@@@@ @@@ @@@ @@@ @@ @@ @@@@ @@@ @@@@@@@ @@ @ @@ @@ @ @ @@ @ @@ @@ @ @@ @ @ @@ @ @@ @@ @ @ @@ @@@@@@ @@ @ @@ @ @@ @ @@ @@ @ @@ @ @@ @@ @ @@ @ @ @@@@ @@@ @@@@ @@@@@@@@@@ @@@ @@@@ @@@@ @@@ @@@@@@@ ================================================================== R E V I E W ================================================================== VOLUME 2.005 MARCH 1992 Gabriele Boccaccini, Middle Judaism: Jewish Thought 300 B.C.E. to 200 C.E.. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991. Pp. xxvii + 289 [This review written for Toronto Journal of Theology is circulated electronically with permission from the editors.] <0.1> This is a rare and paradoxical book. Perhaps because philosophical analysis was usually linked with confessional theology in bygone days, North American biblical scholarship has tended toward historical, now social-historical, problems. In cheerful disregard of this bias, Boccaccini sets out boldly to construct an intellectual history of Jewish literature in the specified 500-year period. This is not, however, a systematic survey of the literature or the era. B. sees it as a ``voyage through the thought of some of the protagonists'' (p. 1), which applies the methods common in the study of secular intellectual history (p. 3). From the outset he is looking not for a single ideological system but for many such systems in competition (p. 25). <1.1> The voyage consists of three parts. In the first, ``Methodological Lines'', B. argues: (a) that in spite of significant advances, scholarship is still hampered by a confessional bias that separates Christianity from Judaism in the first century; (b) that in this period, rather, ``all Christian documents are obviously Jewish'' (p. 21); and (c) that ``middle Judaism'' is a more suitable term than others because it is free of ``ideological implication'' (p. 24). These theses are supported to a degree by the partly-annotated bibliography of studies on middle Judaism, from Josephus to 1990, that constitutes Chapter 2. <1.2> Part II is the most systematic of the book: it takes a ``cross-section'' of Jewish literature from the early second century BCE in order to demonstrate its ideological diversity. B. examines ben Sira as a work in conflict with the wisdom of Qohelet on the one hand and early apocalypticism on the other. B. considers the latter conflict the more programmatic, and here he introduces the book's major thesis, namely, that middle Judaism oscillates between two poles: a theology of covenant/ effort/ works/ justice and a theology of grace/ promise/ election/ mercy -- ``an idea of salvation that rests on human forces and one that rests on the hope of God's intervention'' (p. 78). Ben Sira evinces the former dynamism, for its author stresses the validity of the covenant, the freedom of human will to fulfill the law, and the possibility of atoning for past sins by compensatory righteous deeds. In its commitment to salvation through the law, ben Sira anticipates the ``Pharisaic-Prabbinic tradition'' (p. 117). Works like the Book of Watchers, Book of Astronomy, and 2 Baruch, however, stress the corruption of human nature and all creation through a primal fall. Accordingly, they look for salvation in an ``extraordinary intervention by God'' and thus ``the idea of the covenant is emptied of all substance'' (p. 79). This apocalyptic dynamism anticipates Christianity. <1.3> With such a taxonomy in hand, B. then examines Daniel and the Dream Visions of Enoch, which are both usually considered examples of ``apocalyptic'' thought. Against this view, B. finds different ``generative ideas'' in the two documents: only the Dream Visions reflects the notion of evil as an autonomous, antecedent reality that victimizes humanity and awaits God's intervention; this work is truly apocalyptic. Daniel, on the other hand, represents a theology of covenant. Unlike Enoch, who is freely chosen by God, Daniel is chosen on account of his righteousness (in refusing to eat the king's food; p. 136). And in this text the cause of evil in history is not a primal fall but Israel's willful failure to keep the covenant (p. 146). Israel's enemies are passive instruments of divine punishment for that failure. Thus, although it contains some apocalyptic forms, Daniel is really ``anti-apocalyptic'' in its ideological stance (p. 160). <1.4> Boccaccini concludes this section with a discussion of the Letter of Aristeas. In this work, seldom studied for its system of thought, B. finds a ``true theology of grace'' (p. 171). With its relentless appeal to God's direction of human affairs, its ``unreserved praise of the Greek paideia'' (p. 180), its welcoming of righteous Gentiles without conversion, and its omission of any ``practice, code, or norm that human beings must (or can) propadeutically fulfill'' (p. 173), the Letter attempts to redefine Judaism in a more ``open-minded'' way (p. 184). <1.5> Boccaccini's third section, ``Some Preparatory Sketches'', is a potpourri of shorter essays on Philo, Paul and James, worship as ``memory'', Josephus, and Jewish attitudes toward Gentiles. These essays are unified more by the theme of memory than by the polarization of theologies; nevertheless, Josephus distinctly appears on the covenantal side, while the Essenes ( = Qumraners), Paul, and James all embrace a theology of grace. Paul and James (and