Understanding the First Five Books of the Bible
An Impetus and a Plan for Understanding the Pentateuch
Introduction
What does the verse, “Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine,” mean (Exod. 19:5 ESV)? Did that statement refer to Moses’ generation of Israelites, all Israelites, or possibly all people? Can the interpreter possess a measure of certainty of the divine nature of that proposition as well as the rest of the Pentateuch? Does the Pentateuch retain significance in the cultural milieu of the twenty-first century? Proper study of the Pentateuch answers these questions and more. In the Pentateuch, God communicated truth through human authors regarding how humans should relate to Him, their Creator. Thus, Bible readers should adhere to careful interpretive principles in order to ascertain the meaning and the significance of this important collection of books. This work will survey the creation of the Pentateuch and the use of the historical-grammatical method of interpretation.
Creation of the Pentateuch
The Pentateuch, also called the Torah, refers to the first five books of the Bible. The writer recorded information spanning a period of thousands of years. The majority of the events occurred at least 3000 years ago, and all but the most liberal scholars agree that it was written at least 2500 years ago (Merrill 2003, 120). Scholars have debated issues regarding the authorship, inspiration, accuracy, and transmission of the Torah. Desmond Alexander offered a summary of the literature regarding Pentateuch authorship. Prior to the Enlightenment, the consensus affirmed Mosaic authorship, but in the 1600s, some began to question this tradition. By 1900, the tide had shifted, and the mainstream had rejected Moses as the author. In the early 1900s, Julius Wellhausen popularized the Documentary Hypothesis (DH), which postulated authorship by a group distinguished primarily by the terms they used for God. John Van Seters and others debunked the traditional DH but retained its conclusion regarding multiple editors. The bulk of twenty-first-century Torah experts have adopted the Van Seters position. The new authorship question has become who edited it, when, and to what extent (Alexander 2003, 61–63).
However, apologists such as Josh McDowell have urged caution in denying Mosaic authorship. McDowell claimed that the rejection of Moses ensues from anti-supernatural presuppositions, not the evidence. From a logical standpoint, the simpler theory is most likely to be true. If internal Scriptural evidence and the majority of extra-biblical literature pre-1900 supported Mosaic authorship (with minimal scribal editing), why contrive such an involved theory as DH? The evidence supports the verdict that Moses wrote the Pentateuch and some of his followers added some extra material, regarding issues such as Moses’ death, also under divine inspiration (McDowell and McDowell 2017, 540–541).
A discussion of authorship calls into question the doctrine of divine inspiration. Did God dictate the Bible, or did He allow humans to write it? Gary Schnittjer harmonized this false dichotomy by defining the process of writing the Pentateuch as a “human phenomenon within divine perspective” (2006, 16). God did not dictate His words to men, but He aided and inspired their writing, so they could communicate truth about Him within their historical, cultural setting (Schnittjer 2006, 29). The teaching in the Pentateuch required divine aid due to God’s transcendent nature (Oswalt 2003, 848). God created everything that exists and, thus, exists apart from Creation. Man’s study of God’s nature and plan is limited apart from divine revelation, hence God’s self-revelation through the writer of the Torah.
Throughout the Pentateuch, the writer claimed divine inspiration (Gen. 1:1; Exod. 3:14–16; 20:1; Deut. 18:15–22). He also maintained God’s omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence (Gen. 1; Exod. 3:14–16; Num. 23:19; Deut. 18:20–22). If the all-powerful God inspired the creation of the Pentateuch, it follows logically that one should expect it to be free of errors and contradictions, hence the doctrine of inerrancy. If God aided the writer, the ensuing text should exhibit inerrancy. Thus results the contrapositive, if the text does not exhibit inerrancy, then God did not aid the writer, and inerrancy becomes a very important subject of inquiry. Scholars can study the inerrancy of the Torah by examining its historicity, a practice which relies primarily on archaeology, since very little literature remains from the ancient Near East (ANE) (Chavalas 2003, 37). However, archaeology cannot prove (or disprove) inerrancy, but it can corroborate (or diminish) the case for inerrancy. Neither the critic nor the advocate should overstate the archaeological case (McDowell and McDowell 2017, 414–422).
