The Question of the Theft of Codex Aleph

“Codex Sinaiticus, most of it taken by Dr von Tischendorf in 1859 from St. Catherine’s monastery beside Mt Sinai in Egypt– the monks say stolen –”
http://www.theologicaleditions.com/Features/religioustexts.htm

“J. Rendel Harris (who had visited St. Catherine’s) had no illusions: in his review of Gregory’s “Text and Canon” in the February 1908 issue of The Expositor, Harris expressed extreme skepticism (bordering on outright ridicule) of Tischendorf’s version of events pertaining to the “rescue” of Codex Sinaiticus.” – James Snapp Jr.
http://evangelicaltextualcriticism.blogspot.com/2009/07/codex-sinaiticus-highlights-ii.html

“While staying at St. Catherine’s monastery on Mount Sinai, he made the momentous discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus–a text dated to be from the fourth century C.E. He brought back the text with him. (According to the Mt Sinai monks, though there were bad feelings, and claims that Tischendorf had “stolen” the manuscript.)”
http://www.entheology.org/library/winters/NEWTEST2.TXT

“See for example D.A. Waite, Defending the King James Bible (The Bible For Today: 1993), p. 61, “They just about worship that manuscript.” This was just after alleging, inaccurately, that a was about to be burned (one will note that the steward at St. Catherine’s kept the manuscript in his cell, wrapped in a red cloth, hardly the way in which one treats trash). ”
http://www.aomin.org/aoblog/index.php?itemid=1290

“Under a complicated arrangement, Tischendorf was allowed to transcribe the manuscript, but did not have the time to examine it in full detail. Tischendorf wanted to take the manuscript to the west, where it could be examined more carefully.
It is at this point that the record becomes unclear. The monks, understandably, had no great desire to give up the greatest treasure of their monastery. Tischendorf, understandably, wanted to make the manuscript more accessible (though not necessarily safer; unlike Saint Petersburg and London, Mount Sinai has not suffered a revolution or been bombed since the discovery of Aleph). In hindsight, it seems quite clear that the monks were promised better terms than they actually received (though this may be the fault of the Tsarist government rather than Tischendorf). Still, by whatever means, the manuscript wound up in Saint Petersburg, and later was sold to the British Museum. ”
http://www.skypoint.com/members/waltzmn/ManuscriptsUncials.html

“A story of high adventure swirls around the Codex Sinaiticus. Tischendorf was granted an audience with the pope. The czar of Russia showered him with money and financed his final mission. Despite his fame, though, a shadow hangs over the man, who some insist was a thief.
Scattered Book, Checkered Reputation
…
However, opinion on Tischendorf is as diffuse and puzzling as the ancient pages themselves. Christfried Böttrich, an expert on the New Testament at Germany’s University of Greifswald, claims that “Tischendorf was a man without blemish and above reproach.”
But the monks at St. Catherine’s have a less flattering view. They think he stole the manuscript. “The Codex Sinaiticus Was Stolen,” was the headline of a 2000 article in the Sunday Times about a conference a British parliamentary committee held on stolen artifacts. Prince Charles, who is chairman of the St. Catherine’s Foundation, has reportedly demanded the return of the manuscripts to Egypt.”
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,479791,00.html

peace
Nazaroo

Revelation for Dummies (6) - The Great Period of Martyrdom

In Revelation 7:9-34 we are given a special vision,
of a vast number of Christian martyrs.
Those who try to apply this vision to the very early times (c. 60-130 A.D.)
or even the last 'great persecution' (c. 280-300 A.D.)
must interpret the vision as an exaggeration of sorts,
a poetical hyperbole.

But if we actually look at the history of Christianity for the last 2000 years,
we will be startled when we find just such a period in history,
and it was quite recent: The first and second World Wars.
The following chart diagrams both the expansion of Christianity,
and the significant periods and places of Christian Martyrdom:

The Second World War in particular is remembered for the Holocaust,
the slaughter of some 6 million people of the Jewish faith,
but the actual numbers for this war show that a a vastly larger number
of Christians, mostly civilians, women and children, were also slaughtered,
in a systemic pattern of genocidal acts, mostly simply butchering,
such as in the Croatian Holocaust, and other East-European events from
the beginning of the 20th century until the end of the Cold War.



It is remarkable that although this great slaughter of Christians temporarily slowed the expansion
of Christianity, it also gave it the greatest boost since the fall of Constantinople.

