Technorati Tags: Gabriel Revelation, Gabriel Stone, National Geographic

Technorati Tags: ZIBBC, Zondervan

Technorati Tags: anthropology, Bible, nephesh, soul, spirit

Joshua

This portion of volume 2 is written by Rick Hess. There’s simply no better choice in the evangelical orbit for a commentary on Joshua. Hess is one of my favorite scholars. Anything he writes is worth reading. The Joshua contribution is a model of how literary form and cognate material is useful for interpretation. Hess is well-versed in ANE literature and this contributions shows it. Particularly helpful in this regard are his introductory essay on how the book is framed with certain ANE literature in mind and his material on parallels to historical annals.

All that said, the reader may feel some disappointment with the Joshua contribution. Hess makes it clear that he isn’t going to focus on the dating controversy of the book and the exodus from Egypt–things one would find in a text-focused commentary. Hess’s strengths are cognate literature and linguistic analysis, not archaeology. The commentary really has nothing to offer in terms of any pottery analysis, an issue (again) crucial for the chronological question. However, it is also germane with respect to whether we have a conquest, migration, or indigenous origin of Israel in Canaan, and so it seems to me that this should have received more attention. Another disappointment some may express over Hess’s contribution is the fact that he substantially ignores the work of early date scholars who have written on Jericho (Bryant Wood), Ai (Livingstone), pottery and chronology (Bimson), and the general oversight on the part of commentators that the biblical text actually describes *few* destructions in the conquest and allows for at least a partial non-violent migratory entrance into the land (Merrill, Mattingly). One can see how all this could be ignored in the name of avoiding the chronological issue, but all of this work relates directly to the entrance into the land (no matter when that was). Readers will not get much exposure to the questions these writers raise in terms of the archaeology of the conquest in Hess’s treatment.

Judges

This portion of volume 2 was written by another favorite scholar of mine, Dan Block. Block is well known for his work on Judges (and Ezekiel). As with the Joshua portion, Block’s treatment is rich in its exposure to cognate literary parallels and artifacts that illustrate various items in the book.  Unlike Joshua, Block devotes a good bit of space to chronological issues, and his material here is very helpful. On pages 98-99 he has a detailed table of parallel chronologies covering the Hittites, Babylonians, Egyptians (high and low chronology), Early and Late date schemes for the exodus, and the Levant in general. Block also has an excellent table that illustrates how the chronological language in Judges (e.g., lengths of judgeships) affects the dating of the exodus and conquest. He is quite fair to both sides, taking care to explain how each position would handle the data.

Aside from these chronological matters, there are helpful sidebar discussion on baalism and the “Yahweh and his Asherah” material. The latter issue deserved much more attention than it received, though. I was a bit surprised at the brevity. Personally, I found his excurses on literary parallels to the Gideon’s fleece incident and Hammurabi’s laws and concubinage the most interesting. I have an interest in Israelite divination and so I really appreciated the former.

Ruth

As a short book, I don’t want my brief comments on Ruth to be taken as though there was little of interest in Dale Manor’s contribution. Not so. Granted, Ruth lacks the pizzazz of Joshua and Judges for me (it’s like comparing movies a guy would like — warfare, destruction, action — to a chick click. I’m just not as intrigued. But that said, I was struck by how much background information Manor could come up with for Ruth. There’s a lot in here — agricultural customs and practices, marriage customs, field work — that really matters for the book. Manor has a very interesting sidebar on the “Widow in Ancient Society” that was informative. One quibble, though. The explanation of levirate marriage, so critical to this book, really ought to have been longer and more detailed. I really don’t think it was sufficient.

1-2 Samuel

Both portions of the books of Samuel were written by the capable Phil Long, know for his work in OT historiography and these two books. His excursus on the Hab/piru was clear, concise and well done. I also liked the extended discussion on Dagon. He produced a startling number of artifacts (artistic, iconographical) that illumined both books. This was the first time I was really taken back by the amount of material that could be marshaled for these two books. We usually associate background material with books of the Pentateuch or Joshua, assuming that the early monarchy doesn’t have as much “cool stuff” that opens the text for us. Not so.