Jesus), contrary to common scholarly views, reflect the same generative idea, namely, ``the broken link between God's mercy and God's justice'' (p. 217): for them, unlike Pharisaic-Rabbinic Judaism, salvation is wholly dependent on God's mercy. In examining Jewish views of Gentiles, B. is careful to disassociate these from the theological poles: a covenant theology might be insular or it might hope for the conversion of all Gentiles; a theology of grace might see some Gentiles as already righteous or it might see all humanity as thoroughly corrupted. <2.1> There is much to savour in this ambitious volume. The independence of method and perspective produces some compelling results. For example, B. makes his case that ben Sira does not identify wisdom and law as is often claimed, even though the two are closely linked. His sympathetic treatment of Aristeas, as an intellectual project and not merely a legend about the LXX translation, is salutary. The annotated bibliography in Chapter 2 alone would almost justify the purchase of the book. Although several of the chapters are translated from discrete Italian originals, B. succeeds in crafting an engaging study filled with lively English prose, and arranged in a clear format. <3.1> Nevertheless, it seems to me that both the method and the major proposals of the book are untenable. The basic methodological problem is that B.'s search for a philosophical system in each of his texts leads him to ignore almost completely their diverse genres -- this in spite of his intention to ``let the texts speak for themselves and contextualize their own statements'' (p. 3). He seems not to worry that his voyage passes though quite different regions -- poetry, historical narrative and legend, letter, legal material, testament, romance, philosophy, collections of aphorisms, and several others. B. simply does not consider whether different methods of analysis might be appropriate to these genres, in particular whether some genres might be unsuited to systematic philosophical construction. <3.2> With astonishing audacity, for example, B. draws the ``Pharisaic- rabbinic view of salvation'' from a single saying in m. Avot 3:16: All is foreseen, but freedom of choice is given; and the world is judged by mercy, yet all is according to the quantity of [good and evil] works. He not only ignores the famous problem of the connection between Pharisaism and rabbinism, and the meaning of ``foreseen'' [CPWY], but also fails to consider the aphoristic genre of Avot or the complex nature of rabbinic literature. Similarly, in the case of Paul, he cites Romans 7 as Paul's definitive view of sin, without concerning himself with the peculiar argument and audience of that letter, or even with the fact that it is a letter. His evidence for Jesus is drawn, apparently at random, from statements in the gospels that include Matthew's antitheses. He infers Josephus's covenantal stance from some passages that might sound Deuteronomistic at first hearing, but are better understood on the basis of broader Graeco-Roman assumptions about just retribution. For Josephus removes or softens the Bible's stronger covenantal statements, stresses Jewish respect for foreign deities and traditions (Ant 4:207, 262; ), and is everywhere eager to fit Judaism into a world of religious diversity (Life 113; Ag. Ap. 2:144). <3.3> Equally problematic, and partly a consequence of the genre problem, is B.'s too easy assumption that the theology of election and that of covenant are in fundamental tension. They may be, but after E. P. Sanders' Paul and Palestinian Judaism (1977) that case needs to be made with far greater care than B. applies. Whereas Sanders demonstrated in detail that the same documents combine both ideas, B. more or less assumes that the two notions are incompatible. For example, he extracts the ``Essene'' view from passages in 1QH that extol God's free election without even considering Sanders' point that such liturgical material tends to emphasize God's role, while community ``rules'' (such as 1QS) stress covenantal obligations. B. continues to speak of salvation for the Pharisees as ``a consequence of obedience to the law'' (p. 220), in spite of Sanders' argument that election and covenant often operate at the same time, answering different questions. B. ignores such passages as m. Sanhedrin 10:1, ``All Israel has a share in the world to come'', and rabbinic references to God's superabundant mercy or to the primacy of election. Since the Pentateuch itself juxtaposes the free election of Israel (Gen 12; 15; Exod 1-19) with the terms of the covenant as the basis for reward and punishment (Exod 20), since Josephus insists that Jews hold both fate and free will together (Ant 16:397-398), and since the DSS and other texts do likewise, B.'s assumption that these different emphases bespeak different ideological systems seems unwarranted. It is insufficient for B. merely to note that he disagrees with Sanders' method (p. 68), without engaging that scholar's arguments on an issue so fundamental to the study. <3.4> B.'s major proposals are, accordingly, problematic. First, his attempt to locate all of early (and even later!) Christianity within Judaism rests on faulty premises. He claims that the rigid separation of Christianity from Judaism is due solely to the confessional bias of