If we want to interpret Revelation historically, we are again faced with a prophecy
which has a clear and plain literal fulfillment without exaggeration, and with a specific time marked out.

Again, the overall effect is to place us in the Last Times, with few prophecies left to fulfill,
before the Return of the King.

Who killed whom when the giant died? An exercise in textual reconstruction

And there was againe a battell in Gob, with the Philistines, where Elhanan the sonne of Iaare-Oregim a Bethlehemite, slewe the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the staffe of whose speare was like a weauers beame.

So the KJV at 2 Samuel 21:19. Much ink has been spilt attempting to justify the KJV's interpolation of the brother of in order to keep the text from reading as the Hebrew does, that Elhanan, rather than David, killed Goliath. But what most KJV proponents fail to mention is that the lack of 'brother' is not the only textual problem in this verse. There are only a couple ways to reconcile this verse with 1 Chronicles 20:5--

And there was warre againe with the Philistines, and Elhanan the sonne of Iair, slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite, whose spearestaffe was like a weauers beame.

Disregarding all the spelling variations, the core of both verses reads thus:
Elhanan the son of Jair slew Goliath the Gittite, whose spear staff was like a weaver's beam.

To which Samuel adds "Oregim the Bethlehemite" and Chronicles adds "Lahmi the brother of".

So the KJV stopped short of interpolating the whole plus from Chronicles into Samuel--Lahmi is not named. Or is he--but as the killer, not the killed? Let's look at the Hebrew.

2 Samuel 21:19
WYK ALXNN BN-Ya3RI ARGIM BITh H-LXMI ATh GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Yari weavers house-of-the-bread: Goliath the-Gittite and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

1 Chronicles 20:5
WYK ALXNN BN-[K:YA3UR] [Q:YA3IR] ATh-LXMI AXI GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Yaur: Bready, brother-of Goliath the-Gittite; and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

In these transcriptions I have added vowels only for the name of Elhanan's father, which is found in two forms (K and Q) in each verse of the Masoretic text. The Masoretes themselves obviously recognized a corruption here, but couldn't settle on how to fix it.

Note that the last word in the verse, ARGIM, is an element in the extra of 2 Samuel, where it is tacked on to Jair's name. Note also that the word LXMI, which is an element in the name Bethlehem ("House of Bread"), is given as an extra in 1 Chronicles for the name of Goliah's brother. Furthermore, the name Jair is spelled two (or four) different ways in the two texts, and all cases are Hebrew hapax legomena: Jair is always spelled differently in the Hebrew Bible than either verse has it, whether Q or K.

Clearly there are three different places where the two verses need to be reconciled, not just one. I propose, therefore, the following possibilities for reconstructing of the source for both verses (the changes could have happened in a different order, especially with the first possibility):


 Possibility #1: Only Samuel is corrupted; Chronicles has the correct reading

WYK ALXNN BN-Y3UR ATh-LXMI AXI GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Yaur: Bready brother-of Goliath the-Gittite, and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

1. The last word of the verse was copied into the first half, probably due to skipping to the next line of text, so that both lines now end with the same 7 letters:
H-MLXMH B-GUB 3M-FLSTIM WYK ALXNN BN-YA3UR ARGIM
ATh-LXMI AXI GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.

2.The  text suffered loss of the word אֲחִי AXI (the brother of), by homoeoteleuton I ... I :

WYK ALXNN BN-Y3UR ARGIM ATh-LXMI GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Yaur Weavers: Bready Goliath the-Gittite, and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

3. A 'helpful' scribe changed the unheard-of name Y3UR to the equally unheard of plural form Y3RI, both of which are cognates of a word that means 'wood' (in the British meaning of 'forest'):

WYK ALXNN BN-Y3RI ARGIM ATh LXMI GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Woods-of-Weavers: Bready Goliath the-Gittite, and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

4. Another 'helpful' scribe changed ATh-LXMI to BITh-H-LXMI, changing the meaning again:

WYK ALXNN BN-Y3RI ARGIM BITh H-LXMI GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Yariorgim the Bethlehemite Goliath the-Gittite and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

5. A final scribe put the ATh back in where it now belonged, tidying up the grammar to yield the Samuel reading:

WYK ALXNN BN-Y3RI ARGIM BITh H-LXMI ATh GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Yariorgim the Bethlehemite: Goliath the-Gittite, and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

That's a lot of changes to hypothesise! And it doesn't even account for the K-Q variants in the Masoretic text.


