Review in: Interpretation
2006 60: 326
Review door: Steven
S. TuellGevonden op: http://int.sagepub.com/content/60/3/326.full.pdf+html
I Chronicles 1-9: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary
(The Anchor Bible, vol. 12).
by Gary N. Knoppers Anchor Bible. Doubleday, New York, 2003.
514 pp. $49.95 (cloth). ISBN 0-385-46928-4.
I Chronicles 10-29: A New Translation with Introduction
and Commentary (The Anchor Bible, vol. 12A).
by Gary N. Knoppers Anchor Bible. Doubleday, New York, 2004.
531 pp. $49.95 (cloth). ISBN 0-385-51288-0.
SINCE THE GROUNDBREAKING WORK of Sara Japhet and H.G.M.
Williamson in the 1970s, Chronicles has attracted more and more scholarly
attention. Gary Knoppers is one of the most productive scholars in this
renaissance of Chronicles research, making this work particularly welcome. This
two-volume commentary opens with a complete translation of the text, followed
by a 137-page introduction and a lengthy bibliography (exhaustive through 2000;
understandably sketchy thereafter). The remainder of the first volume covers
the genealogies in 1 Chronicles 1-9. The second volume comments on the reign of
David
Knoppers' work is distinguished by his mastery
of text criticism, discussed in depth in his introduction. As he observes, the
Dead Sea discoveries have made Septuagint criticism particularly important,
since we now know that "at least some of the oldest Greek texts for
certain biblical books were translated from a Hebrew text that differed from
the textual base of the later rabbinic recension" (pp. 53-54). He
therefore urges caution when Chronicles differs from its source texts, "as
the alleged change may be due either to the textual tradition preserved by the
Chronicler's Vorlage or to textual corruption"—and not, as some
commentators too quickly have concluded, to a purposive change by the Chronicler
(pp. 70-71).
Summarizing recent scholarship,
Knoppers deals in particular with the relationship between Chronicles and
Ezra-Nehemiah. Most critical treatments of Chronicles since the nineteenth
century have connected these books in a unified Chronicler's History. However,
the consensus of recent scholarship holds that Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemiah
were composed, and should be read, separately. According to Knoppers, the
linguistic arguments either way are inconclusive. Further, some points of alleged
discontinuity actually point to continuity between these works—the importance
of Mosaic Torah and Davidic promises, "the use of genealogy to define
community," and general matters of style, for example (p. 88). Still,
Knoppers remains with the consensus, due to what he calls "the most
glaring of contrasts" between Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemiah: Chronicles'
view of Israel is inclusive, incorporating the northern tribes, while
Ezra-Nehemiah's view of Israel is exclusive, restricting the true Israel to the
southern tribes of Judah and Benjamin.
However,
the nearly word-for-word parallels between the conclusion of Chronicles (2
Chronicles 36:22-23) and the opening of Ezra (Ezra l:l-3a), as well as the
existence of 1 Esdras (which parallels 2 Chronicles 35:1-Ezra 10:44 and
Nehemiah 8:1-13), show that these works were at least secondarily joined.
Indeed, Ezra 1-6 shares so much in language and theme with Chronicles that it
would be perverse to deny the connection. Knoppers' detailed arguments
pertaining to the date, text, and composition of Chronicles are largely
consistent with a connected Chronicler's History, composed in stages over time
(as proposed by, among others, Freedman, Cross, Blenkinsopp, Schniedewind, and
this reviewer). Knoppers' view of the separate composition of Chronicles and
Ezra-Nehemiah hypothesizes a redactor who edited the opening chapters of Ezra
in order to combine these works. In any case, in Knoppers' perspective,
Chronicles can be viewed on its own; "its characteristic concerns are no
longer being forced into the mold of Ezra-Nehemiah" (p. 100).
Knoppers'
major sticking point, the alleged inclusivity of Chronicles toward the northern
tribes over against the exclusivity of Ezra-Nehemiah, does not represent an
irreconcilable conflict. After all, Chronicles is quite exclusive in its own
right (apart from general exclusion of the history of the north in 2
Chronicles, consider 2 Chronicles 11:13-15; 13:8-12; or 25:7). Ezra-Nehemiah
can sound a note of inclusivity (see the reference to the twelve tribes in Ezra
16:7).
The insistence that Chronicles be read on its own terms also
leads Knoppers to resist assigning Chronicles to the genre of "rewritten
Bible" attested at Qumran, since "Chronicles is more than a
paraphrase or literary elaboration of the primary history" (p. 134).