In light of this richness of data, I was very surprised at two omissions. First, it was hard for me to believe that there was no discussion of the recent work on Aren Maeir’s archaeological work that put forth a strong case that instead of “hemorrhoids” the five golden ‘opalim delivered to Israel as guilt offerings for capturing the ark were uncircumcised penises. The discovery at the Philistine cities of Gath and Ashkelon of situlae (small vial-shaped flasks) in the form of uncircumcised penises prompted Maeir’s proposal (and the word ‘opalim can point to this meaning as well). As Maeir states in a 2008 article, the Philistines offered the penis-shaped vessels because Yahweh had afflicted them with some sort of penile dysfunction, not hemorrhoids. Whether Long buys this interpretation or not (I find it coherent), it should have been included in the discussion.¹  Second, it also struck me that no mention was made of David Howard’s article detailing Gerbrandt’s work on how kingship was expected and permissible in Israel.  This wouldn’t be backgrounding per se, but it at least deserved a mention.

Now some (slight) criticisms for the publisher. I couldn’t help wondering what the point was on page 294 to include an artistic rendering of Dagon before the ark. There was nothing authentic about the modern rendering, so what value does it offer? I liked the picture (at least the cherubim in it actually resembled real cherubim iconography), but in a commentary focused on artifactual data, this seemed pretty odd. Also strange was the placement of an excursus on monotheism on page 446 — coinciding with 2 Samuel 8, David’s growing empire, which has ZERO to do with monotheism. The material was good, but I’d expect it would be better place in a half dozen other locations — how about exodus, especially since the excursus featured a picture of a bust of Akhenaten! Well, at least it made it in.

Technorati Tags: ZIBBC, Zondervan

1. When nephesh is described as being in sheol, does the term refer to only the inner part, the body, or the totality? It seems that if Sheol refers to the grave, the answer would be “totality.”  See Psa 16:10; 30:3; Psa 56:13.

Psa 16:10 isn’t hard to parse in my view.

For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol,

or let your holy one see corruption.

I think it’s pretty clear that this verse sees the total person (body and soul). But there are two interpretive options here.

A. The word translated “corruption” here is shachat, a word that often means “pit” elsewhere (cf. Ezek. 19:4; Job 9:31; Psa 7:15). As such, there is parallelism between “Sheol” and “pit”. They obviously both mean grave (hole in the ground). The verse therefore could be a statement of physical deliverance from death. This seems the most coherent view. Since death involved the cessation of life in terms of both body and its animation, we’d have a “whole person” reference here if the psalmist is talking about physical deliverance from lethal danger.

B. The statement could also be a statement of afterlife deliverance from Sheol, in which case, the immaterial part of a person goes to Sheol and the body does not. That idea may be expressed more clearly in other verses (see below), but it has problems here. Here’s how the verse would break down:

For you will not abandon my soul (inner immaterial part) to Sheol (the Underworld),

or let your holy one (the body?) see the pit (the grave).

“Holy one” would have to stand in place of the body. This is a bit of a stretch. We’d also have to separate Sheol from the pit and have one refer to the Underworld while the other doesn’t - it refers only to the dirt grave. Do we have any reason to do that other than what we “see” in the verse (in other words, is exegesis producing interpretation, or vice versa)?

Option A is just easier and free of problems. Occam’s razor.¹

How about Psalm 30:3?

O Lord, you have brought up my soul from Sheol;

you restored me to life from among those who go down to the pit.

Here we have the same Sheol/pit parallel, but “pit” is a different (very common) Hebrew word (bor). It’s a hole in the ground (see Gen 37:20 for where the word is used - familiar story).

The verb “restored me to life” is the common verb chayah (”to make or keep alive”; “revive”). It’s easy to see how this text also refers to physical deliverance from fatal harm, and is not commenting on the afterlife. The same problems in Psalm 16 are present here.

Here’s Psa 56:13

For you have delivered my soul from death,

yes, my feet from falling,

that I may walk before God

in the light of life.

This is also pretty easy to identify as physical deliverance (the psalmist wants to continue in the “light of life” — and one can walk before God in this life (cf. Gen 17:1-2 for the same phrase).

