 5, 30–2, 35–6, 39–40, 46–9, 161–2, 185–9 narrative arrangement of oracles 46–9 loose citation. See duplication technique Mari Letters. See divination modernism / modernist hermeneutics 10–1, 21–5, 76n78, 162, 183n46 narrative arrangement of oracles. See literary generation Neo-Assyrian oracle collections. See divination non-significant variant 80. See also textual variant omen compendia. See divination oracle collections. See divination “Oracles against the Nations” 60, 124–7 oracles against Babylon 126n126, n127, 152–7, 187, 190 oracles against Edom 134–5, 153n, 154–5, 187, 190 oracles against Moab 134, 135–8, 190

218 paraphrase. See duplication technique post-duplication harmonization 80–1, 174–5. See also textual variant prämasoretischen Idiolekt 13, 72–3 re-contextualization 5, 30–2, 36–7, 161, 181n40, 182n41. See also literary generation scribes. See also divination scribal practice and education, ancient Near East 5–6, 7–16, 164 scribal divination, ancient Judea 162, 178–91 scribal practice and education, ancient Judea  161–3, 164, 175–8 scribal scholar  1–2, 16–20, 24–6, 51–2, 164, 190–1 women scribes 4n secondary application 5–6, 32–4, 49–51, 162, 182, 189–90 secondary interpretation 32–3 Stipp, Hermann-Josef 53–4, 56n7, 69–77. See also prämasoretischen Idiolekt synonymous variation / synonymity 6, 15–6, 81, 82–3, 164–73, 175, 177. See also textual variant

Index of Names and Subjects textual divination. See divination textualization of divination. See divination textual variant 80–1. See also innovation; non-significant variant; paraphrase; synonymous variation; postduplication harmonization Tov, Emanuel 58n15, 63–4, 74–7 traditioning 5, 12–3, 68–9, 172–4. See also intra-textual harmonization intra-Jeremianic  13, 68–71, 134, 135–8, 172–3 intra-scriptural  13, 97–9, 134, 135–8, 172, 174 Two-Edition Theory. See Jeremiah, textual development of book Verbatim repetition. See duplication technique Vertical reading  5, 23, 31, 39–40, 42n29, 162, 185–9 Winitzer, Abraham 10n8, 17n34, 27n72, 35n14, 36

Index of Ancient Texts Old Babylonian Omen Compendia OBE 1 ob.6 34, 189 TIM 9 80:3 34 Mari Letters A.1121 + A.2731 ARM 26 194 ARM 26 195 ARM 26 196 ARM 26 197 ARM 26 199 ARM 16 200 ARM 26 202 ARM 26 204 ARM 26 207 ARM 26 208 ARM 26 209 ARM 26 211 ARM 26 212 ARM 26 213 ARM 26 214 ARM 26 216 ARM 26 219 ARM 26 221bis ARM 26 232 ARM 26 234 ARM 26 236 ARM 26 237 ARM 26 238 ARM 26 239 ARM 26 240

43n32 43n32 37n19 43n32 4n, 37–42 37–42, 43n32, 186 43n32 37–42 37n19 4n, 43n32 4n, 43n32 43n32 4n, 37n19 4n, 43n32 4n, 37n19 4n 43n32 43n32 43n32 4n 43n32 4n, 37n19 4n, 43–4, 187 37n19 4n, 43n32 4n

State Archives of Assyria Ass. A. 49n51 Nin A 49–50 SAA 9 no. 1 45–51, 186, 188–9 SAA 9 no. 1.1 46–7, 186 SAA 9 no. 1.2 46, 186 SAA 9 no. 1.3 46 SAA 9 no. 1.4 46, 186 SAA 9 no. 1.5 46n41 SAA 9 no. 1.6 46, 186 SAA 9 no. 1.7 46, 186 SAA 9 no. 1.8 46–7, 186 SAA 9 no. 1.9 46n40, n41, 47 SAA 9 no. 1.10 46n41, 47, 50 SAA 9 no. 2 49n51

Hebrew Scriptures Genesis 19:11 89 40:8–19 26n66 41:1–32 26n66 Exodus 19:4 135n149 Leviticus 26:6 132n Numbers 21:28–29 136–8 24:17 136–8 Deuteronomy 4:27–28 100n 4:34 101n 4:44–29:1 56 5:15 101n 7:5 98, 174n20 7:19 101n 11:2 101n 12:2–3 98, 104, 174n20 15:3 106 26:8 101n 28:9 135n150 28:26 132n 28:64 100n 32:16–17,21 99n55 32:22 98–9, 107, 174n20 1 Samuel 5:9 89 30:2,19 89 2 Samuel 11:3 110n82 24:24 105n68 1 Kings 1:36 95n 14:15,23 98, 104, 174n20 21:2 105n68 22:43 98 2 Kings 8:25–26,29 110n82 9:27 110n82 10:13 110n82 12:3 98 14:4 98 15:4 98 16:4 104

