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TO THE STUDENTS OF THE ECOLE BIBLIQUB

WlTH WHOM I HAVE LEARNED

WHAT THIS BOOK CONTAINS

I --._

PREFACE

INSTITUTIONS are the various forms in which the EC&I life of apeople f&s expression. Some it will take for granted as a matter of cus-tom; others it will adopt ofiu own choice; and yet otbenwiU be imposed

upon it by an authority. Individuals are subject to the nation’s institutions,but the institutions themselves exist. ultimately, for the sake of the societywhose welfare they promote, whether rhe society be small as a family, orlarge as a state or religious community. Again, the institutions of a societywill vary with time and place, and will depend, to some extent, on naturalconditions such as geography and &mat& but their distinguishing chuac-teristic is that they all proceed, in the end, from the human will.

The institutions ofa people with a long past are therefore closely bound upnot only with the territory in which it has lived but with history. They willbe made to suit that p-eople, and will bear the mark of its psychology, of itsideas on man, the world and God. Like its literature. its an. its science andreligion, its institutions too are an element in, and an expression of, its civili-zation. In order to understand and describe these ancient witnesses to the lifeof a people, the historian has to take into account all the traces of the past.Clearly, written documenti have pride of place, but the things which sutivc,even the humblest remains of man’s l&our, cannot be passed over. Every-thing is grist which will enable us to reconstruct the condit~bns and thesetting of the people’s social life.

Because of these various relations with other sciences, the institutions ofIsrael have usually been studied as part of a larger whole. Long treatises havebeen devoted to them in the classic historical works. the Gewhichtc des VolkesIsrael by Rudolf Kittel, and especially in Schiirer’s Gexhichfr des jiidiwhenVolkes for the last period of the Old Testament. Conversely, the recentstudies by J. Pirenne on Les Inrritufionr des HJbrew~ follow the historicaldevelopment. Formerly, institutions were treated under the heading ofAntiquitafes Hebraicoe, but nowadays they are associated with archaeology, andare thus presented by I. Bentiger in Hebriische Arch&@, 3rd edition, 1927,by F. N&scher in Biblische Altertumshunde, 1940. and by A. G. Bnrrois inManuel d’Archt%ogie Biblique, I, 1939; II, 1953. Ample space is devoted tothem in histories of civilization, such as A. Bertholcr, KulturgcschichteInaelr, 1919, and J. Pedersen, Israel, its Lij nnd Cslrw, I-II, 1926; III-IV,1940.

I. Ar&“<~d’H~~#0n<du Dni, onmin,. IV. ,P,P, pp. rr+; v. ,910. pp. 99-111; Rwur ,“,<mnri.nEI.*‘Lho~r‘& I’AndQiili. 1. IPl2, pp. 3,-w *I, 191,. pp. Iop-I,5.: III, 191,. pp. IP,-l,l.

i-

“Ill PREFACE

AU these works xc exellent and have constantly been used in the prepan-don of this book, but it has been felt that Old Testament institutions couldwell form the subject ofa special study. For this the main source is evidentlythe Bible its& Except in the legislative and ritual sections. the Bible does nottreat directly of these questions, but the historical. prophetical and wisdombooks contain much information, all the more interesting because it tells uswhat actually did happen and not what ought to have happened. To makeuse of all these texts calls for accurate exegesis, and before we can draw con-clurions, literary criticism must assign data to the various passages, for thedevelopment of institutions followed the cause of history. Archaeology. inthe s&t sense. i.e. the study of the material remains of the past, is only anauxilixy science, which helps us to reconstruct the actual setting in which theinstitutiom functioned: but it reveals to us the houses in which families lived.the towns administered by the elders of the people 01 the king’s offi&ls, thecapitals where the court resided, the gates where justice was administered andthe merchants set up their stalls, with their scales and the weights they kept inthdr purses. It shows us the ramparts which armies defended, the tombs atwhich the funeral rites were performed. and the sanctuaries where the priestsdirected worship. Finally, if we wish to have a real understanding of theinstitutions of Israel. we must compare them with those of iu neighbows,with Mesopotamia, Egypt and Asia Minor, where information is plentiful,and with the little states of Syria and Palestine, where it is scanty. But it wasamong the latter that 1srae1 carved out for itself a homeland; many of themwere founded about the same time, and Israel had constant contact with themthroughout its long history.