Possibility #2: Both verses are equally corrupted forms of the archetype.

Reconstruction A: The original text read:

WYK ALXNN BN-YAIR BITh H-LXMI ATh AXI GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Ya'ir the Bethlehemite: the-brother-of Goliath the-Gittite, and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

1a,b. While the Samuel scribe dropped  אֲחִי AXI, the Chronicles scribe dropped אֵת ATh, the Hebrew indicator of a following direct object :

WYK ALXNN BN-YAIR BITh H-LXMI [S:Ath][C:AXI] GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Ya'ir the Bethlehemite[S:] [C:the-brother-of] Goliath the-Gittite, and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

2a. In Chronicles, a 'helpful' scribe re-inserted ATh in place of BITh H-:

WYK ALXNN BN-YAIR ATh LXMI AXI GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Ya'ir: Lehmi the-brother-of Goliath the-Gittite, and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

2b. In Samuel, ARGIM got duplicated after YAIR, as explained above:

WYK ALXNN BN-YAIR ARGIM BITh H-LXMI Ath GLITh H-GThI W-3Ts XNIThU KMNUR ARGIM.
and-killed Elhanan son-of-Ya'ir Weavers Bethlehemite: Goliath the-Gittite and-wood-of spear-his as-beam of-weavers.

3a,b. Finally, the Chronicles scribe changed the spelling of YAIR to Y3UR, while the Samuel scribe changed the spelling to Y3RI to better fit the corrupted context.

WYK ALXNN BN-Y[S:3RI][C:3UR]  . . . thus yielding the final readings in only three steps each.

Other reconstructions are possible, but this one best passes Occam's Razor: three steps, to account for three differences between the texts, prior to the Masoretes taking over the transmission of the two texts. So what was Goliath's brother's name? Well, according to this reconstruction, we don't know, and we can only guess that Elhanan's father was a man who spelled his name the same way that four other Jairs in the OT did. It's also possible that this was the Elhanan the son of Dodo of Bethlehem mentioned in both books, but that would involve a greater level of corruption in the transmission.

These three corruptions, by the way, must have been very early. The Septuagint reads exactly like the Hebrew, even down to a reasonable approximation of the names.

The Targum for Chronicles isn't much help. It reads: "David, the son of Jesse, a pious man, who rose at midnight to sing praises to God, slew Lachmi, the brother of Goliath, the same day on which he slew Goliath the Gittite, whose spear-staff was like a weaver's beam."

The other ancient versions supply the word 'brother' in Samuel, although, as did the KJV, they may well have just moved it in from Chronicles.

The Syriac also paraphrases somewhat, while translating the invented name in Samuel:
Samuel: Elhanan the son of forest a weaver, a Beth-lehemite, slew a brother of Goliath the Philistine, the staff of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam.
Chronicles: Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lahmi of the descendants of the giants, who was the brother of Goliath the mighty man of Gath, whose spear staff was like a weaver’s beam.

The Vulgate also translates Elhanan and Jair/Jaare-Oregim:
Samuel: God-given the son of Forest Weaver, a Bethlehemite, struck the brother of Goliath the Gittite, whose spear wood was like a weaver's beam.
Chronicles: God-given the son of Forest struck Lehmites the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the wood of whose spear was like a weaver's beam.

Esther, Star of the OT: Part 11: The Invisible God...

Last post, we outlined steps to secure Esther in its place in the Jewish and Christian canon.   Lets now move to step 2:

(2) "We must demonstrate that the kind of theology presented in Esther is not foreign to Jewish literature as found in the rest of the Bible, but wholly compatible and consistent with it."

The first part of such a step will be in establishing how God is presented in the rest of the OT.

The OT view of God is unique in literature.  Not any 'God', but a specific God, objectively known by His modus operandi and His personal traits.

The Invisible God...

The first striking thing about the Biblical God is that He is invisible.  From His first interaction with Adam in the book of Genesis, He makes Himself known, not by appearance, but by His voice: 'And they heard the voice of the LORD God walking in the garden ...'

In every interaction between God and man, we find God introduced by His voice; He speaks His way into the scene, and his presence and nature is known by His communication.  