220 2 Kings (cont.) 17:10 98, 104, 174n20 19:1–4 25n64 (= Isa 37:1–4) 23:2 89 23:14 98, 174n20 24:12,17 111 25 66, 68, 69n58 25:26 89 1 Chronicles 3:5 110n82 2 Chronicles 15:13 89 21:17 110n82 22:1 110n82 25:23 110n82 34:30 89 Nehemiah 8:13–17 185 Job 11:19 132n 19:24 99n56 Psalms 48:7 140n162 Proverbs 1:19 90 Isaiah 10:5–18 152n194 13–14 126n126 13:8 140n162 14:1–3 126n126 17:2 132n 37:1–4 25n64 (= 2 Kgs 19:1–4) 40:31 139n 42:14 140n162 50:13–14 126n126 62:14 110n83 Jeremiah. See below Lamentations 4:19 135n150 Ezekiel 6:13 104 20:28 104 34:28 132n 39:26 132n 48:35 110n83 Daniel 2:1–45 26n66 4:2–24 [4:5–27 Eng.] 26n66

Index of Ancient Texts Hosea 8:1 135n150 Joel 4:1 121 Micah 1:5 105n72 4:4 132n 4:9,10 140n162 Nahum 2:12 132n Habakkuk 1:8 135n150 Zephaniah 3:13 132n Zechariah 2:10 158 Jeremiah 1:1–17 144 1:4–10 141 1:5 141–3 1:8 79n6, 129n137, 133, 141–3, 148 1:10 142–3, 146, 173n15, n16 1:14–16 143n169 1:14 156n203, 158 1:15–16 142 1:15–17 142, 143n173 1:15 107, 141, 142n167, n168, 143–4, 147, 156n203, 173n15, n16 1:17 79n6, 129n137, 133, 141–2, 143n167, n169, n170, 146, 148 1:18–19 143n173 1:18 169n4, n6, 171, 173n15, n16, n19 1:19 79n6, 129n137, 133, 141n169 2:8 90n27, 98n52, 147 2:11 98n52 2:14 132 2:20 104, 150 2:26–28 150 2:26 90n27, 146–7, 173n15 3:6,13 104 3:17 111n83 3:18 121n108, 158 3:25 156n208

Index of Ancient Texts 4:4 160, 175 4:6 158, 156n203 4:7 156n204 4:9 90n27, 146–7 4:11 90n29 4:13 135n150 4:17 107 4:27 132, 156n204 4:31 129n135 5:1–9 150 5:7–8 149 5:9 156n205 5:10–19 150 5:10 132 5:11 121n108 5:18 132 5:20–31 150 5:22 151 5:23–28 151 5:26–28 149, 151n190 5:27 149 5:29 156n205 5:30–31 151n190 5:30 156n204 5:31 90n27, 147 6:1 151, 156n203, 158 6:3 107 6:6 156n205 6:8 156n204 6:10 87 6:12 84n16, 87 6:13 147, 150, 174 6:15 156n205, 174 6:22–24 129n135 6:22 156n203, 169n6, 173n15, 174 6:23 129, 171n11 6:24 140, 140n162, 171n11 6:25 107, 153n 6:26 90n29 6:28 150 7:16 175 7:24–26 79n4 7:25 132 7:33 132n 8:1–10a 85–6 8:1 90n27, 146–7 8:5 150 8:9 86–7 8:10a 84n16, 87

221 8:10b 174 8:11 169n4, 173n15, n16 8:12 156n205, 174 8:14–22 86–7 8:14 156n208 8:15 86n21 8:19 173n15 8:21–23 90 8:21 156n204, 173n16 8:23 [9:1 Eng.] 85 9:1–8 150 9:2–5 149 9:6 90n29, 150 9:7 149–50 9:8 156n205 9:9–10 150 9:10 156n204 9:13–14 150 9:15 133, 173n15 10:3 98n52 10:6–8,10 65n39, 74n73 10:15 98n52 10:22 156n203, n204, 158, 173n15 10:25 156n204 11:7–8 79n4 11:10,17 121n108 11:14 175 11:22 94n40, 181n37, 156n205 12:9 107 12:12 91 13:11 121n108 13:12 94n40, 181n37 13:13 90n27, 147 13:20 158 14:10 156n205 14:17 90n29 14:18 90 15:1 95n 15:2–9 96 15:10–21 96n48 15:10–11 95n, 96 15:10 94, 95n, 96n48, 106n74 15:11 94–6, 106n74 15:12 94–6, 158 15:13–14 83n14, 94 15:13 171n11 15:14 106n74, 169n6, 171n11, 173n15, n19, 174 15:15–18 94, 141 15:15 106n74

