[Dialogue] Spong 4/9

[KroegerD at aol.com]

April 9, 2008 
The Origins of the Bible, Part  IV
The Story of the Yahwist Document  

Thus far in this series on the origins of the Bible, my efforts have been  
directed toward how the Torah, which contains the oldest material found in the  
Bible, came into being. The Torah, also called "The Law" and "The Books of  
Moses," is the Jewish name for the first five books of the Bible: Genesis,  
Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. Their creation in the world of  
literature did not happen the way many people today seem to think. No one,  
including Moses, simply sat down and started writing. In fact, the Torah was  written 
over a period of about 500 years by a series of authors. Many of the  stories 
told in this part of the Bible were a combination of myths, folk tales  and 
political propaganda with only the slightest bit, if any, of actual  historical 
memory. The opening biblical stories from Adam and Eve through the  flood have 
absolutely no connection with history, despite the fact that some of  the 
world's more foolish people still try to locate the Noah's ark on Mt Ararat.  The 
first shred of history appears in the Abraham story and it is slight indeed.  
If a person named Abraham lived at all it would have been about 900 years or 
45  generations prior to the writing of the Abraham story in the book of 
Genesis.  Moses, the greatest hero in the Jewish story, lived about 300 years or 15 
 generations before the Moses narratives in were written in Exodus and as 
many as  700 years before the Moses stories that appear in Deuteronomy. This 
means that  most of these biblical accounts are not history at all, at least not 
in any  technical sense, but are rather interpretive folk lore. That needs to 
be said  again and again. Even after constant repetition it is hard to make 
this truth  heard, since most people have grown up in the power of 2000 years of  
literalization that continues to affect our reasoning today. In this column, 
I  want to trace in more detail the beginning of what is called "The Yahwist  
Document" that scholars today designate as the oldest part of the Torah and 
thus  the oldest part of the biblical story.  
Writing history, which is what the Torah purported to be, is an activity that 
 normally starts only when a nation has become established and secure enough 
to  begin to look at itself with some objectivity. While the Jews were fleeing 
 Egypt, journeying through the wilderness, or invading and conquering the 
land of  the Canaanites, there was little time or interest in transforming its  
experienced history into a written narrative. It is also important to note that 
 in the ancient world, one who could write was first of all rare, a skill  
possessed in the tenth century BCE in the Middle East by less than one tenth of  
one percent of the entire population. Thus the one who wrote this first part 
of  the Torah can be accurately presumed to have been high in either 
government or  ecclesiastical circles. Writing also required considerable wealth, or at 
least  access to wealth, since both parchment and ink were very expensive. We 
can  assume, therefore, that both education and wealth were the marks of this 
 original author of biblical material. Inevitably, such a person would 
reflect  the attitudes and biases of the ruling classes which he represented. I use 
the  word "he" not to be insensitive, but to recognize the fact that in this 
period  of history the privileges of education and status had simply not yet 
been  conferred upon women.  
The Yahwist Document got its name from the fact that this narrative referred  
to God by the name Yahweh (YHWH), the name it claimed had been revealed to 
Moses  at the "burning bush." Those letters in Hebrew were in some way 
identified with  the verb "to be" and it was translated in the book of Exodus to mean, 
"I am that  I am." Since the verb "to be" is the foundation verb of any 
language, it seemed  to be a fitting name for the deity who was regarded as the 
foundation of the  tribe's identity.  
When this strand of material is lifted out of the Torah and separated from  
the later strands, its historical setting becomes immediately visible. The  
Jewish nation has been established. Saul, the first king, a member of the tribe  
of Benjamin, had been unable to secure his throne. The narrative describes 
Saul  as a melancholy, depressed man, who could not unite the various tribes of  
Israel. When all of Saul's sons, save for a crippled child, were killed along  
with the King in a battle against the Philistines at Mt. Giboa, his throne 
was  claimed by his military captain, a man named David. It is David who is the 
clear  hero of this Yahwist writer. David was portrayed as chosen by God and 
anointed  by the prophet Samuel to be king of the Jews at a very early age, 
indeed while  still a shepherd boy keeping the flocks of his father Jesse. Heroic 
tales had  obviously gathered around him in the memory of the people as tends 
to happen to  a popular leader. It was said of the young David that he had 
killed a lion, a  bear and finally that he had killed Goliath, a Philistine. 
When David moved to  claim the throne for himself, the Yahwist writer suggests 
that he immediately  instituted a series of political moves to solidify that 
claim and to win popular  support. He ordered a national time for mourning the 
deaths of King Saul and his  sons, punished anyone who appeared to take pleasure 
in Saul's demise and made  plans to conquer the city of the Jebusites, called 
Jerusalem, to make it his new  capital. If he was going to unite the 
disparate tribes of Israel into a single  political entity he needed a neutral city as 
a symbol of that new unity into  which he intended to call the people of his 
nation. These tactics appeared to  work. With his power at home firmly 
established, David began to expand his realm  with a series of military victories. In 
the final test for a monarch, David  completed a forty year reign and then 
was able to pass his throne on to his son  Solomon, thus establishing the 
continuity of his nation in a continuing royal  family. Among his last acts 
according to this narrative was to delegate to his  son Solomon the task of building 
the Temple in Jerusalem, which would make that  city not just the political, 
but also the spiritual capital of the Jewish  people. With these three 
institutions now established, the throne of David, the  city of Jerusalem and the 
Temple of Solomon that was finished in the first  decade of King Solomon's rule, 
the time was right for someone to set this nation  into the stream of history by 
telling their national story. That was the setting  in which a court 
historian, perhaps a member of the royal family, perhaps a  priest associated with the 