The present book offers only the conclusions of all this research. Nomadiccustoms and tribal organization left traces on the life of Israel long after thesettlement in Canaan; hence the book begins with an introductory study ofnom&m. Next cane family institutions, then civil and political institu-tions. The second volume’ will deal with military and religiom institutions.This book, however. is not intended for speci&se in biblical studies; rather,it is meant to help towards an intelligent reading of the Bible. Consequently,there are many references to biblical texts, but the author has deliberatelyre&ained &on over-technical discussions and from leading the pages witherudite footnotes. Many of the suggestions or statements advanced here needto be more fully supported and are based on findings of textual, literary orhistorical criticism which are open to debate. He can only hope that hisreaders will have confidence in him. Those who wish to check his statementsand to form their own judgment will find the necessary material in thebibliographical notes which are grouped according to the chaptea. Thisbibliography. however, is LUX meant to be complete; it contains only sucholder works z have not been superseded, and those more recent studies

PREPACE ix

which seem most useful and from which the author has drawn his informa-tion. III quoting &em, be wishes to acknowledge his debt to those who havestudied these questions before him, but he is also providing weapons againsthimself. for many of these works put forward solutions very different fromthose he has finally adopted. The inquiring reader may look and choose forhimself

The subjec-matter of the book is restricted by its title to the Old Testa-ment period. and the New Testament period is called as witness only by wayof clarification or addition. In the study of the Old Testament itself, institu-tions occupy a subordinate place, and the reader may sometimes feel that heis very far from the spiritual and doctrinal message he seeks for in the Bible.Nevertheless, he is always on the border-land of biblical religion, and oftenin direct contact with the message it enshrines. Family customs, funeral rites,the status of foreigners, of slaves, the notions of personality and the I& ofthe king, the connection between the law--even profane law-and theCovenant with God, the manner of waging war-all these Aect religiousideas, and these same ideas find conscious expression in worship and liturgy.The institutions of the Chosen People prepare the way for, and indeed fore-shadow, the institutions of the community of the elect. Everything in thisslcred past matters to us, for the Word of God is a living thing, and a man isbetter able to hear its tones if he listens to it in the actual surroundings inwhich it wa first given to mankind.

T R A N S L A T O R ’ S N O T E

THIS bwk is a translation ofLes Institutions de 1;9ncien Teshm~mt, pub-lished in two volumes by Ler Pditims du Cerf; Paris; the first volumewas published in 1958. the second in ~+a. The tralulation has been

made from this first edition of the French original, but it incorporatss anumber of additions and corrections which Fr de Vaux wishes to see insertedin the text; he has also brought the entire bibliography up to date to thebeginning of 1961. The principal additions wiU be found on pp. 3% 58, 82,130 and 208, and the main corrections on pp. 14% 183 and 303.

The spelling of proper names follows that to be adopted in the forthcom-ingjerw&m Bilk,1 the English edition of the Bible deJ&ualem,~ but biblicalwanes have been registered in the index under the spelling given in theAuthorized Version as well. Biblical references are in way instance to theoriginal text (Hebrew, Greek or Aramaic); where the numeration of versesdiffers among the various translations, it would have been cumbersome torefer to all the numerations in both Catholic and non-Catholic versions. Thereferences have therefore been left as they stand, but they can always be foundby referring to the Bible de Jbrusnlem. The index has been rearranged andexpanded; in particular. the longer entries (e.g. Abraham) have been brokendown into sub-headings, and the main references have been given first.

It only remains for me to thank Fr de Vaux for the interest he has taken inthis aamlation, for the promptness with which he has answered all myqueries, and for enabling us to include so much new material, especially inthe Bibliography.

NOTE ON NOMENCLATURE OF SOME

BOOKS OF THE BIBLE AND APOCRYPHA

C O N T E N T S V O L U M E I

F OR the convenience of readers who are not familiar with thenomcnclarurc adopted in this book, the l is ts below show thecquivalcnu in the Authorized/King James Version, and in Douai-

Challoncr and Knox, where differences octur‘.