222 Jeremiah (cont.) 15:20 79n6, 129n137, 133, 169n4, 173n15 15:21 141n164, 148–9 16:4,9 100 16:6 89 16:10 156n208 16:11–13 93, 98, 105 16:11 98n52 16:13–21 101 16:13 100, 107, 188 16:14–15 93, 99–100 16:15 158 16:16–20 98 16:18–20 93, 105 16:18–19 101, 106 16:18 98n52, 100–1, 173n15 16:19 173n16 16:20 98n52 16:21 93n38, 101 17:1–4 130, 163, 171, 181n38 17:4 169n4, 171, 173n15, n16, 174 17:5–8 93, 101 17:5a 93n38, 94, 181n38 17:25 146 18:11 94n40, 181n37 18:16 156n204 18:18 90n27 19:8 156n204, 175 20:10 107 21:1–2 25n64 21:5 101n 21:12 175 21:14 107 22:11–12,18–19 112n86 22:23 140n162 22:24–30 112 22:24 110 22:28 107, 110 22:30 94n40, 181n37 23:2 133 23:5–6 179n31 23:5 171n11 23:6 171n11, 174 23:7–8 99, 120n 23:9–40 120n 23:9 120n 23:11 90

Index of Ancient Texts 23:33 90 23:13,14 120n 23:16 94n40, 181n37 23:19 175 24:1 110n82, 146 25:4 132 25:9 107 26:7,8,11,16 90n27 27:1–29:19 69n58 27:6,8,20 69n58 28:3 69n58 28:6 95n 28:11,14 69n58 29:1 69n58, 90n27 29:3 69n58 29:10 113, 115, 121, 173n15, n17 29:14 76n77, 138n157 29:16–20 76n77 29:25 94n40, 181n37 30–33 109, 113, 128 30–31 109n77, n79, 129n138 30:3 113n93, 124n120, 129n136, 138n157 30:4–8 124, 186n, 188 30:5 91 30:5–10 127–30 30:6 140n162 30:7 168 30:8–11 129n139 30:8–9 129n136 30:8 113n93 30:9 109n78 30:10–11 181 30:10 113n93, 169n4, 181 30:11 79n6, 128n132, 148–9, 169n4, 173 30:12–15 128, 129n136 30:12–13 127 30:13 79n6 30:14 129–30 30:15 129n138 30:16 127 30:17 113n93, 128, 129n136, 133, 168 30:18 113n93, 128n132, 138n157 30:20 69n58 30:21 109n78 30:23 175

Index of Ancient Texts 31:4–5 113n93 31:8–13 113n93, 124n120 31:8 158–9 31:15 128 31:16–17 128 31:16–18 113n93, 124n120 31:18–19 128, 129n138 31:18 113n93 31:20 128 31:21 113n93, 124n120 31:23–25 113n93 31:23 138n157 31:27 121 31:28 113n93, 129n138 31:31 121, 173n15 31:34 89 31:35–37 116–8 31:37 94n40, 181n37 32:1–15,16–25 109n77 32:4 175 32:21 101n, 128n133 32:26–44 109n77 32:32 90n27, 147 32:36 115, 123 32:37–42 115 32:37 113n93, 115, 121, 123, 124n120, 173n15, n17 32:39–49 128n133 32:42 113, 121, 173n15, n17 32:44 138n157 33:1–13 109n77 33:4,5,6 114n95, 115n 33:6–7 114 33:7 113n93, 138n157 33:9 84n15, 114, 124, 128n133 33:11 113n93, 115n, 138n157 33:14–26 94n40, 108n 33:14–15 171 33:14 171n11, 173 33:15 171n11, 173n15, n18 33:16 84n15, 171n11, 173n15, n17, n174 33:17–26 108n, 110n80, 115n, 116–8, 138, 163, 181, 188 33:17 94n40 33:18 115n, 116n100 33:20 94n40 33:20–22,25–26 116–8

223 33:21–22 115n, 116n100 33:25 94n40 33:26 138n157 34:1 108n 34:3 175 35:19 94n40, 181n37 40:3 156n208 42:1,8 89 42:11 79n6, 129n137, 148 43:5 53n1 43:5–6 106n74 44:12 89 44:23 156n208 46:1–26 125 46:2–26 124 46:2 120n 46:11 79n6 46:20 158 46:25 95n 46:26 125n124, 138n157 46:28 79n6, 169n4 47:1–7 125 47:2 158 48:1 120n 48:2,8,15 135n148 48:18 135n148, 140 48:24 134n147 48:40–44 138 48:40b,41b 171n11 48:41a 135n148 48:42 133n146 48:45–47 136–8, 163 49:1 120n 49:2 126 49:6,39 138n157 49:7 120n 49:17 175 49:18–21 187 49:19 139, 173n15 49:21 92 49:22 169n6, 171n11, 173n15 49:23 120n 49:24 140 49:28 120n 50–51 107, 125, 127n128, 152n194, 153–6 50:2–51:58 152n194 50:2–5 126n126, 127n128