scholarship, which assumes that ``Judaism'' means Torah-observant rabbinic-style Judaism. Since he sees another kind of Judaism operative throughout the period, Christianity ought to be seen as part of that other stream. But a different reading of the evidence of is not confessional bias. If other scholars understand Paul to be proclaiming the end of Judaism, or if they conclude that Jews generally required observance of dietary laws and circumcision, that is their right; they have made their cases. It is not responsible to dismiss such scholarship out of hand as confessional. <3.5> And what does it mean in real terms to say that one of Paul's converts in Thessalonica or Corinth or Philippi -- a Gentile who used to revere the local deities, now has repented to wait for the return of Jesus from heaven, but who knows little about Judaism, does not visit the Jewish quarter, much less the synagogue, and does not submit to circumcision, sabbath rest, or dietary laws -- that such a person was really a Ioudaios? Would such a person have believed it? Would Paul have accepted that view? <3.6> Significantly, B. can only maintain his identification of all Christianity as Jewish by proposing that the ``generative idea'' of Christianity was the disjunction between God's justice and God's mercy (p. 227). Christianity is thus easily aligned with other Judaisms that made the same break. For B., Paul's analysis of the fall and the resultant human condition, drawn from Romans 3, 5, and 7, marks the centre of his thought. He does does not consider that Romans 5:12-21, concerning Adam's sin, is closely paralleled in the very ``Pharisaic- Rabbinic'' literature that is supposed to evince a theology of covenant (Sifra <.H>obah par. 12:10)! And how does it happen that Paul's typical letters, to his own churches, do not emphasize these themes at all but rather ``Christ and him crucified'' (1 Cor 2:2)? B.'s entire summary of ``Paul's Christianity'' (pp. 220-222) does not even mention Christ's death and resurrection. But did not the Christ event have something to do with the ``generative idea'' of Paul's (if not others') Christianity? <3.7> Paradoxically, in spite of his strenuous effort to bring the discipline out of its confessional bonds, B. may have inadvertently produced the most ``confessional'' study of the period in a long time. Although he claims that confessional bias has caused the isolation of Christianity from Judaism, one might as easily see it the other way round: that Gentile Christianity has consistently tried to legitimate itself, ever since Luke-Acts, by insisting on its Jewish heritage. Seen from that perspective, B.'s peremptory insistence on the Jewish character of all Christianity, argued mainly by repetition and diagram (in Chapter 1), could be mistaken for apologetics. <3.8> It does not help that B. enthusiastically favours the theology of promise and grace over the ``salvation that [allegedly] rests on human forces'' (p. 78), which produces the ``self-sufficient'' programme of ben Sira (p. 185). B's bias comes to the fore especially in his treatment of Aristeas. Unlike the ``rigid, almost mathematically determined proportion between God's mercy and justice proposed by Ben Sira'' (p. 170), Aristeas does away with God's wrath and rests on his mercy alone. B. enthuses further about the Letter, ``there is no room for a God challenged by sin and forced to wrath in order to reaffirm authority over humankind and the cosmos'' (p. 171), and ``Human initiative and freedom find a new space and value in this conviction'' (p. 174). Aristeas calls Jews to look at the world ``open-mindedly'' and ``to abandon every prejudice'' (p. 184). In effect, therefore, if not by intention, B.'s analysis makes Christianity heir to the nobler side of Judaism. This thesis is not unlike R. H. Charles's old argument that apocalyptic thought, adopted by Christians but repudiated by later Judaism, was in fact Judaism's higher theology. <3.9> Finally, B.'s proposal that Judaism between 300 BCE and 200 CE be termed ``middle Judaism'' seems to create more difficulties than it solves. It is true that the commonly-used ``early Judaism'' does not distinguish the immediate post-exilic period from the era beginning with Alexander or Ptolemaic rule. But to call the latter ``middle Judaism'' raises a serious objection: What shall we do for an encore? B. rightly eschews the old ``late Judaism'' because of its supersessionist overtones. But it is not clear that ``middle Judaism'' is an improvement, for a middle implies an end. And ``middle Judaism'' is already taken by ``medieval Judaism''. It is surely better to use either a non-chronological term or to accept ``early'', which is open-ended. <00.1> The book is worth reading for its refreshing questions and admittedly nonconformist approach. It will be of interest to graduate students and professional scholars, as an admirable attempt at synthesis that does not quite work. Review by: Steve Mason Division of Humanities York University 4700 Keele Street North York, Ontario Canada shlomo@vm1.yorku.ca (c) 1992 Reproduction beyond fair use only on permission of the editors. ----------------------------end review---------------------------- RV:Mason, Steve AU:Boccaccini, Gabriele YR:1991 BT:Middle Judaism: Jewish Thought 300 B.C.E. to 200 C.E. PL:Minneapolis PR:Fortress //end//