Abraham also hears God's voice (Gen 12:1), but he does business through the Priest Melchizedek (Gen 14:18), or must 'see God' and communicate only via God's angels (Gen. 18:1-2, esp. Gen. 22:11). 

Isaac also must discover God's by indirect sign (Gen. 24:66), in fact a fortunate coincidence! (Gen.24:43-44).  

Jacob too must spend the first half of his life as an ignorant agnostic, then encounter God indirectly, by a dream (Gen. 28:16-21).  In passing, Jacob seems to have learned that God is not detectably omnipresent (contra Pantheism), but only choses to reveal Himself via signs and supernatural effects.

Joseph also discovers God via dreams (Gen 37:5), and most importantly, God's actions are revealed to him through Providence, the hidden hand of God, directing fate for a miraculous (i.e., an improbable) outcome (Gen. 45:5-8).

Even Moses is not introduced to God by a direct view:  He sees instead a sign; the burning tree, and hears God's voice only. (Exod. 3:2-6).  Even when Moses seems to 'see God', again, the view and staging is severely limited, and is most strange (Exod. 33:20-23), certainly an exception to any rule one could draw from the O.T. generally.  The people of Israel and indeed the world must experience God indirectly through frightening signs alone (Exod. 13:15, 19:16), and must hear His voice through appointed prophets only (Exod. 7:1, 19:21).

Appearances by Angels are tantalizing but brief and puzzling.  As God's agents, they are treated to all intents and purposes as if one were dealing directly with God (cf. Gen. 32:25-32, Gen. 18:1-16 etc.)   Abraham and Jacob don't quibble about their obvious authority. 

But the prevailing doctrine is not affected by any apparent 'exceptions':

"You cannot see my face: 

For no man shall see me and survive." (Exod. 33:20, cf. Judges 6:22)

Nor has the doctrine changed in any way, long after the coming of the Messiah, in spite of all the miracles and signs surrounding that event:

"No man has seen God at any time." (John 1:18)

Thus there is complete harmony between OT and NT on these crucial points.


The God of Improbability and Impossibility...

Perhaps because of these limitations of human access to the Most High and Living God, we find God compensating by showing His action in history through the improbable and the impossible:

Moses witnesses a tree burning that never actually burns up, remaining unharmed (Exod 3:2).   No explanation is given, and the reader is expected to recognize indeed the impossibility of it, marking the event as God-caused.

Abraham likewise is given a sign with a message, in the birth of Isaac:

"Is anything too hard for the LORD?" (Gen 18:14)

 Gideon requests the impossible twice from God for certainty (cf. Gen. 41:32) and he gets a highly improbable (miraculous) answer for his test both times (Judges 6:36-40).

The same teaching is repeated in the NT:

"For with God nothing shall be impossible!" (Luke 1:37)

The examples could be multiplied from both Testaments, but the point is clear:


The Biblical God is a God who reveals Himself through highly improbable and even impossible (miraculous) events.   His hand is the invisible Hand of Providence.   This is precisely the same God who is quietly revealed in the book of Esther (on both counts; invisibility, and improbability).

(to be continued).

Esther, Star of the OT: Part 10: The Providential Aspect

At this point, the task before us can be outlined:

(1)  We must show that Esther is not merely secular or non-religious literature (in the best inclusive sense of religious), but is actually profoundly religious in character. 

(2) We must demonstrate that the kind of theology presented in Esther is not foreign to Jewish literature as found in the rest of the Bible, but wholly compatible and consistent with it.

(3)  We must show that the book is authentic Jewish historical literature, and not merely an imitation or forgery of the same.

Lets look at number 1.   The very subtlety of Esther makes revealing its religious character a challenge.  But thankfully, many have labored in this area, and made quite a clear case that Esther as story utterly depends upon what we call God's Providence, His unseen hand working invisibly in the turn of events.

"The whole book could be taken as nothing more than chance and luck. It can be seen as a literary tale of how a young Jewish orphan just happened to become queen and be in the right place at the right time to save her people. Or is there more to it than that?"  - S. Atteberry, "God Uses Harem Girls: Esther"

A Series of Coincidences

What is a coincidence?   An unlikely coordination of circumstance.  The key word, the essence, is "unlikely".  The improbable, the unusual, the strikingly odd, and out of the ordinary, is what is meant, and what will be recognizable in a legitimate and significant 'coincidence'.