2. But then what about passages that have the ruach apparently disembodied?  See Eccl 3:21; Eccl 12:7 (it appears the ruach “goes” somewhere after death; it leaves the body).

Here are the two verses:

Eccl. 3:21 - Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward and the spirit of the beast goes down into the earth?

Eccl 12:7 - and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.

The first one perhaps targets some cultural or religious belief that there is a difference between humans and animals when it comes to death and the afterlife (”who knows”), but whatever that is isn’t made clear. I think both verses taken in tandem do point to the idea that, upon death, the spirit — the immaterial part of a human being, the thing which animates the body, the “life spark” if you will, returns to God who is perceived as dwellign above the firmament / heavens. Does this refer to afterlife, or isit more general?  Here’s what I mean.

Let’s start with the general idea. This could speak universally in the sense that the ancient writer conceived of the “life spark”, which was originally imparted to humaity by God (Gen 2:7) returns to God at death. The body would go to the grave. The problem, then, would be matching this upwith the idea of Sheol. It is clear there is some sort of consciousness associated with the afterlife, even in Sheol. How is this possible without the “thing” (spirit/soul) in which the inner life is associated in the rest of the Hebrew Bible? If that’s “outta here” then how can there be ANY afterlife in Sheol?

Now for the second option: this language speaks of the “dust” (a euphemism for the body, since it was created from “the dust of the ground”; cf. Genesis 2:7) returning to the ground –but here conceived of as the Underworld–and the spirit (the immaterial part) returning to God in a salvation-afterlife sense. In other words, it’s poetic language for a positive afterlife with the body staying behind. This is possible in Israelite thinking, since the subject of a physical resurrection is asserted only in texts that are demonstrably late (Ezekiel and Daniel 12).² To be consistent with the rest of the canon, one would have to argue that such salvation is only for the righteous, not all.

My inclination here is to go with the first view with a slight adjustment. “Sheol” is simply a cosmic-geographical conception that refers to TWO “places” in Israelite thinking: (1) “where everyone goes when they die” and (2) “where the unrighteous remain after going there when they die.” This double-duty of the word is important.

It seems to me that these verses in Ecclesiastes do *not* contradict the ideas I’ve blogged before related to the negative and positive view of the afterlife in the OT: everyone dies and goes “to the great beyond” (a general description even we use today to refer to the “spiritual realm”; Sheol referent #1); the righteous among them go to be with the Lord (there’s the spirit departing to God idea from Ecclesiastes) and the unrighteous do not (they remain in Sheol, which is anything but pleasant - Sheol referent #2). Those in Sheol have a conscious afterlife because their spirit — which, having left the body now belongs to the “spiritual realm”–hasn’t left Sheol to go anywhere else. The righteous also have a conscious afterlife because their spirit is just at a different address in the “spiritual realm.” As I’ve noted before, this isn’t as developed as the NT thinking, but it’s one the same page for sure.

3. What about passages where ruach and nephesh both occur?  Are they distinguished or are they “parallel” to each other?  Here’s the list of the ones that matter (i.e., ruling out clear references to wind or God’s spirit):

Job 7:11

“Therefore I will not restrain my mouth;

I will speak in the anguish of my spirit;

I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.

1 Sam 1:15

But Hannah answered, “No, my lord, I am a woman troubled in spirit. I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I have been pouring out my soul before the Lord.

It would be silly to think that one set of emotions come from the spirit and another set comes from the soul. We’ve already seen that the terms overlap with each other in a whole range of emotions. They are clearly parallel and synonyms here in both passages.

Job 12:10

In his hand is the life of every living thing

and the breath of all mankind.

The terms are also synonyms here, by virtue of the abundant references for each term as referring to life itself and breath (a “vital sign”).

Isa 26:9

My soul yearns for you in the night;

my spirit within me earnestly seeks you.

For when your judgments are in the earth,

the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness.

The terms are also synonyms here since, as we saw in past posts, both refer to inner yearning when used separately.

Now for some additional questions to tackle:

1. What about Old Testament thinking about the “heart”? Does this point to a third part of a human being, or does it overlap with nephesh and ruach?