A.V.jK.j. In this bookJoshua JOS”CI Samuel 1 Samuel (I S)z Samuel 2 Samuel (2 S)I Kings I Kings (I K )ZKings 2 Kings (2 K)I Chronicles I Chronicles (I Ch)2 Chnmicles 2 Chronicles (2 Ch)Eza Esdrar (Erd)Nehemiah Nehemias (Ne)I E&as 3 Es&as2 F&as 4 EsdnsTobir TobiasEcclesiartes Qoheleth (Qo)Ecclesiaster Sirach (Si)Solomon Canticle (0)

DC., KnoxJOSUeI Kings2 Kings

3 figs4 KingsI Paralipomcna2 PnrabpomenaI Esdras2 Esdras

Osee (OS)Abdias (Abd)Michaca.5Sophonias (So)Aggaew

Apmlypx (AP)

TabiasEcclcsiartesEcclcsiasticusCanticle of Canticles ID-C.)Song of Songs (Knox) ’OxeAbdiarMichausSophoniasAggaeus

Apmalypx

Tn,,,.,s~~~on’s NOTE

INTRODUCTION

NOMADISM AND ITS SURVWALI. The Bcrckground2. Tribal Organization ,,

(a) The constitution of a tribe(b) The union, division and disappearance oftribes(c) The organization ondgovemment of n tribe(d) Tribal renifory. War and raiding

3. The Low ofHospitality and Asylum4. Tribal Solidarity and Blood-Vengeance5. The Later Development of Tribal Organization in Israel6. Relics of Nomadism7. Tke ‘Nomadic Ideal’ ofthe Prophets8. The Rekabiter

Phar I

ChapterFAMILY INSTITUTIONS

I. ~olygomy and monogamy2. The fypical Inaelile mmn’age3. Choosing the bride4. En&vmus5. Mmiafe ceremonies6. Repudiation and divorce7. Adultery and fornication8. 7k levirufe

3. THE Posrno~ or WO M E N. Wr~ows

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xvi

Chapter

CONm.NTS

R. THE Ammi~smano~ OF rm K,NGDOMI. 7%~ kingdom of DavidL. The administmion under ~&mm3. The distrirrs of Judah4. The disnicts of the kingdom of 1me1S. Local administmticn

9. FINANCE AND Pusuc WORKS

I. Royal ,even~es and state revenues2. ‘ Voluntary’ 0, exceplional contributions3. Tithes4. Faced labou,

10. Law AND JUSTICE

I. Legislative codes2. Emfem Iau in ancienr times3. The sources of Israelite /au,4. Chmuteristics o/ Ismelite lawS. The king’s legislafive and judicial powers6. Judges and cows of law7. Rocedure8. The judgment of God9. Penalties

IO. Private vengemce and Cities oJRefugr

11. ECONOMIC LIFEI. Landed p,operty2. Family pmperry and loge estates3. Conveyances and similar formalities4. Deposit and hiring5. Loam6. Semrifiu7. Sureties and bail8. 7%~ Sabbatical year9. Thcjubilcc Year

12. DIVISIONS OP TM@I. Ancient Earlem calendars2. Tke Imelitc caalenda,. The day3. The month4. The week

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183186

CONTENTS xvii

ChapterS. Tke ym,6. The beginning of the yro,7. The ems

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13. WBICHTS AND MEAsuIm I95

I . Imelite ‘mehology’ I95

2. Linear measwes I96

3. Measures ofcapairy I99

4. Meawes of weight 203

S. The coinage 2.06

PART III

MILITARY INSTITUTIONS

1 .r’“” Amms OF ISRAEL$1 A people under arms2. The professional army

(a) The corps of mercenaries(b) The chariotry

3. The consnipf army

2. FoRTmaD CITIES AND SIEGE WARPARE

I. Fo,tiji,d towns2. Ramparts3. Fortijiedgares and citadels4. Siege wmfare5. The w&e, supply

3. ARMM~~NTSI. Offensive weapons2. Defensive arms

4. wauI. A short military history o/Israel2. The conduct ofwa,3. The consequences ofwa,