Those who understand the science of Probability Theory know that probabilities can be estimated, and calculated from other probabilities by strict rules of combination:  Probabilities are expressed as fractions between 0 and 1, and the probability of two different events happening is calculated by simply multiplying the probability of each event together.   The probability of a string of events happening is calculated by multiplying the fractional probability of each event together.

It becomes apparent that the chances of ALL the events in a long sequence happening becomes very small, even if the chances of each individual event are reasonably probable.  For instance, the chances of "heads" in a fair coin toss is 50% or as a fraction, 1/2.   The chances of flipping "heads" twice in a row however, is (1/2 x 1/2) or 1/4 (25%).   The chances of 3 in a row are (1/2 x 1/2 x 1/2) = 1/8 (12.5%), that is the overall chance is halved again.  Consequently, you have only about a 1 in 1000 chance of throwing 10 "heads" in a row!

Now look at the story of Esther:

"The book begins on a whim of a king. King Ahasuerus had given a great banquet for all the leading officials and dignitaries of his kingdom. After much revelry, the king ordered for his queen, Vashti, to be brought before everyone, so he could show her off. Vashti refused. In a fit of drunken rage Ahasuerus for all intents and purposes divorced her to set an example that wives are to obey their husbands. After he sobered up and cooled down, he realized that he had no queen. The decree could not be changed so the search began for a new queen.  All the beautiful young virgins were brought in, and one of the virgins was Esther." (ibid.) 

The probability of the first event happening is unknown.  We might even posit that it was inevitable, bound to happen sooner or later, given the propensities of the characters.   Technically, the probability of the event could be set to 100% (i.e., certain).  This means the first factor in our probability equation is simply 1.  This would not really yet be a 'coincidence'.  Nothing particularly unlikely here.

But Atteberry goes on to list the sequence of following events:

(1) Out of "a harem that likely numbered in the 1000s", in the first coincidence of the book she won the contest!   She found favour and was crowned queen.  It would be fair to say, since such choices are fickle, that even if beautiful or intelligent, Esther had less than a 1/100 shot in such a contest, and that may be too generous.

(2) "Mordecai found out about an assassination plot and warned Esther who told the king."  Another fortunate, but honestly unlikely occurance.  Even supposing the discovery was probable, give it less than 50-50 that it would be Mordecai who chanced to do it: 49/100.  Again we 'err' on the conservative side.

(3)  Haman rises to power, and Mordecai foolishly refuses to bow to him.  A rash act, even predictable in the sense that at least one Jew among tens of thousands might openly act in such a way (cf. Daniel).   But since it is but one person, how is it Haman determines to exterminate every Jew in the Babylonian Empire?  Even granting the first event likely, we must view the second unlikely.  Give the cause 99/100, and the effect 49/100.   Again we estimate odds cautiously.

(4)  Esther risks appearing to the King unsummoned.  Anyone who goes to the king without being called risks being killed, and the king had not sent for her for thirty days.

"This was the king who commanded the engineers of a bridge he was building be thrown off the end of the bridge when they fell behind due to a horrible storm. When a father requested this king not to send his last son off to war (he had lost his 3 other sons to this king’s war), the king commanded the last son be killed in front of the father, then had the father blinded so that was the last thing he saw. This was the king to which Esther was going, without an invitation."  (ibid)

Beautiful or not, Esther is dealing with a psycho, she's going against his second in command, and the subject matter is hardly pleasing.   We have to assess the risk negatively, even if close to 50-50, so set it again at 49/100.

(5)  "Now another coincidence happens: the king had insomnia. He commanded the book of the annals be brought to him and heard the re-telling of how Mordecai saved his life."    The reader will pardon me if I again set the probability for this event below 50-50.   The insomnia is an independent event; the narrow window for the nick of time, the luck of the reading selection, all conspire to call for a significantly negative probability for this set of events: Call it a one in three chance, again too generous, at 1/3.

What now is our estimated probability for this series of events?

1/100 x 49/100 x 99/100 x 49/100 x 49/100 x 1/3 = .0004 or 4 in 10,000!

That is, by the most generous estimate, a 0.004 % chance of occurring.

"...It is truly a book of coincidences. That is why we need Esther. Too often we think that just because there is no obvious working of God in the world that God is not working. Esther’s discreet witness says otherwise.

And we need these reminders. We need reminders that God working in our world is not always obvious—even to those in the church. We also need reminders that God uses harem girls to accomplish His purposes. Sometimes God uses the small things, the little things, the things that could be easily overlooked to accomplish His purposes.

