Against the Gods E-Book

John D. Currid

• Herausgeber: Crossway
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 235

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

Did Moses borrow ideas from his cultural neighbors when he wrote the Pentateuch? Scholars disagree on the relationship between portions of the Old Testament and similar ancient Near Eastern accounts. Following in the footsteps of higher critics, some evangelical scholars now argue that Moses drew significantly from the worldview of his pagan contemporaries. Respected Old Testament scholar John Currid, however, pushes back against this trend by highlighting the highly polemical nature of Moses' writings. From the Genesis creation account to the story of Israel's exodus from Egypt, Currid shows how the biblical author's continually emphasized the futility of paganism in contrast with the unparalleled worldview of the Hebrews. Currid's penetrating analysis and thoughtful argumentation make this a ground-breaking resource for anyone interested in this ongoing discussion.

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“A clearly written account of a centrally important issue—the influence (or not) of ancient Near Eastern thought upon Old Testament writers. John Currid’s books and commentaries have proven invaluable, and in this additional volume, his thorough research, theological acumen, and nuanced argumentation makes it an essential requirement for ministers, theological students, and serious students of Scripture. This is an invaluable aid in furthering our understanding of the Old Testament and a loud affirmation of the Bible’s utter trustworthiness and inerrancy. A marvelous book.”

Derek Thomas, Minister of Preaching and Teaching, First Presbyterian Church, Columbia, South Carolina; Professor of Systematic Theology and Historical Theology, Reformed Theological Seminary, Atlanta

“This is a splendid introduction to the use that the Old Testament makes of the religious ideas of Israel’s ancient neighbors. Currid compares the biblical accounts of creation and the flood with the versions from neighboring cultures and shows how the Bible puts down and rejects the theological ideas of Babylon, Egypt, the Hittites, and the Canaanites. This process, which Currid terms ‘polemical theology’, serves to demonstrate the unique sovereignty of the God of Israel. This is a very positive approach to the issues raised by the extrabiblical parallels and is greatly preferable to seeing the parallels as showing the Bible as simply borrowed pagan ideas and myths.”

Gordon J. Wenham, Adjunct Professor, Old Testament, Trinity College, Bristol, England

“In this vital work John Currid presents an enormously useful approach to understanding the relationship of the Old Testament to the literature and thought of Israel’s ancient Near Eastern neighbors. This book is certainly a must read for any Old Testament scholar, yet it also provides a relevant and readable introduction for every student of Scripture.”

David W. Chapman, Professor of New Testament and Archaeology, Covenant Theological Seminary; author, Ancient Jewish and Christian Perceptions of Crucifixion

“A rising influential voice in Old Testament studies is asserting that the biblical worldview, while monotheistic, often parallels and at times pirates with minimal discrimination the pre-enlightened religious ideas and rituals of ancient Israel’s neighbors. In contrast, John Currid persuasively demonstrates in Against the Gods that the Bible’s tendency is not to appropriate but to dispute and repudiate pagan myths, ideas, identities, and customs. This important introduction to Old Testament polemical theology provides a balanced corrective to many current comparative studies.”

Jason S. DeRouchie, Associate Professor of Old Testament, Bethlehem College and Seminary

“If you’re like me, you need to know a lot more about biblical backgrounds and how to think about them. John Currid’s Against the Gods is a great place to start.”

James M. Hamilton, Associate Professor of Biblical Theology, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; author, God’s Glory in Salvation through Judgment

Against the Gods The Polemical Theology of the Old Testament

Copyright © 2013 by John D. Currid

Published by Crossway

1300 Crescent Street

Wheaton, Illinois 60187

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provided for by USA copsyright law.

Cover design and illustration: Tyler Deeb, Pedale Design

First printing 2013

Printed in the United States of America

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway. 2011 Text Edition. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

In some quotations from the ESV, the author has substituted “Yahweh” for “the LORD.”

Scripture quotations marked AT are the author's translation.

All emphases in Scripture quotations have been added by the author.