Temple, or perhaps someone who was both, was  commissioned, probably by the 
king, to write the history of this Hebrew nation.  This is how the first strand 
of that material, which would later be called  "Sacred Scripture," came into 
being.  
The date was some time around the year 950 BCE. Solomon had been on the  
throne for about a decade. The Jewish people had become wealthy because tribute  
money from David's conquests was now flowing into Jerusalem. This part of the  
Middle East was at peace. The Temple, thought to be God's earthly dwelling  
place, was complete and the life of the nation was widely believed to be resting 
 safely in the arms of its two protectors, God and the King. This was the 
time to  write the story of their origins. So the work of the Yahwist writer was 
begun.  
When his story was complete, the image of Israel as God's chosen people was  
secure. It was buttressed by the claims made in this narrative. They were  
basically three: God had chosen the House of David, and thus the tribe of Judah,  
to rule over the chosen people, the will of God was expressed through the 
Temple  in which God lived as a protective presence, and the high priest 
specifically  and the Temple priesthood in general were alone designated to order the  
religious life of the nation as the sign of God's continuous blessing.  
As soon as this narrative was complete, it began to be read as part of the  
liturgy of the people gathered in the Temple for worship, as is the destiny of  
all sacred scripture. In that process this narrative with its power claims  
achieved the status of being "God's revealed truth." This idea was certainly  
encouraged by the priesthood, who were well served as the aura of sanctity 
began  to grow around these words. It also served the interests of the royal 
family  since what came to be called "God's Word" affirmed their divine right to 
rule.  The role of Jerusalem in the national life of the Jews as a symbol of the 
 people's unity was established. In this manner the vested interests of each 
of  Jerusalem's power centers were solidified. The Jewish people, so recently 
a  loose knit confederation ruled by local judges and worshiping at shrines 
located  in Hebron, Beersheba and Bethel, now found unity in a new federation 
that was  being imposed on them as nothing less than an expression of the will 
of God.  
In a world in which there was no division between Church and State (i.e.  
religion and politics), this first text to become part of the scriptures of the  
people was in fact a very political document. By tracing the Jewish story from 
 creation to the call of Abraham, this narrative had gone from the universal  
beginning of human history to the dawn of their own national history. By  
relating the stories of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph this narrative  
established, as both legitimate and moral, the Jewish claim to the land that  they had 
in fact conquered. By incorporating the ancient shrines of Hebron,  Beersheba 
and Bethel into their story they identified the religious traditions  of the 
past with a new center in Jerusalem, which was their ultimate and grander  
successor. By telling the story of the noble history of the Jews prior to  
falling into slavery in Egypt, this narrative rebuilt their national reputation.  It 
was political propaganda at its best, a powerful and effective attempt to  
define what it meant to be a Jew, a member of the "Chosen People."  
What would happen, however, if and when the Jewish nation was ever to be  
divided in civil war? Such a rebellion would have to be against the scriptures  
as well as against the Temple and the King. That was destined to occur sometime 
 after 920 and the death of Solomon. That was when the second strand of 
material  that composes the Torah today came into being. To that story, I will turn 
when  this series continues.  
John Shelby Spong  
P.S. For those wanting more information on the Asilomar Conference go to 
_www.westarinstitute.org_ (http://www.westarinstitute.org/) .  
Question and Answer
With John  Shelby Spong 
Paul from Australia writes:  
I saw your interview on "Compass" with Geraldine Doogue on Australian  
Broadcasting Company TV in 2001. It's hard to describe how good it felt to hear  
your words and how that interview led me to an indescribably wonderful freedom  
that I still don't even understand. Anyway, something I've been curious about - 
 does your wife, Christine, share your views on Christianity? And if there 
are  differences, do they ever create any tension between you two? And, second  
question, I had been in a relationship with a fundamentalist Christian girl, 
and  my rather agnostic stance ultimately meant we couldn't be together. In 
your  experience how much difference in religion can the average relationship 
handle?  
Dear Paul,  
I'm glad you saw the Geraldine Doogue program. I probably received more mail  
from that program than any I've ever done.  
You ask about whether Christine shares my views on Christianity? Prior to my  
meeting her, she was very active in her church, St. Peter's Episcopal Church 
in  Morristown, New Jersey. She was twice elected to the Vestry and, as a 
volunteer,  she ran the entire Christian Education Program of her parish for ages 
one to 99  years, she says. She also headed up the Christian Education 
Commission for the  Diocese of Newark. Growing up in England, she was a cradle 
Anglican. She is a  person of deep Christian commitment, sound judgment and a keen 
mind.  
She serves now as my editor for both this column and my books. She  
administers my professional life and accompanies me everywhere I go. She is in  every 
audience that I address and in every church where I preach. I absolutely  adore 
her and say so every chance I get.  
Does she share my perspective on Christianity? Not any more than I share  
hers. We have worked together so long and so closely that I honestly don't know  
who has influenced whom the most. I only know that I could not accomplish half 
 of what I do had she not been in my life for the last 18 plus years. I had 
been  a widower for a year and a half when we got married and I know what it 
means "to  be born again."  
In regard to your fundamentalist girlfriend and "how much difference in  
religion can the average relationship handle?" I think if one partner believes  he 
or she has the truth and if the other disagrees the other is wrong, or if one 
 partner thinks the other is going to hell, then that is too much to handle. 
If  your need to be right is greater than your need to love then the 
relationship  cannot help but be neurotic. Religion is usually not the problem. The way 
 religion is used and the role it plays in a person's security system is.  
Thank you for asking.  
John Shelby Spong 



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