2. What about the OT shema statements (”You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might”)?  How should these be understood? Do they contribute anything to the discussion?

3. What about New Testament statements that apparently distinguish between soul and spirit?  (For example, Hebrews 4:12).

Technorati Tags: anthropology, nephesh, ruach, Sheol, soul, spirit

I was looking for specific items in the treatments of Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. Let’s take the books in order:

Leviticus

Roy Gane’s ZIBBC Leviticus is strong in several respects. There is an abundance of connections made to wider ANE law codes and ritual practices, along with judicious comments from a variety of modern secondary sources that provide insight into the often strange language and imagery of Leviticus. For example, there is a Hittite parallel to the act of a priest laying his hand on the head of the sacrificial animal; parallel descriptions of the use of witnesses to establish guilt, the use of incense in the ancient world, and tables comparing the penalties for adultery and other sexual offenses in Leviticus with Mesopotamian laws.

Gane has a rather lengthy discussion of The Day of Atonement ritual (Leviticus 16), taking particular care to go through the options on the meaning of the goat “for Azazel.”  I agree with his conclusion, that Azazel refers to some sort of desert demon.  For reasons Gane notes, this is the most coherent explanation.

Regarding the rationale for ritual, sacrifice, clean and unclean, Gane offers several explanatory trajectories. He seems to lean toward Milgrom’s notion that the guiding rationale for all this is to teach the value of life and bless the life-Giver, and the rejection of death. I’m not sure he ever cites the work of Mary Douglas, whose contributions to ritual study and the OT is significant.  She isn’t in his bibliography, but she may be cited in the extensive footnotes. I read through a few pages of them, but not all of them.

Gane also devotes a full page sidebar to divination. He confirms some obvious (but uncomfortable to some) points, namely that divinatory practices like casting lots and the Urim and Thummim were not all that unusual. While it is true that outside Israel such practices and many others proliferated, Gane tends to downplay the extent of divination in Israel, though, failing to note biblical and archaeological evidence for “astral prophecy” and the association of oracular sites associated with “divine trees.” Another example is when he writes that necromancy was condemned because it “purported to draw on superhuman power apart from God.” In a worldview where the unseen world was believed to be heavily populated with divine beings (under the ultimate authority of the God of Israel), such contact would not have been viewed as merely “purported”.  In fact, if we believe in the unseen world, a world that regularly features contact with humans, why would we view it this way — why not view it as factually real?  It makes little sense for God to give a law abotu something that can’t happen. That’s akin to commanding “thou shalt not fly” in the Torah. The reason there were laws against necromancy is because it did work, and an Israelite was not to be involved with any divine/demonic entity other than the God of Israel.

As with my previous posts, these mild criticisms shouldn’t diminish the value of the contribution. Most Bible students aren’t going to enter the quagmire of scholarly commentaries on Leviticus!  Gane has provided a wonderful concise, coherent resource for tapping into the relevant background material for this neglected book.

Numbers

For Numbers (written by R. Dennis Cole) I was specifically interested in the treatment of the ritual test for adultery (Numb 5), the Balaam incident (Numb 22-23), and the itinerary of the journey from Egypt to the Promised Land  (Numb 33).

I was a bit disappointed with the discussion of the adultery trial by ordeal in Numbers 5. On one hand, the discussion did note that the ritual, as odd as it seems to us, does empower the accused woman in that it at least provides some means to avoid an accusing husband of seeing to it that his wife is punished without any evidence at all. One the other hand, there isn’t any discussion of how the ritual was actually supposed to render a correct verdict. Ultimately, one has to embrace the idea that Yahweh would effect the result that brought punishment for one truly guilty. I was also puzzled by the comment Cole makes that “the Torah in fact legislates against any kind of class system.” I don’t see how this is true. Women could not inherit property in the Torah. The account fo the daughters of Zelophahad in Numbers 27 is the exception that proves the rule. These women had to appeal directly to Moses in this regard precisely because there was no provision in the law for inheriting the property in the absence of a male in the family.

The Balaam incident discussion is excellent. Two full pages are devoted to incorporating the Deir ‘Alla texts that are so important for contextualizing this unusual episode. Readers exposed to this material, which specifically mentions Balaam, the son of Beor, will be informed and fascinated. This sort of treatment is why the ZIBBC should be on every shelf.

