Torah
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| − | {{Scriptures}}'''The Torah''' | + | {{Scriptures}}'''The Torah''' is the first five books of the Tanakh or Hebrew [[Bible]]<ref> The Tanakh is the source for the Christian Old Testament</ref> and the traditional foundinhg document of [[Judaism]]. Jewish students of the Torah understand it to be both the written Torah and the oral tradition associated with Torah. The Torah is believed by most Jews, particularly Orthodox Jews, to be the direct word of God given to Moses in its entirety. According to Jewish mystical teachings, the Torah existed prior to its reception by the Jews and was used as a "blueprint" by God in His creation of the world. Thus every word of the Torah is considered immutable and nothing can ever be added or subtracted from it. The five books of the Torah are: |
*[[Genesis]] | *[[Genesis]] | ||
Revision as of 16:58, 6 December 2011
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The Torah is the first five books of the Tanakh or Hebrew Bible[1] and the traditional foundinhg document of Judaism. Jewish students of the Torah understand it to be both the written Torah and the oral tradition associated with Torah. The Torah is believed by most Jews, particularly Orthodox Jews, to be the direct word of God given to Moses in its entirety. According to Jewish mystical teachings, the Torah existed prior to its reception by the Jews and was used as a "blueprint" by God in His creation of the world. Thus every word of the Torah is considered immutable and nothing can ever be added or subtracted from it. The five books of the Torah are:
While traditionally ascribed to Moses, many modern Biblical scholars consider the Torah to be the edited work of at least five different writers with roots in both Israel and Judah:
- Yahwist or J: rooted in Judahite tradition; refers to God as YHWH
- Elohist or E: rooted in Israelite tradition; prefers the grammatically ambiguous "Elohim" as the name of God
- Deuteronomist or D: believed to have come from the camp that led religious reforms under the Judahite king Josiah; later revised after Josiah's untimely death in Egypt
- Priestly or P: Probably written under the auspices of the Kohanim, the priestly clan said to be descended from Moses' brother Aaron and those in charge of daily operations at the Jerusalem temple
- The Redactor or R (possibly the Biblical figure Ezra): While responsible for little or no original content, the Redactor is thought to have been responsible for knitting related but separate Israelite and Judahite traditions, as well as varying schools of thought within Judah, into a single, more-or-less coherent whole.
While this model is not universally accepted, it has been one of the most important working hypotheses of Biblical scholarships over the last century-plus.
The Book of J
In The Book of J by professor Harold Bloom, the case is made that the first five books of the Bible were compiled by the "Redactor" (probably Ezra) around the time of the Exile using Jawist, Elohist, Priestly, and Deuteronomist sources. In this book Bloom separates out the "J" or Jawist document alone and presents it in all its original glory. One thing that stands out in J when it is isolated this way is how interesting the female characters are compared to their male counterparts, and how the J document states origins in such a way that emphasizes the Kingdom of Judah's claim to the scepter over that of the northern Kingdom.
After compiling all the evidence, Bloom makes the case that the author of J was a brilliant female poet and writer in the court of Solomon. Yahweh as a deity is anthropomorphized to a greater extent in J than in any other source. He's a hands-on sort of God who must "go down" to see what they are building at Babel and actually wrestles with Jacob. Over time, Jewish priests cleaned up J's depiction of Yahweh by first calling his appearances to men "The angel of the LORD" which introduced a buffer (an example is the burning bush speaking to Moses), and even later, angels were described as created conscious beings in their own right as messengers of Yahweh, thus completing his elevation to an unknowable transcendence.
See also
Footnotes
- ↑ The Tanakh is the source for the Christian Old Testament