Dal Deuteronomio ai libri dei Re

by Thomas Römer

Contributo essenziale per lo studio e lo sviluppo della ricerca critica intorno alla "Storia deuteronomistica", questo volume riflette la grande capacità di Thomas Römer di interloquire a tutto campo con l'accademia europea e nordamericana. In primo luogo l'Autore presenta una panoramica della storia della ricerca sul "Deuteronomista" e – ripercorrendo le principali tappe dell'indagine critica sui libri da Giosué a II Re – evidenzia fondamentali questioni di metodo e interrogativi aperti. Römer avanza poi un'ipotesi originale sulla genesi e la composizione della Storia deuteronomistica postulandone tre diverse edizioni: una versione all'epoca di Giosia e nel quadro dell'imperialismo assiro, quindi un'edizione esilica, infine una in epoca persiana.

Genres: Biblical Studies, Religion

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2006

About the author

Thomas Römer is Professor of the Hebrew Bible at the Collège de France and Professor at the University of Lausanne.

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Reviews

[Janet]

I am not a professional or even knowledgeable in this field, so keep that in mind when reading this review. When I first started the book, I was disappointed because I thought I would get a more definitive overview of the history and times covered in the old testament books, Joshua through Kings. Instead the author purported to show that these books along with Deuteronomy itself were written and rewritten at three distinct periods of Jewish history. Romer used close textual review and elucidated themes that the “redactors” (in other words, scribes who edited and expanded the text over the years) used to interpret past history in terms of intervening events, especially the idea that if the Jewish people did not worship their God alone and persisted calling upon other gods, they would lose the land that Moses brought them to. Romer also highlighted word choice and syntax such as the use of the singular or plural you. (On an unrelated note, have you folks noted how we really do need a plural you in contemporary English?)

At any rate, as I came to understand what Romer was doing, at first, I was skeptical and unconvinced by his examples. However, as I went through the book and first read the revisions that Romer attributed to the era when Josiah was king of Judah, and then read about the revisions during the Babylonian exile, and then the revisions after many of the exiles returned, I found his thesis compelling.

Also, I’m sure this is Old Testament 101 to Biblical scholars, but I also became more impressed with the literary device of the book of Deuteronomy as a report of a speech by Moses, and at the same time, I could be convinced that within the “speech” there were warnings and rules which reflected issues which were crucial at different times in Jewish history up till around 500 BC.

Now, I have to say that I am a very compulsive reader, and I did go back and check the chapters and verses which he gives as references. In my experience as a non-religious layperson reading these books of the Bible two years ago, I found the repetition of speeches and interpolation of peculiar incidents aggravating and frustrating. I’m not eager to reread this whole corpus now, but I’m more appreciative of how the confusing text of the books that we read today reflects an urgent desire by the scribes of ancient times to explain those centuries of wars and tragedies and to inspire their fellow Jews to adhere to their religious practices.

[Jack Naylor]

Romer is a deft narrator, and as such, this book wins quite a few points with me. I found the overview of the scholarship to be quite helpful, and all of his arguments for the parsings of the DtrH to be easily traceable. I'm just not sure I appreciate his confidence in his own narrative. Josiah is the hero, and the earliest layers are all identifiable as such because of some demonstrable connection to his cultic and political centralization. But too much boils down to - this verse clearly comes from the original Josianic DtrH because it's concerned with an agenda he would be concerned with - why do we know he would be concerned with that agenda - because it's in DtrH. He talks himself in a circle. Its not exactly clear to me why Hezekiah couldn't be the originator of the text and was later downplayed by some exilic Josiah fanboys.

In any case, I don't think a lot of his suggestions are unreasonable (there certainly is a Deuteronomist concerned with the narrative of exile as it relates to the worship of other gods), and I would actually recommend this book, but it's way too presumptuous.

*Also, citing Finkelstein's The Bible Unearthed a bunch is not a reason to say that the United Monarchy "definitely" didn't exist at all.

[Greg]