Paul reflects this truth in 1 Cor. 1:25-29:

 'For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength.   Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.  But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong;  God chose what is low and despised in the world, things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are,   so that no one might boast in the presence of God.'

There are always those times in life when we wonder where God is. Esther reminds us that there are times that God is firmly behind the scenes, and we may not see how He has been working till well after what is taking place now. Part of our walk with God is realizing that God is with us regardless of circumstances or how we feel. The Jews had to have felt abandoned as they saw the decree that would take all of their lives. But seven years before they even realized they were going to need a deliverer, a Jewish queen came to the palace. ... God used those events to deliver his people. Even in the worst the world can throw at us, God continues to walk with us and provide ways of deliverance for His people. He walks with us through the messes as well as the celebrations.

The book of Esther seems to be driven by whims, accidents, and coincidence. But is it? The underlying, almost invisible, current running through Esther is that God is working in the world to accomplish his purposes. He can even use a harem girl and an arrogant, pagan king to do this. The book of coincidences is really a book of grace. In one of the most pagan places possible—the palace of a pagan king who does not even know that he has married a Jew, nor does he know that a decree has went out in his name to destroy his wife and her people, God is working."

Many have claimed that the content of Esther is 'unlikely'.  There is no point in denying this.  Because that actually is the point of the book.  With God nothing is impossible.  This is a theme that runs throughout all Holy Scripture, especially the O.T.   Esther goes out of its way to show the hidden hand of God in the Providential and unlikely events surrounding the Jewish people.

This is not a flaw of the book, but rather its central theme.

(to be continued)

Esther, Star of the OT: Part 9: Luther's Contradictory Platform

Before passing to other issues, we need to re-examine Martin Luther's radical position on Esther.
The observation of Peter J. Leithart  (2005) nails the problem squarely:

"Luther was famously hostile to the book of Esther. Luther was also famously enamoured of the idea of the Deus absconditus, the hidden God. These positions are inconsistent: No book of the Bible better narrates the power and providence of the hidden God than Esther, which refrains even from naming Him."

 Leithart notes that Luther's strong advocacy of Providence, the idea of God acting behind the scenes in history with a hidden hand, ought to have caused Luther to embrace the book as the center-piece of his platform!  In fact, the idea of God's Providence was a fundamental part of the Reformation.

The question of the authenticity and/or historicity of the book is not relevant to the point before us, because Luther didn't question the fundamental point that it was indeed a Jewish book, originally written in Hebrew.  He did not deny that it was part of the Jewish canon, accepted by Jews everywhere and included in the Tanach (Holy Scripture).  Luther did not doubt that the book had been adopted by the entire Jewish nation since the 200 B.C., and was the basis of the annual celebration of the Festival of Purim, or that Esther was publicly celebrated as a historical document, and had been since time immemorial.

Luther instead attacked the book on the two points already discussed:

(1) That the book (Hebrew version at least) didn't openly use God's name [YHWH], and that no specific prayers are recorded in the book;
(2) And infamously, because the book was too Jewish.

The whole basis of the attack is that somehow Esther is different than all  the other accepted Holy books, because it presents a different God, or  has a different way of presenting God.  i.e., the claim is that either :

 (1) After the captivity of Babylon, Jews had now become non-religious and had abandoned worship of the God of Israel for Babylonian paganism, and so their writings from this period are simply not inspired, or,
(2) God ceased to inspire Hebrew writers during and/or after the Babylonian Captivity.

This is not a natural Christian or Jewish position on the OT canon, and Luther's attitude seems rather based on criticisms by various opponents of both religions, ancient and modern.  There is indeed some substance in these claims regarding the book's superficial appearance.   The problem was noticeable enough that  some early Christians felt moved to rectify the alleged lack by adding sections to give the book a more overtly 'Godly' look.  The Jewish scribes however,  lthough aware of the claims, felt no such need, and continued to copy the book verbatum.

The point is not that the claim had no superficial reality, but that the two  conflicting ideas in Luther's position are in fact ultimately incompatible:   The book can't be too Jewish, and at the same time not Jewish enough.  But recognizing this contradiction is not enough to solve the problem.  We have to decide which side of the fence to come down on.  