224 Jeremiah (cont.) 50:3 153n, 154–5, 156n203, n204, 158 50:4 121, 173n15, n18 50:6 133n143 50:8 153n 50:9 84n15, 153n, 154–5, 156n203, 158–9 50:13–14 154 50:13 153n, 156n204, 175 50:14–15 154 50:14 107, 156 50:15 107, 155–6 50:16 153n 50:17–19 126 50:18 153n, 156n205 50:20 121, 173n15, n18 50:21–22 154 50:24,25,28 153n 50:29–30 154 50:29 107, 155 50:31–32 153n 50:31 156n205 50:32 107 50:33–46 153n 50:33 153n 50:34 126, 153n 50:35–37 154 50:40 153n, 154 50:41–43 171n11 50:41 84n15, 156n203, 169n4, 171, 174 50:42 153n, 171n11 50:43 140, 153n, 171n11 50:44 153n, 154, 156n205 50:45 153n 50:46 155n198 51:2 107 51:5–6 126 51:6 153n, 155n200 51:11 155 51:18 98n52 51:26 156n204 51:27 156n205 51:28 155 51:29 156n204 51:34 133n143 51:36 155n200 51:41,43 156n204

Index of Ancient Texts 51:44,47 156n205 51:48 153n, 156n203, 158 51:49 126 51:52 156n205 52 66, 148 52:1–34 69n58 52:4,7 107 52:17 104n65, 143n172, 147 Doublets in Jeremiah. See also doublets (Index of Names and Subjects) 1:18–19 // 15:20 82, 97n51, 140–9, 161–2, 168n3, 169, 172, 181n38, 186n, 187–8. 5:9 // 5:29 // 9:8 84n15, 149–52, 161–2, 168n3, 172, 186n, 190n56 5:29 // 5:9 // 9:8 84n15, 149–52, 161–2, 168n3, 172, 186n, 190n56 6:13–15 // 8:10b–12 84–92, 87n24, 97n51, 125, 144, 162, 168n3, 172, 181n38, 186 6:22–24 // 50:41–43 97n51, 152–61, 168n3, 172, 186n, 187, 189–90 8:10b–12 // 6:13–15 84–92, 87n24, 97n51, 125, 144, 162, 168n3, 172, 181n38, 186, 186n 9:8 // 5:29 // 5:9 84n15, 149–52, 161–2, 168n3, 172, 186n, 190n56 10:12–16 // 51:15–19 157n 15:12–14 // 17:1–4 83, 92–107, 162–3, 168n3, 172, 186n, 188 15:20 // 1:18–19 82, 97n51, 140–9, 161–2, 168n3, 169, 172, 181n38, 186n, 187–8 16:14–15 // 23:7–8 93, 99–100, 188 17:1–4 // 15:12–14 83, 92–107, 162–3, 168n3, 172, 186n, 188 23:5–6 // 33:14–16 11, 84n15, 97n51, 108–24, 125, 138, 161–3, 168n3, 172, 181n38, 182n43, 186n, 187–8 23:7–8 // 16:14–15 93, 99–100, 188 30:10–11 // 46:27–28 99, 124–33, 162–3, 167–8, 172, 181, 186n, 188 32:4 // 34:3 169–70 33:14–16 // 23:5–6 11, 84n15, 97n51, 108–24, 125, 138, 161–3, 168n3, 172, 181n38, 182n43, 186n, 187–8 34:3 // 32:4 169–70

225

Index of Ancient Texts 46:27–28 // 30:10–11 99, 124–33, 162–3, 167–8, 168n3, 172, 181, 186n, 188 48:40b, 41b // 49:22 82, 133–40, 161–3, 168n3, 172, 182n42, 186n, 190 49:18–21 // 50:40, 44–46 153n, 154, 155n198, 187, 190 49:22 // 48:40b, 41b 82, 133–40, 161–3, 168n3, 172, 182n42, 186n, 190 49:26 // 50:30 190 50:30 // 49:26 190

50:40, 44–46 // 49:18–21 153n, 154, 155n198, 187, 190 50:41–43 // 6:22–24 97n51, 152–61, 168n3, 172, 186n, 187, 189–90 51:15–19 // 10:12–16 157n Dead Sea Scrolls 2Q13 (2QJer) 4Q70 (4QJera) 4Q71 (4QJerb) 4Q72 (4QJerc) 4Q72a (4QJerd) 4Q72b (4QJerae)

53–4, 66 53–4, 66, 91n31, 174 53–4, 65–6, 65n39, 97n50 53–4, 66 53–4, 53n1, 65–6, 69n58 53–4, 66n43