Trade paperback ISBN: 978-1-4335-3183-5 ePub ISBN: 978-1-4335-3186-6 PDF ISBN: 978-1-4335-3184-2 Mobipocket ISBN: 978-1-4335-3185-9

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Currid, John D., 1951-    Against the gods : the polemical theology of the Old Testament / John D. Currid.        1 online resource    Includes bibliographical references and index.         Description based on print version record and CIP data provided by publisher; resource not viewed.     ISBN 978-1-4335-3184-2 (pdf) -- ISBN 978-1-4335-3185-9 (mobi) -- ISBN 978-1-4335-3186-6 (epub) -- ISBN 978-1-4335-3183-5     1. Bible. O.T.—Criticism, interpretation, etc. 2. Middle Eastern literature—History and criticism. 3. Polemics—Religious aspects. I. Title. BS1171.3.C87    2013

2013004991

221.6—dc23

Crossway is a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

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1514   13   12   11   10   9   8   7   6   5   4   3   2  1

Contents

Prologue

1

A Brief History of Ancient Near Eastern Studies

2

The Nature of Polemical Thought and Writing

3

Genesis 1 and Other Ancient Near Eastern Creation Accounts

4

Ancient Near Eastern Flood Accounts and the Noahic Deluge of Genesis 6–9

5

Joseph, the Tale of the Two Brothers, and the “Spurned Seductress” Motif

6

The Birth of the Deliverer

7

The Flights of Sinuhe and Moses

8

Who Is “I Am that I Am”? Exodus 3 and the Egyptian Book of the Heavenly Cow

9

The Rod of Moses

10

The Parting of the Waters of the Red Sea

11

Canaanite Motifs

Prologue

This book is about the relationship between the writings of the Old Testament and other ancient Near Eastern literature. It is a difficult, complicated, and much-debated topic in the field of biblical studies today. To be frank, there is little consensus regarding exactly how the two relate to each other. There are extremes, to be sure: on the one hand, some believe that ancient Near Eastern studies have little to contribute to our understanding of the Old Testament and, in fact, constitute a danger to Scripture. On the other hand, there are some who would say that the Old Testament is not unique but it is merely another expression of ancient Near Eastern literature that is grounded in myth, legend, and folklore. Surely the truth lies somewhere between the two extremes. It is certainly undeniable that the historical, geographical, and cultural context of the Bible is the ancient Near East, and study of the era has much to add to our understanding of the Old Testament. But it is also true that the Old Testament worldview is unique in the ancient Near East, and this is immediately confirmed by its all-pervasive monotheism. It simply does not swallow ancient Near Eastern thought hook, line, and sinker. And so, the question for modern minds in this regard is, what precisely is the relationship of the Old Testament to ancient Near Eastern literature?

This book attempts to look at one particular slice of this large and multifaceted issue. My hope is to advance the debate a little, stir up some thoughts, and perhaps make some progress in the discussion. The book, however, is not written for scholars, although I hope some scholars may benefit from it. The work is introductory and, therefore, is designed for those who know little about the topic of polemical theology. My desire is that it might invigorate people to do further study in the Old Testament and its relationship with ancient Near Eastern culture and thought.

The study is also meant to be exemplary and not exhaustive. In other words, I do not consider every case of polemical theology in the Old Testament, nor is every example I consider done in exhaustive detail. My objective is to demonstrate that the concept of polemics is not foreign to or uncommon in the Old Testament. And, in fact, polemical writing was commonly practiced throughout the entire ancient Near East.1

The study is also not meant to be reductionistic. The relationship between the Old Testament and ancient Near Eastern literature and culture is quite complex. I am focusing on only one aspect of that relationship, and it is obviously only one lens by which to look at the material. There are numerous other lenses that ought to be employed to examine the material in order to arrive at a fully developed perspective on this vast issue. I am aware that I may be accused of being minimalistic, but that is certainly not my intention. My desire is to push things forward in order to stimulate conversation.

The main ideas of the monograph were originally presented in a series of lectures I gave at the Fall Conference at Reformed Theological Seminary–Charlotte in 2007. That three-part series was entitled, “Crass Plagiarism: The Problem of the Relationship of the Old Testament to Ancient Near Eastern Literature.” Much has been added to that seminal work, and this new material has been included in this book. In many ways, it remains a work in process, and I hope to write on the topic for years to come.