I was even more impressed with the treatment of the itinerary of Numbers 33. This passage is critical for the study of the exodus route and has long been a frustration for interpreters. It has also been the subject of scrutiny with respect to archaeological evidence for the place names in the list, which are extensive. Cole devotes six tables to the itinerary, and they are a model of clarity, at once densely packed with information but easy to follow. I’ll absolutely make use of this the next time I teach on the exodus route.

Deuteronomy

Deuteronomy is just packed with items of interest for a commentary of this nature. One of the major items concerns how the structure of Deuteronomy closely follows that of ANE treaties and covenants, especially Hittite suzerainty treaties. Eugene Carpenter devotes almost two pages to this backgrounding. The treatment is revealing for those to whom the parallels are new. I was wishing for more, though, something akin to the way the covenantal parallels were visually illustrated by Kenneth Kitchen in BAR (which Carpenter cites). This would have communicated more than the prose description, though that is good.

More generally, Carpenter brings an impressive array of ANE parallels and other visuals to his portion. A good example is his brief but insightful treatment of aniconism (prohibition of images of the deity), not only in Israel, but also in other ANE cultures. Others include parallels on ancient court systems, boundary stones, inheritance rights, eunuchs, divorce laws, and levirate marriage. If this commentary doesn’t make Deuteronomy more interesting for students and pastors, I don’t know what will.

Carpenter sidesteps one of the more controversial issues in Deuteronomy — the insistence (really, presumption) of centralized worship. Briefly, other scholars have shown that the phrase “the place where the Lord shall set his name” most likely refers to the temple. But there was no temple in Deuteronomy, a fact that has led many to date Deuteronomy much later than the time of Moses. Carpenter makes the language generic by pluralizing it, though it isn’t plural: “God instructs Israel that he will put his name at those places where he chooses to be recognized and worshipped” (p. 471). He also writes, “The Lord claimed the Promised Land by placing his name there.” While Yahweh did take Israel (land and people) as his “portion” (cf. Deut 32:8-9, reading with LXX and DSS), it really can’t be demonstrated that the whole land is the point of this language. There are more coherent strategies to handle the “setting the name” issue if one wants to defend an earlier date for Deuteronomy than traditional source criticism posits.

Next up: Volume 2: Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1-2 Samuel.

Technorati Tags: Bible backgrounds, ZIBBC, Zondervan

Looks like a very worthwhile event. If you’re in the Toronto area and want some exposure to some prominent scholars in this area, this is for you!

Technorati Tags: Bible, Egypt, Symposium

In my judgment, Exodus is one of the more neglected books in the Old Testament. This may sound surprising since there is so much in the book that is familiar to so many: the burning bush, the plagues, the exodus, the ten commandments, the tabernacle, and the ark of the covenant. These items may be familiar, but this book presents a number of exegetical, theological, historical, and archaeological difficulties. And there are few quality commentaries on the book. Bruce Wells makes a genuine contribution here in bringing issues to the attention of the reader, offering relevant background material at every turn, and offering excellent bibliographic material. His contribution is a cornucopia of background data, again richly illustrated.

The items that follow can be found in scholarly commentaries and academic journals, but too often the non-specialist isn’t exposed to important and difficult issues. One of the key contributions (broadly speaking) of the ZIBBC will be to make the non-specialist a more informed and engaged reader. The church is not served by publishers who aim to merely affirm their readership’s positions or ignorance. The church needs pastors and lay students who are actively engaged in struggling with the text. Here are some examples.

1. Moses and the Sargon Legend: Most readers will never have heard of the Sargon Legend unless they’ve stumbled onto a website that seeks to undermine biblical inspiration with academic material. This Mesopotamian legend is part of a broader literary genre scholars call the “Abandoned Child Motif.” In a nutshell, Sargon is abandoned at birth and set adrift on a river in a sealed reed basket. Sound familiar? Wells has a brief discussion of the very obvious parallel to the biblical Moses story and concludes with an honest, measured statement:

While the Moses narrative likely does not depend on the Sargon legend, it may well be that the biblical story attempts to describe the events in Moses’ life in such a way that an astute reader in the ancient world would recognize the “abandoned child” theme and foresee that great achievements are in store for this lonely infant afloat on the river.

