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The Lost World of the Torah: Law As Covenant and Wisdom In

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The Lost World of the Torah: Law As Covenant and Wisdom In THE LOST WORLD OF THE TORAH LAW AS COVENANT AND WISDOM IN ANCIENT CONTEXT JOHN H. WALTON & J. HARVEY WALTON InterVarsity Press P.O. Box 1400, Downers Grove, IL 60515-1426 ivpress.com [email protected] ©2019 by John H. Walton and J. Harvey Walton All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from InterVarsity Press. InterVarsity Press® is the book-publishing division of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA®, a movement of students and faculty active on campus at hundreds of universities, colleges, and schools of nursing in the United States of America, and a member movement of the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students. For information about local and regional activities, visit intervarsity.org. All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV ®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com. The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™ Cover design: David Fasset Interior design: Beth McGill Images: glittering silver background: © Nastco / iStock / Getty Images Plus starry sky: © Micael Malmberg / EyeEm / Getty Images Bible passages: © Ipkoe / iStock / Getty Images Plus black slate: © xamtiw / iStock / Getty Images Plus blue sky: © czekma13 / iStock / Getty Images Plus code of Hammurabi: © jsp / iStock / Getty Images Michelangelo’s Moses: © powerofforever / iStock / Getty Images Plus ISBN 978-0-8308-7257-2 (digital) ISBN 978-0-8308-5241-3 (print) Contents Introduction 1 Part 1: Methodology Proposition 1: The Old Testament Is an Ancient Document 9 Proposition 2: The Way We Interpret the Torah Today Is Influenced by the Way We Think Law and Legislation Work 18 Part 2: Function of Ancient Near Eastern Legal Collections Proposition 3: Legal Collections in the Ancient World Are Not Legislation 25 Proposition 4: Ancient Near Eastern Legal Collections Teach Wisdom 32 Proposition 5: The Torah Is Similar to Ancient Near Eastern Legal Collections and Therefore Also Teaches Wisdom, Not Legislation 37 Proposition 6: The Israelite Covenant Effectively Functions as an Ancient Near Eastern Suzerainty Treaty 46 Proposition 7: Holiness Is a Status, Not an Objective 54 Part 3: Ritual and Torah Proposition 8: Ancient Near Eastern Ritual Served to Meet the Needs of the Gods 65 Proposition 9: Ancient Israelite Ritual Serves to Maintain Covenant Order Because Yahweh Has No Needs 70 Part 4: Context of the Torah Proposition 10: The Torah Is Similar to Ancient Near Eastern Legal Collections Because It Is Embedded in the Same Cultural Context, Not Because It Is Dependent on Them 83 Proposition 11: The Differences Between the Torah and the Ancient Near Eastern Legal Collections Are Found Not in Legislation but in the Order Founded in the Covenant 89 Excursus: Observations About Composition 94 Proposition 12: Torah Is Situated in Context of the Ancient World 99 Proposition 13: Torah Is Situated in the Context of the Covenant 104 Proposition 14: Torah Is Situated in the Context of Israelite Theology Regarding Yahweh’s Presence Residing Among Them 112 Part 5: Ongoing Significance of the Torah Proposition 15: Discussions of Law in the New Testament Do Not Tell Us Anything About Old Testament Torah in Context 121 Proposition 16: The Torah Should Not Be Divided into Categories to Separate Out What Is Relevant 133 Proposition 17: Torah Was Never Intended to Provide Salvation 154 Proposition 18: Divine Instruction Can Be Understood as a Metaphor of Health Rather Than a Metaphor of Law 161 Proposition 19: We Cannot Gain Moral Knowledge or Build a System of Ethics Based on Reading the Torah in Context and Deriving Principles from It 167 Proposition 20: Torah Cannot Provide Prooftexts for Solving Issues Today 183 Proposition 21: The Ancient Israelites Would Not Have Understood the Torah as Providing Divine Moral Instruction 191 Proposition 22: A Divine Command Theory of Ethics Does Not Require that the Torah Is Moral Instruction 200 Proposition 23: Taking the Torah Seriously Means Understanding What It Was Written to Say, Not Converting It into Moral Law 209 Summary of Conclusions 223 Appendix: The Decalogue 231 Further Reading 259 Subject Index 263 Scripture Index 267 Praise for The Lost World of the Torah 273 About the Authors 275 More Titles from InterVarsity Press 277 Introduction In English we use the expression “law and order ” This sort of construction is known as a hendiadys—two nouns joined by and expressing a single idea (cf “assault and battery”) In this expression, order is the objective and law is the means of achieving it Law is not the only way to achieve order; others