It is a pleasure to take a moment to thank those who helped in the preparation of this manuscript. First, I would like to thank my teaching assistant, Lacy Larson, for her labors in this project. I am grateful, as well, to Reformed Theological Seminary–Charlotte for granting me a study leave to produce the book. Justin Taylor of Crossway was encouraging to me from beginning to end, and I appreciate his support of this project.

1 See, for example, John D. Currid, Ancient Egypt and the Old Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1997), page 62 and note 64.

1

A Brief History of Ancient Near Eastern Studies

Ancient Near Eastern study today is a highly developed discipline that includes much modern technology, with computer analysis and data organization as dominating forces. Obviously,s this has not always been the case because at its inception in the beginning of the nineteenth century no such tools were available. As we will see, the first researchers in the discipline were those who discovered unknown languages and those who deciphered them. In reality, the serious examination and study of the cultures of the ancient Near East are relatively recent phenomena. The field of study is barely two hundred years old. Presently, the discipline is thriving, becoming specialized, and the amount of information is exploding.1 How did such a development occur in a mere two-hundred-year period? How did the discipline evolve into what it is today? This chapter will attempt to do two things: first, it will provide a cursory outline of the history of ancient Near Eastern studies and, second, it will briefly consider the relationship of that field to the field of biblical studies.

The Beginnings of Research in the Ancient Near East (1798–1872)

Prior to 1798, the world’s knowledge of the history of the ancient Near East was principally derived from the Bible and from some early Greek writers who preserved some aspects of it in their own histories. One of the more important of these historians was Herodotus, who lived in the fifth century BC. He introduced his history with a famous statement:

I, Herodotus of Halicarnassus, am here setting forth my history, that time may not draw the color from what man has brought into being, nor those great and wonderful deeds, manifested by both Greeks and barbarians, fail of their report, and, together with all this, the reason why they fought one another.2

One of Herodotus’s primary goals in writing a history was to give explanation and understanding to the hostilities between the Greeks and the Persians that occurred in the first half of the fifth century BC. Part of his work included some information about the histories of Egypt, Babylon, Assyria, Phoenicia, and other areas of the ancient Near East. Much of his testimony came from oral tradition that was provided by contemporary natives of the fifth century BC, such as the priests of Egypt. The trustworthiness of Herodotus’s history is a matter of raging debate: to some he is “the father of history,” and to others he is “the father of lies.” 3 No matter, the evidence of the history of the ancient Near East prior to the nineteenth century was paltry.

Archaeology was of little help before the nineteenth century in providing evidence for our understanding of the ancient Near East. The field of archaeology was in existence before that century; modern fieldwork had begun with organized digs at Herculaneum, located on the Bay of Naples, in AD 1738:4

Tunnels dug at Herculaneum led to the recovery of magnificent statuary now housed in the Naples Museum. Karl Weber drew some very accurate architectural plans during these early excavations. The digs were eventually suspended at Herculaneum because of the great problem of having to chop through meters of volcanic residue that covered the site.5

Excavations at Pompeii soon followed, beginning in 1748. The first buildings to be excavated included “the smaller theatre (or Odeon, 1764), the Temple of Isis (1764), the so-called Gladiator’s barracks (1767), and the Villa of Diomedes outside the Herculaneum Gate (1771).” 6

Systematic archaeological work in the Near East, however, did not begin until the turn into the nineteenth century. The first great stride in the field was in Egyptian research. In 1798 Napoleon invaded Egypt. He brought with him a scientific expedition of scholars, architects, and draftsmen whose primary purpose was to survey the ancient monuments of Egypt. The account of their findings was published in a series of tomes, from 1809–1829, titled Description de l’Egypte.7 This exploration was important because Egypt was the first ancient land of the Near East rediscovered in modern times: it opened up the eyes of the West to a vast ancient civilization. When Napoleon’s army gathered at the base of the pyramids to engage the Mameluke army in battle (July 21, 1798), Napoleon said to his troops, “Soldiers! From atop these pyramids, fifty centuries look down upon you!” This message was not merely encouragement for the French expeditionary force; it was intended for all Europe.