This is an impressive synthesis of 60 years or so of scholarship on the Deuteronomistic History, the books of Deuteronomy through 2 Kings. His, is a middle-of-the-road analysis of the development of the books based on a triple redaction of the Deuteronomistic History. First, there was the book of Deuteronomy that was not part of the DH that was produced either in the reign of Hezekiah or Josiah. The DH was a product of scribes producing court propaganda in the reign of Josiah (Samuel and Kings). After the fall of Jerusalem and the deportation of the elite of Judah in 587, a second redaction was done, updating Deuteronomy for the Exile, gluing Joshua and Judges, and updating the DH for exile. Finally, there was an early Persian period final redaction of the DH that harmonized it with the Priestly material (Exod., Lev., Num.) and substantially reworked Joshua (his hypothesis is that the earliest Torah in the late Persian Period was a Hexateuch (Gen-Josh) not the Pentateuch (Gen-Deut). The book is very well organized and presents an excellent history of scholarship as far as the European scholarly tradition is concerned. The author is Swiss and there is a bias towards Continental and British scholarship on the DH and not enough attention is paid to the Frank Moore Cross and his disciples, particularly as it contrasts greatly with his hypothesis of a substantial Persian Period redaction. Obviously there was a Persian Period and Hellenistic editing that took place to produce the document that we have now, based on differences between the Samaritan Pentateuch, Masoretic Text, and Septuagint (and variations between Greek A and Greek B of that) and surprisingly Romer doesn't really address it from this perspective as Emmanuel Tov has done. Cross and his disciples would not have considered the post-exilic editing as drastic as Romer, and would dispute the dating of certain chapters and verses that Romer puts in the post-exilic period.

[Erik Champenois]

"The So-Called Deuteronomistic History" was a surprisingly clear and crisp book which clearly outlines the basics of the history of the Deuteronomistic history and of Römer's own three-stage theory, which sees the Deuteronomistic history as generally composed in three different eras: the Assyrian, the Babylonian, and the Persian periods. I find Römer's arguments largely compelling, even while some of the arguments around redaction of specific texts may be relatively less clear-cut.

I found the echoes of Assyrian treaty literature in Deuteronomy particularly interesting, as also the idea of the Book of Joshua as a propaganda work inspired by Assyrian conquest narratives, and the representation of Solomon as a wise king reflecting wider Assyrian, Egyptian, and Mesopotamian themes. Similarly persuasive was the identification of specific passages throughout the Deuteronomistic History that reflect he Babylonian exile, as well as the return from exile, clearly showing that those passages were written at those points of time. (The arguments are more meticulous than reflected here, and rely on the contradictions and multiple different constructions of the same events in the texts, as well as the indications of redactions through multiple conclusions, narrative disruption, etc.). As just one small example, the story of Moses dying outside of the land appears to have been added as an extra conclusion after a prior conclusion in Deuteronomy, and would have had particular significance for the Babylonian deportees, having likely been written to reflect that environment.

[Tyler Horton]

Really well written and informative, this is an impressive work offering a narrative of the formation of the Former Prophets and Torah. It reads quite well, especially considering what it is, but is an academic work and assumes you either know the texts very well or will be looking them up as you go. I'm not convinced his argument works and find his statements about what is 'obviously wrong/untrue' to be a bit much. I find it hard to believe we can really identify layers to this extent, and, that we can then locate them in their distinct places of historical development. That said, this is surely the place to go for a real introduction to the issues and the scholarship on this set of texts.

[Dan]

A remarkably clear, coherent explanation of why Romer believes the DH is a three-layer creation (Josianic, exilic and post-exilic). If only all the dissections of the Hebrew Bible were this accessible. But now I have to go back to Idan Dershowitz's The Valediction of Moses to see how the proto-Deuteronomy supposedly preserved in the Shapira fragments (in Dershowitz's ingenious but wildly contrarian view) could have fit into Romer's scheme.

[Cole Gillespie]

Read it in two sittings. If your an autist, I think you’ll love it but know what you’re getting into ig

Because of this I will now, with more furvor and boldness, keep wearing my brass serpent (nehushtan) chain as it is at least slightly anti-deuteronomic propoganda ✊🏻

[Jeremy Garber]

Römer provides a sophisticated yet readable outline of the story of the Deuteronomistic History and the political tensions beneath its creation. In brief, the author makes the argument that the books of the Hebrew Bible that make up the “so-called Deuteronomistic History” (Judges, Chronicles, and Kings) were created in three separate stages, before, during, and after the exile to Babylon. Römer does an especially good job of comparing the various strands of the text to Ancient Near Eastern texts, suggesting a political movement that wanted to centralize religion and politics in the city of Jerusalem and created a history to justify that concentration. This history traces the movement of a people from scattered outsiders to a minor nation that looked longingly outward to become a militarized superpower – and the tension of desire and oppression that caused them repetitive waves of grief. As a theologian, this book from the discipline of biblical studies was far more informative and readable than many of its kind. Suitable for general graduate students in divinity, theology,

[Clayton Tune]

You know, Romer is WAY above my education level but his ideas are fascinating. The DT History fascinates me and he is (apparently) one of the leading scholars in the field. The introduction to Babylonian and Assyrian literature was new for me and very interesting. Though it may not help in the class I'm teaching, it helps to know. This would most definitely not be a light, bathroom read... or if Bathroom is too negative of a place, a Sunday afternoon read.