The final issue relating to the authority of the Pentateuch for today’s readers involves its transmission since the original writing (or autograph). Although the autographs are lost to time and entropy, the McDowells made a case for the reliability of the extant manuscripts. The Soferim recopied the Pentateuch and other Scriptures during the post-exilic period. The Masoretes began their transmissions by the 8th century AD, and all extant Masoretic manuscripts (MT) exhibit a high degree of consistency (McDowell and McDowell 2017, 93–102). However, twentieth-century scholars such as Frederic Kenyon questioned the transmission of the text prior to the Masoretes since the oldest MT was the CodexCairensis from 895 AD (1895, 42). Then, some shepherds discovered the Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS) in some caves in Jordan in 1947. The DSS include Old Testament (OT) manuscripts from the third century BC, and they exhibit tremendous correspondence with the MT despite a thousand years of separation. Researchers have amassed thousands of Pentateuch manuscripts and can recreate the autographs with a high degree of certainty. (McDowell and McDowell 2017, 102–115). Proponents of divine inspiration of the Pentateuch seem to have a strong case.
Interpretation of the Pentateuch
If one assumes God inspired the creation of the Pentateuch, then two conclusions follow pertaining to its interpretation: (1) the text exhibited unity, and (2) the text possessed significance for how people should live. John Goldingay elucidated how this process begins with exegesis, determining the original meaning of individual passages. Then, the interpreter can draw conclusions on how the passages relate to other passages and to life (Goldingay 2003, 387). According to E. D. Hirsch, the meaning of any written work is the meaning the author intended because “the text had to represent somebody’s meaning—if not the author’s, then the critic’s” (1967, 46). It is difficult to overstate the absurdities that ensue from relegating meaning to the critic (Hirsch 1967). Thus, valid interpretation seeks the author’s original meaning.
The interpretive process commences with establishing the text. McDowell posited four steps: (1) gather manuscript evidence; (2) evaluate internal and external evidence of each; (3) determine the most plausible reading; and (4) translate the text to contemporary language (2017, 120). After establishing the text, William Klein, Craig Blomberg, and Robert Hubbard articulated the importance of investigating the historical context. The author of the Pentateuch wrote for an ANE audience who subscribed to a worldview different from that of the modern reader, hence research of ANE culture. The interpretation must reflect the likely interpretation of the original audience, or it is, at best, incomplete (Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard 2017, 313–316). For example, monotheism was a foreign concept to the animistic cultures of the ANE; consequently, the very concept of the unity of God offended Israel’s neighbors (Oswalt 2003, 846). The ANE reaction to monotheism resembles the modern pluralists’ response to the Christian’s exclusive truth claims (McDowell and McDowell 2017, 617). An interpretation of the Pentateuch that lacks knowledge of ANE culture would probably miss that application.
Interpreters must also consider the literary aspect. Biblical writers exhibited myriad literary genres and styles (Ngewa 2006, 10). Schnittjer pointed out that narrative comprised the majority of the Pentateuch. He used the term “narralogic” to explain the rules of the biblical narrative genre (2006, 21). The writer of the Pentateuch used various patterns and techniques to relate the history of God’s interaction with humanity, including cause-to-effect, effect-to-cause, parallelism, extended echo effect, and other techniques, knowledge of which aids interpretation (Schnittjer 2006, 15–22). The other part of literary analysis involves studying the surrounding literary context (Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard 2017, 295). As described above, the Torah exhibited unity, so the passages related to one another. As the interpreter exegetes more passages and understands how they related, the theology of the Pentateuch emerges (Schnittjer 2006, 23–34).
Goldingay expounded how the succeeding books of the Bible amplify and interpret the theology of the Pentateuch. The concept of intertextuality relates to the idea that new revelation aided the interpretation of old revelation (Goldingay 2003, 388). Thus, for example, with the Davidic Covenant, God amplified the covenants that He made with Abraham and Moses, and the interpreter gains better understanding of one covenant from interpreting the other two (Steyne 1997, 200). In this manner, God progressively revealed the theology of the Pentateuch with its culmination in the New Testament (NT) (Ngewa 2006, 11).