In regard to the future of Egyptian archaeology, Napoleon’s expedition made a most important discovery: the Valley of the Kings.8 From the Eighteenth–Twentieth Dynasties, which is the New Kingdom period of Egyptian history (c. 1550–1070 BC), the Egyptian rulers at Thebes built for themselves royal tombs on the west side of the Nile River.9 The Valley of the Kings contains more than sixty tombs, although not all of them belong to royalty. This area, of course, became a central spot for excavation work beginning in the middle of the nineteenth century and continuing today. The most famous discovery here was the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamen by the archaeologist Howard Carter in 1922.

The reality is that no real advances could be made until the hieroglyphic language was deciphered, which leads us to consider the most significant find of the Napoleonic excursion: the Rosetta Stone (1799):

It proved to be invaluable because it was the key to unlocking ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, a picture script unutilized for over fourteen hundred years. Dating to the time of King Ptolemy V (204–180 BC), the Rosetta Stone is inscribed in three scripts: demotic, Greek, and hie­roglyphs. The Greek proved to be a translation of the ancient Egyptian language on the stone.10

The English physician Thomas Young (1819) and the French philologist Jean-François Champollion (1822) performed linguistic work on the stone, and they were able to decipher the hieroglyphic language. The cracking of the language was an important step. As Andrews comments, it “marked the beginning of the scientific reading of hieroglyphs and the first step toward formulation of a system of ancient Egyptian grammar, the basis of modern Egyptology.” 11 Thus, this early find by the Napoleonic expedition proved to be one of the greatest discoveries ever as it opened up the world of ancient Egypt.

The decipherment of hieroglyphs not only led to the discovery of ancient Egypt as a highly civilized culture worthy of investigation; it was also seen as important for the study of the Old Testament. For example, the work of Champollion soon bore fruit with the translation of a monumental triumphal relief on the Bubastite Portal of the main temple of Amon at Karnak.12 The relief provides striking verification of the biblical account of Shishak’s invasion of Judah and Israel in the tenth century BC (see 1 Kings 14:25–26 and 2 Chron. 12:2–4).

Archaeological work also began in Mesopotamia in the first half of the nineteenth century. Georges Roux comments:

But in 1843 Paul Emile Botta, Italian-born French consul in Mosul, started at Khorsabad the first archaeological excavations in Iraq, discovered the Assyrians and opened a new era. Almost at once (1845) an Englishman, Sir Henry Layard, followed his example at Nimrud and Nineveh, and soon a number of tells were excavated.13

Based on these excavations, scholars began to reconstruct the history of Mesopotamia, including the lands of Assyria and Babylonia. In this early period of discovery, Mesopotamia yielded many more monuments and inscriptions relevant to the history of the Old Testament than did Egypt. For instance, the annals of Sargon II were found at this time, and the king called himself “the conqueror of Samaria and of the entire country of Israel.” In these same annals, Sargon II says that he deported 27,290 upper-class citizens from Israel and replaced them with peoples from other nations. He made Israel an Assyrian province, placed a governor over it, and exacted heavy tribute from the inhabitants. Thus Israel, the northern kingdom, met its end and ceased to exist. The annals of Sargon II provide helpful information about this important period.

For the scholarship of this time, there was a general sense of innocent discovery. Certainly the researchers recognized some problems with harmonization of ancient Near Eastern history and biblical history, but there does not appear to have been a dominant hermeneutic of suspicion in the academy. When, for example, the influential Society of Biblical Archaeology was founded in 1870, one of the founding members, Samuel Birch of the British Museum, made the following remarks to the first official meeting of the society:

It is true that these results have not been obtained without difficulties. There has been some conflict between Assyrian and Jewish history, and although Assyrian scholars, dealing with the special subject of Assyria, naturally lean with favour to the information monuments of Nineveh afford, it is by no means sure that the Assyrians, especially in speaking of foreign nations, may not have recorded errors. As the research advances, the difficulty of reconciling the chronology of the Assyrians and the Jews will melt away before the additional monuments that may be acquired. There is nothing to alarm the exegetical critic in the slight discrepancies that always present themselves in the world’s history when the same fact is differently recorded by the actors in some national struggle.14

Although Birch may be accused of naivete, in reality the most that can be said about him with certainty is that he was not prescient. For indeed, right around the corner—in fact, in an article just about to be published in the journal of Birch’s own society—George Smith announced that he had discovered an Assyrian account of the flood.15 Everything was about to change.