The essential issue is this:

I.  Is Esther qualitatively different from, and thus incompatible with, recognized Holy Scripture?

For this is the core challenge thrown down by Luther and others who would reject the book from the canon of Holy Scripture.

(to be continued...)

Esther, Star of the OT: Part 8: The Facts about Hebrew Narrative

Our easily stunned commentator, Deffinbaugh, quoted in Part 6, asked the following second question:

(2) "Why is prayer never specifically mentioned in the book?"   

This also sounds like a damning flaw in the literary work.  But it also sounds a little like the first thing the Serpent said in Genesis, designed to instill doubt and a kind of excited panic.

But lets look around a little before declaring the sky might be falling:

"But, for many readers [of Esther], the story's canonical context - the way it invites comparison between Esther and Moses or Daniel, for example, - invites also the possibility that we should think of an unseen God of Israel at work 'behind the scenes' in the narrative.  Textual support is often claimed in Mordecai's cryptic words to Esther that if she stays quiet 'deliverance will stand up for the Jews from another place' (Esther 4:14).  

This mode of reasoning is similar to a 'providential' reading of Ruth - so that Ruth's 'chancing to chance' upon the field of Boaz (Ruth 2:3) is viewed not, indeed, as 'chance' but as the doing of YHWH. 

Yet the only action of YHWH explicitly recounted by the narrator in the whole story is YHWH's gift of conception to Ruth at the very end (Ruth 4:13)." 

 - Gunn & Fewell, Narrative in the Hebrew Bible (Oxford, 1993)

Again we have confirmed that Esther is hardly unique in its oblique and indirect reference to YHWH.   But even more interesting is the second claim about the book of Ruth:   We get the impression that like Esther, Ruth is lacking appropriate references to God, presumably including prayers.  
But as is typical in scholarly commentary, the description and impression left by the commentary is actually miles away from the text itself!  Every argument sounds clinching and 100% true of course, until we hear the other side! 

Turning to Ruth, we are confronted with an immediate prayer from Naomi for her daughters in law:

"May the LORD [YHWH] deal kindly with you,
as ye have dealt with the dead, and also with me.
The LORD grant that ye may find rest,
each in the house of her husband." (Ruth 1:8-9)

Ruth suddenly doesn't seem like the 'Godless and secular narrative' we expected!  At least one character prays openly for her kin, before we even get out the door.   Even when enduring deep grief and hardship, our Naomi stoically attributes her misfortune to YHWH:

"the hand of the LORD has gone out against me." (Ruth 1:13)

Nor has the topic of the God of Israel even gotten started before we are treated to the most moving and profound statement about the LORD in the entire Bible, from the youngest character in the story:

"Do not plead with me to leave you,

or turn back from following you!

For wherever you go, I will go:

and where you stay I will stay.

Your people shall be my people,

and your God, my God.

Where you die, I will die,

and there I will be buried:

The LORD do so to me, and more also,

if anything but death parts me and you!" (Ruth 1:16-18)

There is probably nothing more dramatic and heart-gripping than this in the whole OT, other than the overwhelming revealing of Joseph to his brothers, and the shock of Jacob in Genesis 45, "Joseph is yet alive!"  (Gen. 45:26)

What we learn from these stunning discoveries is that nothing can be more misleading than a scholarly commentary, or more eye-opening than the text itself.  We must constantly be on guard not to let others do our thinking, and our checking for us.

It is likewise in the book of Esther regarding prayer:  Nothing could be absolutely more clinching and slap-in-the-face obvious than these two critically important portions:

'When Mordecai perceived all that had been done, he tore his clothes, and put on sackcloth and ashes, and went out into the middle of the city, and wailed with a loud and bitter cry.' ...

'And in every province, wherever the King's commandment and decree came, there was a great mourning among the Jews, and fasting, and weeping, and wailing, and many lay in sackcloth and ashes.' (Esther 4:1-3)

One has to wonder just how stupid, or how maliciously misdirecting a commentator has to be, to suggest that 'prayer is not specifically mentioned' in the book of Esther.  And really, just consider the ludicrousness of the assertion:
What uneducated fool, what unknowing island native, would not, upon seeing a large gathering of Jews anywhere in the world, fasting, weeping, wearing sackcloth and wailing, - would not interpret the scene as heart-rending prayer?

Deffinbaugh and his ilk need to be publicly ridiculed for such nonsense as this, as a deterrent to future historical revisionists.