2. The chronological difficulties in the text for the timing of the exodus: Wells discusses the problems associated with the chronology of the exodus in the pertinent passages. (In my reading, Wells is a bit stilted in favor of the late date, which is the majority view among scholars). While he discusses early vs. late chronology with respect to all the usual stopping points (Pithom and Rameses, 1 Kings 6:1, Merenptah, Exodus 12:40), his sidebar on p. 187 related to the problem of the generations of Moses and Aaron (Exod 6:14-25) will be new to many. The difficulty of mapping these generations onto a 400 or 430 year sojourn is not a matter that can be lightly set aside as merely interpretive. As Wells notes, “… there is no obvious solution that makes all the biblical data fit together neatly.” Bringing such things to the attention of the non-specialist shows a commitment on the part of ZIBBC authors and editors to raise the bar for that audience and their Bible study.

3. The issue of historicity of the exodus story:  As someone who has taught the history of Israel on the undergraduate level, I really appreciated Wells’ brief comments on the difference between “possible, plausible, or probable” when thinking about what historicity means. It’s nice to see some logic in a textbook.

4. Natural and Polemic Explanations of the Plagues: Wells does a nice job of introducing readers to the work of Great Hort, whose naturalistic explanation for the plagues is about as coherent as that view gets, and the notion that the plagues targeted Egyptian deities. What’s especially appreciated about Wells’ treatment is that he shows how both have definite weaknesses. That is, he doesn’t simply adopt the ideas to escape the supernatural.

5. The location of Mount Sinai: It’s about time that some mainstream attention is put toward the very possible view that Sinai was actually in Midian. Wells wisely does not endorse the Jebel el-Lawz location, but he is quite fair with the evidence in Scripture that points to Midian and not to the traditional location.

6. The lengthy discussions of the ten commandments and the rest of the laws laid out in Exodus is worth the price of the volume. This is a neglected area and Wells provides a wealth of comparative information. As noted in my first ZIBBC post, this is his specialty and it shows.

Now for some nit-picking.

1. Wells’ comments about the Angel in the burning bush are undeveloped and perhaps even under-thought. Granted, this is one of my own academic focus points, but given his willingness to engage biblical-theological material elsewhere, there’s a lot more that could have been said. Particularly noteworthy in its absence is any discussion of Exod 23:20-23 in regard to the Angel. This passage was fundamental to Jewish teaching on the two powers in heaven that was later declared a heresy once Christianity was born.

2. I was also disappointed with the commentary on Exodus 6:3 (God spoke to Moses and said to him, “I am the Lord. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty, but by my name the Lord I did not make myself known to them”). It’s of course true that most scholars see this passage as proof that Yahweh was unknown to the patriarchs (by name). This notion fuels discussion on the evolution of Israelite religion and source-critical theory on the Pentateuch. Wells fails to note that there is substantive disagreement on the accepted translation, most notably by Francis Andersen in his book The Sentence in Biblical Hebrew. On syntactical grounds, Andersen argues for a translation that is basically opposite in its meaning to the accepted view: “I am the Lord (YHWH). ?3 I appeared to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as El Shaddai. And my name is the Lord (YHWH); did I not make myself known to them?” Andersen’s seminal work on sentence structure and its implications for this crucial text should at least have been noted.

3. Wells notes that the first commandment reflects henotheism or monolatry. On the surface–and restricting the discussion to this one verse–this seems coherent. It actually isn’t since henotheism presumes certain ideas out of step with orthodox Yahwism. Yes, henotheism is a useful term if one restricts the discussion to whether Israel believed its God was superior among many. The same goes for monolatry, which allows for the existence of other elohim but insists on the sole worship of one. But these terms do not say enough. Henotheism allows that the top deity could be toppled or fall out of disfavor. It also is not consistent with respect to why the favored deity is favored — that is, it fails to speak of ontological uniqueness. The same goes for monolatry, since all that term does is tell us how many can be rightly worshipped. It provides no information as to why. An orthodox Israelite (e.g., the biblical writers) considered Yahweh unique on the basis of certain attributes (pre-existence, sole creatorship, omnipotence, omniscience, lone sovereign). Henotheism and monolatry fail to articulate all that an Israelite believed about Yahweh, and so they aren’t very helpful.¹