The Period of Suspicion Begins (1873–1905)

Although we will deal with the ancient Near Eastern flood accounts in chapter 4 of this work, it is important to mention the discovery of the Assyrian flood story because it is a watershed event in the history of ancient Near Eastern studies. Smith began his report with the following statement:

A short time back I discovered among the Assyrian tablets in the British Museum, an account of the flood; which, under the advice of our President, I now bring before the Society.16

After translating and commenting on the Assyrian text of the flood, Smith concluded the following:

In conclusion I would remark that this account of the Deluge opens to us a new field of inquiry in the early part of Bible history. The question has often been asked, “What is the origin of the accounts of the antediluvians, with their long lives so many times greater than the longest span of human life? Where was Paradise, the abode of the first parents of mankind? From whence comes the story of the flood, of the ark, of the birds?” Various conflicting answers have been given to these important questions, while evidence on these subjects before the Greek period has been entirely wanting. The cuneiform inscriptions are now shedding a new light on these questions, and supplying material which future scholars will have to work out.17

This publication received immediate scholarly response, and as Alexander Heidel points out, “it created a tremendous enthusiasm throughout Europe and gave a great impetus to the study of cuneiform inscriptions in general.” 18

Many scholars of the time concluded that the Hebrew account of the flood was directly dependent on the earlier Mesopotamian texts. It is true that the Mesopotamian flood stories predate the Old Testament by centuries. So from a simple chronological consideration, these scholars inferred that the biblical flood account evolved from the Mesopotamian story. Friedrich Delitzsch is a prime example of that mind-set because he “drew sharp attention to the Babylonian ingredient in Genesis, and went on to conclude that the Bible was guilty of crass plagiarism.” 19 S. R. Driver, when considering ancient Near Eastern creation accounts, argued “that we have in the first chapter of Genesis the Hebrew version of an originally Babylonian legend respecting the beginning of all things.” 20

Scholars of the later nineteenth–early twentieth centuries did not believe that the Hebrew writers merely borrowed Mesopotamian myths, leaving it at that. No, indeed; there was a second step, and that was that the biblical authors had stripped the Mesopotamian accounts of pagan elements. In other words, they had gone to great lengths to sanitize and “Yahwize” the myths. Friedrich Delitzsch, for instance, said, “the priestly scholar who composed Gen. chap. i endeavoured, of course, to remove all possible mythological features of this creation story.” 21 Driver concluded that “no archaeologist questions that the Biblical cosmogony, however altered and stripped of its original polytheism is, in its main outlines, derived from Babylonia.” 22

Although they believed that the biblical accounts of creation and the flood were stripped of their original polytheism and of many other pagan elements, many of these early scholars believed that some remnants of those elements remained in the text. A classic example is the contention that the word tehom (“deep”) in Genesis 1:2 is a remnant of Mesopotamian myth. Supposedly it relates to Tiamat, the goddess of the deep sea who was a foe of the creator-god Marduk. In the Mesopotamian account, Marduk had to vanquish Tiamat in order to bring about creation. Delitzsch commented,

The priestly author that wrote the first chapter of Genesis took infinite pains to eliminate all mythological features from his story of the creation of the world. But since his story begins with the gloomy, watery chaos which bears precisely the same name as Tiamat, namely Tehom, . . . it will be seen that there is a very close relationship between the Biblical and the Babylonian story of the creation of the world.23

This connection between the two accounts has become accepted as fact in much literature of the twentieth–twenty-first centuries, and has almost reached the status of a sacred cow in some quarters.24

New Horizons (1906–1940)

Discovery of other cultures of the ancient Near East and their literatures came more slowly than in the cases of Egypt and Mesopotamia. Canaanite culture, for example, was known primarily from the Bible prior to the discovery of the Ugaritic texts at Ras Shamra beginning with the excavations there in 1929 and following. The parallels between the Old Testament and the literature of Ras Shamra are ubiquitous. I will not consider them at this point because the final chapter of this book is a study of the relationship between Ugarit and Israel.