would include ethics and customs of etiquette (“little ethics”) Society is regulated by mores and taboos that dictate what constitutes orderly (or disorderly) conduct Such regulations can be formal or informal, enforced by outside agency or by social pressure, oral or written, explicit or implicit They can be normative throughout society or subject to differences of opinion (for example, based on conflicting ideas between generations) Order is generally associated with a particular understanding of what consti- tutes the common good Law is not limited to what is perceived as moral behavior For ex- ample, traffic laws, though essential for order, are not moral in nature At the same time, perceptions of foundational morality are often em- bodied in law, but not always In fact, some people would agree that some laws should be judged immoral and therefore should be resisted (e g , racial segregation laws) The objective of law is order, and moral behavior is often one aspect of order In modern Western societies, law is formal, written (codified), and enforced by agencies and institutions (police, judiciary) Such an approach to legislation is referred to as “statutory law ” Given how deeply entrenched this idea of law is, it is 2 The Lost World of the Torah instinctive for us to imagine that law in other societies functions in the same way That is one of the major presuppositions that will be challenged in the following chapters In conjunction with assumptions about how law works, people have assumptions about how the Bible works—how it should be inter- preted In our modern world, our handling of what we call the “bib- lical law” teeters between heated controversy and utter neglect Con- troversies arise when Old Testament laws seem either odd beyond comprehension (not eating lobster) or morally reprehensible (exe- cuting children) Neglect results when we consider the law obsolete, no longer carrying any normative power (tassels on clothing, sacri- fices) Even readers who do attempt to make use of the Old Testament “law” often find it either irrelevant or so confusing that they throw up their hands in despair, frustrated at its perceived impenetrability De- spite the extremes of vitriol and dismissiveness, people—sometimes the same people who are controversial or dismissive—continue to propose moral principles from these laws and garner prooftexts to resolve the issues that arise in society by offering the “biblical view ” As a result, both Christians and skeptics regularly abuse the Old Tes- tament Law as it is misrepresented and misunderstood, and its true message too often lies either fallow or trampled underfoot If we seek to be faithful interpreters we need to be readers who read the text in an informed and careful manner, who are consistent in the methods that we use, who refuse to manipulate the text to our own ends, and who respect the autonomy under which divine authority operates 1 We must interpret in light of a sound understanding of the language and literature of the text, including how the genre works We must be committed to seeking what the original communicators in- tended to say—no more, no less We dare not incorporate ideas into 1See discussion in John H Walton and D Brent Sandy, The Lost World of Scripture: Ancient Literary Culture and Biblical Authority (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2013), 284-87, where we referred to this as competent, ethical, and virtuous reading Introduction 3 the text that were not in their purview Beyond these acts of interpre- tation, we must commit to being responsive to the text Differences of opinion may well exist as to what that response ought to be, but tradi- tionally many have agreed that in its most general sense it involves being the sort of people who represent God well in the world (whatever that entails) as we participate in his plans and purposes As faithful interpreters of Law—more accurately, Torah—we must therefore seek understanding of how the genre works, what the paragraphs of legal sayings meant in their context, and what significance (if any) they should have for people today seeking to order their lives and society in faithful submission to God’s word The most important interpretive question is not, “what is this statement telling me to do in order to represent God properly?” The question we should ask first is, “why is this in here?”—because that will help us address the literary task It is the first objective of this book to provide information about the Torah that will help readers to become more aware of how this biblical literature functioned in its context—that is, why this literature was presented in this particular way, and why what it says in this form was important enough to be regarded as Scripture
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