Technorati Tags: Exodus, ZIBBC, Zondervan

1. The term describes that which animates a living thing; many times equated with breath of the act of breathing (but sometimes blood) — and both humans and animals are said to possess this “life”:

ruach: Gen 6:17; Gen 7:15; Gen 7:22; Gen 45:27; Zech 12:1; Psa 135:17; Job 7:7; indeed “breath” (Hebrew: nishmat) and ruach are interchanged in a few passages (note the parallelism): Isa 42:5; Isa 57:16.

nephesh: Gen 1:20-21; Gen 1:24; Gen 1:30; Gen 9:4-5; Gen 12:13; Gen 19:19; Gen 35:18; Exod 4:19; Job 11:20; Job 33:22; Job 33:28; Job 33:30

2. The term is used to describe one’s “inner life”

A. The seat / source of emotions.

ruach: Numb 5:14; 5:30; Eccl 10:4; 2 Chron 18:22; Isa 54:6; Isa 57:15; Prov 14:29

nephesh: Lev 26:15; Lev 26:30, Lev 26:43; Jer 13:17; Jer 14:19; Lam 3:17; Gen 34:3, 8; Gen 42:21; Exod 15:19; 23:19; Num 21:4; 1 Sam 1:10, 15; 2 Sam 5:8; 17:8; 2 Kings 4:27; Job 14:22; Psa 6:3; 13:2; Psa 23:3; Psa 35:25; Psa 42:1-2

B. Enthusiasm / volitional will / decision-making capacity / attitudes / inner disposition / self awareness

ruach: Isa 19:3; Isa 57:15; Isa 61:3; Jer 51:11; Hagg 1:14; Psa 76:13; Job 32:18; Prov 18:14; Ezra 1:1; Exod 6:9; Num 14:24; Josh 2:11; Josh 5:1; Isa 29:24; Ezek 11:19; 18:31; Ezek 21:12; 36:26; Psa 34:19; 51:19; Prov 15:13; Prov 16:19; Prov 17:22; Prov 17:27; Prov 29:23; Eccl 7:8; Jer 10:14; 51:17 (idols lack this; contrasted with stupidity; see also Hab 2:19); Dan 5:12; 6:4; 1 Chron 28:12

nephesh: Lev 26:16; Judges 16:16; 1 Sam 2:33; Psa 42:6; Psa 107:26; Deut 14.26; Deut 21:14; Deut 23:24; 1 Sam 23:20; Prov 19:2; Deut 4:29; Deut 6:5; Deut 10:12; Deut 11:13; Deut 11:18

Now for some differences.  I would suggest that nephesh is the more “comprehensive” term.  That is, while nephesh can refer to the animation of life and the inner life, it can also refer to the WHOLE person, body / flesh + inner, immaterial life. Here are some examples where nephesh is basically equal to “whole person” (including the word being equivalent to personal pronouns like “I”; “me”; “them”):

Gen 12:5; Gen 46:18, Gen 46:22, Gen 46:25-26; Lev 2:1; Lev 4:2, Lev 4:27; Lev 5:1; Num 31:35, Num 31:40, Num 31:46; Ezek 18:4; Lev 11:43-44; Gen 27:19

But why, then, can nephesh refer to only the body (a corpse)? Examples:

Lev 21:1; Lev 21:11; Lev 22:4; Num 5:2; Num 6:6, Num 6:11; Num 9:6-7, Num 9:10; Num 19:13

The answer is because it is a natural human inclination to equate a person with their body (we live in the corporeal realm). Think about it. If you came home and saw your wife or husband lying on the floor, would you pick up the phone and call 911 and say “There’s an unconscious body on my floor!” or “My wife’s unconscious body is on the floor!”  No. You’d say “my wife is laying on the floor unconscious!” It’s really not odd.  When people are at a funeral, they frequently still refer to the corpse as the deceased by name, retaining its *personal* identity. Our lives are lived in the realm of embodiment; we can’t help but think this way.

