A Land Like Your Own

Traditions of Israel and Their Reception

Silverman, Daughton

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2010
• eBook ISBN: 9781498270908
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

A Land Like Your Own explores the ways the Bible has reused previous traditions and has subsequently been reused by both Jews and Christians. The ten essays included cover a broad range of topics in the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and subsequent traditions, but they all highlight the many ways in which the traditions associated with Israel have impacted communities. A Land Like Your Own will interest anyone involved in biblical studies (students and scholars alike) through its wide-ranging array of topics, highlighting how interconnected the many biblical studies subdisciplines truly are.

1

On Religious and Cultural Influence

Jason M. Silverman

Introduction

Students of biblical texts often encounter the question of these texts’ relations to the extra-Israelite/Judaean cultures among which they lived. These relations can be understood in a number of ways, as isolationism, general regional koine, or influence of some kind. Since Palestine had numerous contacts with many civilizations, research often appeals to parallels with texts from Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, or Iran. While these kinds of studies are valuable, they are methodologically and conceptually treacherous.

To discuss questions of influence, it is first necessary to clarify what is meant by the term and to specify a working methodology for assessing its presence and effects.1 This paper offers a model for understanding influence and offers criteria for determining its presence in texts. The term “influence” is here understood as one type of “interaction.” “Interaction” here denotes a variety of types of intercourse, from superficial to significant, including the social-situational phenomenon of the meetings of cultures as well as the “intellectual” side. Political and social structures as well as cultural and religious elements are included in the concept. This is generally recognized as being nigh universal.2 The scholarly use of the term for the intellectual side of interaction—“influence” or “dialogue”—is inconsistently used, however, with a variety of connotations attached. It is therefore important to note what is not meant by the word “influence” here: it does not mean a wholesale “cut and paste” of literate materials from one canon to another (say, from the Bundahišn to 1 Enoch). Neither does it denote a religious conversion under another name, nor does it indicate the “syncretism” or “assimilation” of anthropologists.3 Of concern here is not the development of entirely new systems or traditions, but of change within a system due to external interaction; the question of how much change a system or tradition can undertake before being a new system is an interesting problem, but it cannot be broached here.4 Interaction and influence are here understood as unavoidable aspects of the human condition, one which has impacted and continues to impact all traditions and religions. In all cultures, and particularly in largely oral cultures, influence is a subtle affair and requires much thought to tease out.

Influence: A Conceptual Model

Hinnells offers a suggestive discussion of the types of influence possible between communities, and his ideas are worth keeping in mind when assessing questions of influence.5 He notes two basic types of influence, each with their own variations: (1) the conscious imitation or borrowing of elements from another tradition. This can be either positive (i.e., accepting ideas accepted in another tradition) or negative (i.e., rejecting ideas which are rejected in another tradition); (2) conscious rejection of another tradition. The rejection of a tradition, however, can still affect the rejector’s own tradition in two ways: (a) by rejecting aspects of own traditions seen to conform too closely to the rejected one; (b) by utilizing the modes of discourse of the rejected tradition to combat or argue with it. Hinnells notes that type 1 will often occur consciously while type 2 will often occur unconsciously, although either can simultaneously function consciously and unconsciously.6 In addition to these forms of influence, a tradition can be influenced by using new ideas to re-interpret native ideas. This last type of influence is the most difficult to detect, because it will for the most part utilize native ideas and motifs and will claim to be an organic growth of the tradition. All of these types of influence are possible—even likely—even in situations without external coercion (such as a state-mandated reform program). In other words, an officially supported “missionary” program is not necessary for influence to occur; it can quite simply happen when two cultures interact on a personal level. This personal level includes administrative scenarios as well as scenarios from the course of everyday life.

Two studies from a slightly different scholarly debate7 highlight two important aspects of any religious tradition: within each system there is a continual presence of hermeneutics as well as a hierarchy of importance for each element within the tradition.8 No human is static, and individuals will continually (re-)interpret their traditions. However, in this process, elements that are considered to be more peripheral are prone to more extensive reinterpretation than those that are central. Vroom, emphasizing the incorporation of “foreign” and “incompatible” elements within a tradition, argues that such incorporation involves the reinterpretation of old beliefs as well as a reconfiguration of the relative structural importance of elements within the receiving system.9 Without limiting the discussion to traditions that are “incompatible” as Vroom does, his observations on the results of influence or borrowing on the receiving tradition are still useful for evaluating less radical influences. The reinterpretation of elements within a system and the importation and adaption of elements into a system will necessitate the altering of the “ratios” and relations in that system. In other words, foreign influence is most likely to occur in negotiable aspects of a tradition, while still having effects beyond itself in the system as a whole. When analyzing potential instances of influence, then, it is necessary to consider (1) areas in the receiving tradition which are most susceptible to reinterpretation (i.e., how central or peripheral they are); (2) the re-interpretation which would be needed or effected by the influence or borrowing; and (3) the relative structural impact on the receiving system.

Light understands religions to consist of three “cognitive entities”: symbols, categories into which symbols are arranged, and the organizational rules which govern the importance and interactions of symbols and categories.10 The rules that govern the relative importance or types of acceptable change will vary drastically from tradition to tradition, so that rules that are valid for one tradition will not likely be the same for another. This means that a change (or influence) which one tradition may be able to accept as normal and unproblematic could very well be “a drastic and traumatic alteration in foundational understanding from the viewpoint of the other tradition.”11 This relates to Vroom’s understanding of the structural importance of a given element within a tradition, and Light’s illustrations make the point amply clear: while the Chinese religions are easily able to assimilate a new deity, the same is not true of the monotheistic religions. Even though two religions may share an analogous category of “divinity,” they need not have the same structural importance, thus qualifying any superficial parallel between them.12 Thus, to a Christian scholar the adoption of a new deity looks like a drastic change, while to a de...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Contributors
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: On Religious and Cultural Influence
• Chapter 2: The Synagogue at Herodium
• Chapter 3: Gender and Syro-Palestinian Archaeology
• Chapter 4: Reconsidering Jacob
• Chapter 5: Of Donkeys and Witnesses
• Chapter 6: The Influence of Egyptian Throne Names on Isaiah 9:5
• Chapter 7: Jesus and Yeshua
• Chapter 8: 1 Peter as Biblical Proto-Theodicy
• Chapter 9: Interpreting Together and Receiving New Testament Concepts of Apostolicity
• Chapter 10: Defense and Disputation, Erudition and Exchange