The Invention of Hebrew

Traditions

by Seth L. Sanders

The Invention of Hebrew is the first book to approach the Bible in light of recent epigraphic discoveries on the extreme antiquity of the alphabet and its use as a deliberate and meaningful choice. Hebrew was more than just a way of transmitting information; it was a vehicle of political symbolism and self-representation. Seth L. Sanders connects the Bible's distinctive linguistic form--writing down a local spoken language--to a cultural desire to speak directly to people, summoning them to join a new community that the text itself helped call into being. Addressing the people of Israel through a vernacular literature, Hebrew texts reimagined their audience as a public. By comparing Biblical documents with related ancient texts in Hebrew, Ugaritic, and Babylonian, this book shows Hebrew's distinctiveness as a self-conscious political language. Illuminating the enduring stakes of Biblical writing, Sanders demonstrates how Hebrew assumed and promoted a source of power previously unknown in written "the people" as the protagonist of religion and politics.

Genres: Judaism, Biblical Studies, History

280 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Rob Vanhoff · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well written materialist explanation of ancient Hebrew inscriptions in the context of Northwest Semitic inscriptions and Ancient Near-eastern literature more broadly. Explores questions like, What can we learn about the users of Hebrew, given these inscriptions? How are these inscriptions to be properly differentiated from other inscriptions from similar times and places? What makes the Hebrew Bible unique among other literature of the ANE? This is not specifically about how the Hebrew Bible was written; its focus is on material culture rather than texts transmitted/mediated through a scribal tradition.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

An innovative and provocative read! Sanders traces changes in the content, form, and social contexts of writing in the Bronze and Iron Age Levant, arguing that the emergence of alphabetic vernacular writing is inextricably linked in this region with a new kind of political communication, speech that directly addresses and simultaneously calls into being a "people." For Sanders, this political communication is a necessary precondition for the writing of biblical literature, addressed to and producing the polity of "Israel." Sanders argues, against scholars (Habermas, Warner, Anderson) who would locate the innovation of the public/nation in modernity, that Hebrew's second-person address produced "Israel" as a pre-modern public.

At times, his arguments can be vague (for example, the standardization of Hebrew across political borders is never fully explained, nor are the agents of standardization identified). His argument that the book of Deuteronomy articulates a "negative political theology" by placing text and deity in the traditional sovereign place of the king is compelling and innovative, but does it matter that a main stated goal and reported effect of this political theology is the wholesale destruction of Canaanite people and cult? Seems like it should.

The book is detailed and careful in its approach to philology, archaeology, and theory, engaging and very clearly written. Highly recommend, especially for anyone looking for new approaches to biblical studies or the history of ancient Israel.

[Michael Cahn · Rating 5 out of 5]

very good study of an intricate problem: Writing in Babylonian, speaking a Hebrew dialect, and how it all got mixed up

[Dancingfoolvb · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bit difficult and abstract, this book looks at the possibile origins of the Hebrew language.