However, describing Chronicles as rewritten Bible does not mean regarding this
work as a mere paraphrase of Genesis-Kings. A consideration of Jubilees, the
Temple Scroll, or Josephus' Antiquities surely demonstrates that
rewritten Bible texts have their own clear purpose and integrity. What this
genre designation does imply is that Chronicles shares with other exemplars of
rewritten Bible faithfulness to its source text, joined to the attempt to unify
the tradition on a biblical base. Surely this designation is appropriate, as
the most readily distinguishing feature of Chronicles is the degree to which it
reproduces large blocks of biblical material. Indeed, Knoppers demonstrates in
his own comparisons of Chronicles with source material in Genesis and the
Deuteronomistic History that its connections with other parts of the canon
should be fully explored.
Knoppers places 1 Chronicles 1-9 in its
historical and biblical context through an excursus on genealogies in the
ancient world, which emphasizes the creative expression possible in
genealogical material. The Israelite tribal genealogies emphasize Judah
(treated first: see 1 Chronicles 2:3-4:23), Benjamin (treated last: see
8:1-40), and Levi (given "center stage" in the genealogies: see
5:27-6:66). The list of returnees from exile in 1 Chronicles 9:2-18, which in
Knoppers' view shares a common source with Nehemiah 11:3-19, links the temple
liturgy of the Chronicler's own time with the temple liturgy of David and the
tabernacle service of Mosaic Torah, thus asserting continuity with ancient
tradition. Since Knoppers is so careful on text-critical matters, his decision
to restore Dan to the tribal genealogies (1 Chronicles 7:12) is surprising.
Given the absence of Dan, not only from the versions of this passage but from
the Levitical town lists in 6:54-81 as well, it is more likely that Dan has
been polemically excluded by the Chronicler than that it has fallen out due to
scribal error.
In his
treatment of David's reign in 1 Chronicles 10-29, Knoppers compares Chronicles
to the annals of ancient Near Eastern kings. He identifies numerous instances
of achronological historiography, that is, "deliberately narrating events
out of chronological order to make a larger point" (p. 545). Just as the
annals of Assyrian kings place their greatest successes at the beginning of
their reigns, Chronicles describes the conquest of Jerusalem as the first act
of David's reign (1 Chronicles 11:4-9), places David's first attempt to bring the
Ark to Jerusalem prior to the account of his Philistine wars (13:1-14), and
speaks of David consecrating to God the booty of nations he has not yet
conquered (18:11). Knoppers rightly rejects the overly simplistic view that
Chronicles ignores material critical of the king, such as the story of David
and Bathsheba, in order to whitewash David. Rather, the presentation in
Chronicles is purposefully shaped to present "David's reign ... as
Israel's normative age" (p. 741). Anything that needlessly complicates
this aim is ignored— not just anything negative. In the story of the census and
its disastrous aftermath ( 1 Chronicles 21), David's repentance becomes as
normative as his obedience. Knoppers reads the Hebrew sàtàn in 1
Chronicles 21:1 not as the proper name Satan, but simply as "an
adversary," so that David's census is prompted by a nameless human
advisor. Knoppers observes that either translation is possible from the text
itself. More adequate justification than he provides is required for this shift
from a venerable reading. Sometime in the Persian period, has'sätän became
the proper name Satan. 1 Chronicles 21 is fraught with supernatural beings and
actions: consider the mammoth destroyer with his drawn sword who addresses
David through the words of his seer Gad, or the fire from heaven that consumes
David's sacrifice. Why then should the shift from has'sätän to Satan not
begin here?
Knoppers
is a formidable scholar and this is a formidable work, bringing an astonishing
depth and breadth of information to bear upon the interpretation of Chronicles.
A newcomer to Chronicles scholarship may become lost in the wealth of detail
that Knoppers provides. The difficulty of the material is minimized by
Knoppers' lucid style. An excellent index at the end of the second volume makes
the commentary more accessible. That Knoppers' extensive, detailed treatment of
1 Chronicles required publication in two volumes makes it expensive for many
pastors' book budgets. This commentary is an essential addition to any theological
library, and deserves to be read beyond the relatively small circle of
Chronicles scholars. I hope that many pastors, challenged and stimulated by
Knoppers' fresh treatment of a sadly ignored ancient text, will begin to teach
and preach from Chronicles, a book that St. Jerome said holds "the meaning
of the whole of sacred history."
Steven S. Tuell
PITTSBURGH THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY
PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA
Geen opmerkingen:
Een reactie posten