An important year in ancient Near Eastern studies was 1906, when excavations began at the Hittite city of Bogazkoy (Hattusa). There archaeologists discovered thousands of inscriptions in several languages that make it possible for historians to piece together the basic history and culture of the Hittites. Hugo Winkler, the chief archaeologist, uncovered the royal Hittite archives, in which approximately 10,000 clay tablets were found. Some of these were written in the Akkadian language, but most were in Hittite. Within ten years of its discovery, the Hittite language had been deciphered. The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago started the Chicago Hittite Dictionary (CHD) project in 1975, and it has made great strides in formulating a complete dictionary of the Hittite language.

One factor that played a considerable role in nineteenth-century ancient Near Eastern studies was the desire of the investigators “of making discoveries that would throw light on biblical history.” 25 That was no longer the case in the twentieth century, as researchers began studying cultures of the ancient Near East on their own merits and for their own sakes.26 The German excavations at Bogazkoy are an example of this latter trend. This shift does not mean, however, that the remains found at Bogazkoy did not shed light on the Old Testament, only that it was not a primary purpose of the investigation. For example, George Mendenhall did some groundbreaking work by demonstrating the striking parallels between the covenant forms in the Old Testament and the covenant-treaties found in the Hittite archives at Bogazkoy from the fifteenth–thirteenth centuries BC.27

During this period, ancient Near Eastern studies were given a continuous supply of new literature as archaeologists uncovered major cuneiform archives. One of these came from the site of Nuzi, which was excavated between 1925 and 1933.28 Nuzi was a Hurrian administrative center located in modern northern Iraq, and the excavations revealed thousands of tablets dealing with the administration of the city. These documents covered a wide range of topics, including politics, religion, and law.29 Although not a goal of the excavations, the literature found at Nuzi does enlighten our understanding of biblical history. The Nuzi documents describe customs of the Hurrians that were similar to the practices of the early Hebrews such as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In particular, they give a picture of inheritance rights, marriage practices, and adoption customs that parallel those in use during the patriarchal period of Israel’s history.

Thousands of tablets were also uncovered from the Middle Bronze II levels at Mari, a large site in western Mesopotamia. The excavations, begun in the 1930s, found some 20,000 cuneiform tablets in the archives of the city’s main palace.30 A majority of the documents are economic and administrative in nature. The setting described by the Mari tablets is quite similar to the patriarchal period of biblical history.31 For instance,

. . . both portray a dimorphic society, that is, a social dichotomy between tribal chieftains, like Abraham, and powerful urban centers. This is evidenced in both Genesis and the Mari texts by customs of economic exchanges between the city dwellers and nomads, the concept of “resident aliens,” and the common practice of camping in the vicinity of towns. The social structures in both literatures are organized the same way with three tiers: extended family, clan, and tribe. Other customs are quite similar, such as census taking, inheritance laws, covenant oaths, and the prominence of genealogies. The same personal and place names are found in the literary corpus of each culture: for example, Haran and Nahor.32

Consequently, the period encompassing most of the first half of the twentieth century was one of discovery. Thousands upon thousands of tablets were found in various languages mostly unknown before this time. In addition, the first areas of discovery in the ancient Near East from the nineteenth century—in Egypt and Mesopotamia—continued to supply more and more linguistic information to aid scholars in understanding and reconstructing their cultures. Archaeology was helpful in these tasks as it came of age as a discipline in the time between the two world wars. It “jettisoned, for the most part, any image it had of mere treasure-hunting.” 33 The field developed sophisticated techniques and methodology in excavation, as well as scholarly competence.34

The Age of Synthesis (1945–Present)

Since the end of the Second World War, discovery of new languages and cultures in the ancient Near East has slowed down considerably. The great exception is the finding of an archive at Ebla (Tell Mardikh) in 1976.35