Steeped in the teachings of the Torah, the NT writers built upon it and interpreted it as they wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. They used the Pentateuch to explain the gospel, the purpose of life, and the nature God, and gave modern interpreters a paradigm for applying the Pentateuch to modern culture (Schnittjer 2006, 10). For example, the writer of Matthew recorded Jesus’s interpretation of part of the Decalogue. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus elucidated that the laws are not lists of propositions, as they may appear, but paradigms of principles of godliness (Matt. 5:21–48) (Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard 2017, 444–445). Thus, the prohibition against adultery actually meant not even to think lustfully about a non-spouse.
The NT also helps with contextualization, the process of determining significance from the teachings of the Pentateuch for the current reader (Goldingay 2003, 387). Not all biblical propositions were universally normative, and narratives often contained normative truth (Ngewa 2006, 10). Returning to the Sermon on the Mount, the modern interpreter can expand on Jesus’s interpretation of the Pentateuchal ban on adultery and conclude that they should also refrain from viewing pornography. The goal of contextualization is the integration of God’s worldview, which requires interpreting biblical passages in terms of immediate context, overall biblical teaching, and current cultural customs (Ngewa 2006, 11).
Conclusion
God inspired Moses to write the Pentateuch in order to communicate truth to His people about how He relates to them and the rest of creation. Historical scholarship has uncovered a plethora of evidence that corroborates the Torah and supports the doctrine of divine inspiration. Interpretation presents difficulties since Moses wrote to his contemporaries in the ANE about 3500 years ago, and their culture differed from twenty-first-century America. Therefore, the student should research carefully the historical and literary context of each passage of the Pentateuch. The interpreter should then filter the interpretation with respect to the gospel by analyzing pertinent NT passages. Careful exegesis prepares the researcher to determine significance of the Law for today and decreases the likelihood of accidental eisegesis (reading extra meaning into the text). The care is worth it because the successful interpretation of the Pentateuch yields the Creator God’s perspective on the things He created, including the person interpreting His Bible (Schnittjer 2006, 30).
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Reference List
Alexander, T. Desmond. 2003. “Authorship of the Pentateuch.” In Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch, edited by T. Desmond Alexander and David W. Baker, 61–72. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity.
Chavalas, Mark W. 2003. “Archaeology.” In Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch, edited by T. Desmond Alexander and David W. Baker, 37–49. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity.
Goldingay, John. 2003. “Hermeneutics.” In Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch, edited by T. Desmond Alexander and David W. Baker, 387–401. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity.
Hirsch, E. D., Jr. 1967. “Validity in Interpretation.” In Hermeneutics: God’s Message and Its Meaning, Readings and Resource Materials, 43–84. Springfield, MO: Global University.
Kenyon, Frederic G. 1895. Our Bible and the Ancient Manuscripts. London: Eyre and Spottiswoode. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.ah21fq&view=1up&seq=9.
Klein, William W., Craig L. Blomberg, and Robert L. Hubbard, Jr. 2017. Introduction to Biblical Interpretation. 3rd ed. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
McDowell, Josh, and Sean McDowell. 2017. Evidence that Demands a Verdict: Life-Changing Truth for a Skeptical World. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson.
Merrill, Eugene H. 2003. “Chronology.” In Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch, edited by T. Desmond Alexander and David W. Baker, 113–122. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity.
Ngewa, Samuel. 2006. “Principles of Interpretation.” In The Pentateuch: Critical Issues, Readings and Resource Materials. 2nd ed., edited by Global University. 9–12. Springfield, MO: Global University.
Oswalt, John N. 2003. “Theology of the Pentateuch.” In Dictionary of the Old Testament: Pentateuch, edited by T. Desmond Alexander and David W. Baker, 845–859. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity.
Schnittjer, Gary Edward. 2006. The Torah Story: An Apprenticeship on the Pentateuch. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Steyne, Philip M. 1997. In Step with the God of the Nations. Rev. ed. Columbia, SC: Impact International Foundation.