So, it looks like we have a dichotomous view of humankind from the OT evidence: humans are material and immaterial, body and soul. There are some passages that have “body and soul (nephesh) together (Psa 31:9; Isa 10:18). Nephesh can encompass the totality; ruach cannot — it can just refer to the inner life and all its capacities, and it is not distinct from nephesh since nephesh also often refers to the inner life.

But we’re not done yet. Now we have to test this notion.  Here are some questions and passages that need close attention:

1. When nephesh is described as being in sheol, does the term refer to only the inner part, the body, or the totality? It seems that if Sheol refers to the grave, the answer would be “totality.”  See Psa 16:10; 30:3; Psa 56:13.

2. But then what about passages that have the ruach apparently disembodied?  See Eccl 3:21; Eccl 12:7 (it appears the ruach “goes” somewhere after death; it leaves the body).

3. What about passages where ruach and nephesh both occur?  Are they distinguished or are they “parallel” to each other?  Here’s the list of the ones that matter (i.e., ruling out clear references to wind or God’s spirit):

Job 7:11; 12:10; 1 Sam 1:15; Isa 26:9

Let’s hear what you think.

Technorati Tags: anthropology, body, nephesh, ruach, soul

I’m happy to say that Volume 1 does the set justice. It is far more comprehensive than anything comparable, like a handbook on the Pentateuch¹ or “normal” commentaries which, by their nature, must focus more on textual analysis. I’ll try and illustrate those points while giving you some highlights of the set. To be clear, I won’t always agree with the thoughts of the ZIBBC contributor, and would perhaps have added something that isn’t included. That shouldn’t diminish the value of the set for readers, though.

Genesis

The contributor for the Genesis volume was John Walton, the ZIBBC general editor. Walton has had broad exposure to ANE comparative literature, and so he’s a very good choice for Genesis. The material on Genesis makes the expected connections: situates the book against wider ANE history and chronology, discusses comparative ANE flood narratives, the Sumerian King List, and reviews possible historical connections to the patriarchal narratives in terms of archaeological discoveries that illumine patriarchal culture. But Walton goes far beyond the expected. For an evangelical work, his effort to draw attention to comparative cosmological and religious (theological) material is to be highly commended. There’s nothing to be gained from hiding this material from the reading audience. The result of doing so, in my experience, is that inquiring minds will judge the contributor either incompetent or dishonest when he or she learns that there’s more to the story (and its background) than what that evangelical writer told them.

For example, Walton guides the readers carefully through comparative cosmology, showing the biblical writers to be describing a flat, round, earth with a solid sky (”firmament”), connecting these elements to ANE cosmological texts. This is not only being honest; it’s having a firm grasp on the obvious when the text is closely followed. Walton explains why the material is what it is — what polemical and theological purposes are served — and so what is missed by treating Genesis as a science textbook. I would like to have seen more careful though put into explaining how “normal” this understanding ought to be for us, considering the fact that God made no attempt to change a writer’s worldview before choosing to use him, but given the space constraints of the print world, this omission was unavoidable. Walton also serves readers well with his discussion of the temple and the cosmos, showing how cosmology and temple theology relate to one another. Walton’s full explanation on how the key to reconciling Genesis with science is to note it isn’t about science, but about “temple cosmology” is set forth in his recent book, The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate. The section on Genesis 6:1-4 is weak, but this was expected, as Walton’s views on the sons of God incident have been published.² The survey of flood accounts and Babel parallels are nicely laid out and illustrated with comparative portions. The discussion of parallels to the patriarchs are appropriately cautious and, as throughout all the volumes, beautifully illustrated with photographs. I have other quibbles, but not with respect to the omission of any material.

Again, as a scholar I’m going to have points of dissatisfaction, but most of what I could muster falls on the side of wishing Zondervan had devoted whole volumes to each book of the Pentateuch.

Next up: Exodus

Technorati Tags: Bible backgrounds, Bible in ancient context, Genesis, ZIBBC, Zondervan