5. T HE HOLY WARI. The concept of the holy war, and its rites2. The holy wars a the beginning of Ismel’s history3. Religion and the ~11,s under the monarchy4. The religious wm of the MaccabeesS. The ‘Order of the War’from Qumran

xxChapter

6. THE LBVITESI. Etymoio~y

CONTENTS

2. 7% hereditary priesthood3. The priestly tribe of Levi4. Historic.4 development

(a) Non-Imitical priests(b) Imite priests

6. Was them em (I non-priestly @ibe called Levi?7. The origin of the Levites

7. l-m PUWHOOD IN Jmusrm~ UNDBR THB MONARCHY

I. Ebyarhar and Sadoq2. Thr descendants of Sadoq3. The priests and the kings4. The hierarchy5. The revmws of the clergy6. Tke lower-ranking personnel7. Were there propkelr am&d to the Temple?

a. TEE PRIBETHOOD APrEP. TAB FXUE

I. Z’riests and Zmites down to the period of Esdms and Nchemias2. The Reviles in the work of the Chronicler

(a) The Zmites md the Ark(b) The singers(c) The door-keepers(d) O&r Zmitiarlfutiions

3. ‘Sotas of Sadoq’ and ‘Sons of Aaron’4. The high priest

(a) His tiLleS(b) The investiture of the high priest(c) The high priest md the idea cfkingship(d) The sucressiDn of high priests

5. The revmntes of rhe Temple and of the clergy(a) The Temple

(b) ~+?Y9. ALTARS

1. Pre-Lmrlite altars in Palestim2. Zsmrlite altars outside the main sanctuary3. The altm wed in the desert

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4. The altars in Solomon’s Temple(a) The alrar of holomsrs(b) The altar aperfumes

5. The alror of Ezechiel6. The &rs in Be second Temple7. The religious signijiunce of altars

10. Tm Rrrun~ OF SacarnceI . Ho1ocausu

xxiPage410410411412412413

2. Communion sari&es3. Erpiatory siurijices

(a) Sacrijia/or sin(b) The snnifice of rejmtion

,.

(c) The distinctimr between sarriJice for sin and the sam~ce ofreparation

4. Vegetable &rings5. The shcwbread

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6. Offerings of incemr

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12. Tm ORlGlN OP Ismma RnUN

I. Mesopotamian smijice7r. Sacrifice among the ancient Arabs3. Canaanile sac&e4. The origin of the sacrificial ritual of Israel5. Human sacriJice in Israel

(a) Human smrijces in historical texts(b) Prophetiml texts(c) The law concerning &fin-born(d) Sanifices to Moloch

43343.3435438440441442443443444

13. Tm RmGIous SrcNlncaNce OP SacRmcE 447I. Was sanijce II gij to o mufevolenr or a se&h deity? 447z. Did sacrt$ce achieve union with the deity by magic! 448

(a) Union with 0 god by man’s eating a divine vi&n 448

_---~- - - -

mm

3. War s&Jice a meal taken by the god?4. Ourline of a theory of ranijice

I?) ;he&ommunion

(c) Expiafion

14. SECONDARY ACTS OP THE Cl_mr1. Litu,gicalp,aye,

(a) Pmyer and the m/r(b) The place and rime of prayer, et.

2. Riles oJ~pu,iJicarion md oJdemnser,arion(a) Smifces and ablutions@) The ashes offhe red he-i/&(c) The rifuoljo, lep,osy

3. Rites oJconsec,&n(a) cencrol ,emmkr@) Vows(c) The Nmirifer

15. Tm Lmmc~ar CALENDAR

I. The ordinary services in the Temple(a) The daily services(b) The sabbath(c) The new moon

2. The religious cnlendm(a) The Elohistic Code ojthe Covenmr(b) The Yahlvistic Code ofthe Covmanr(c) Deuteronomy(d) The Low qfHo/iness(c) Ezechiel

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CONmNTS

chapter5. The antiquity of the sabbath6. The religious &t~iJicmce of the sabbath7. The history of the sobbath

17. THE ANCIENT FEASTS OF ISRAELI. The feasts of the Passover and of Unleavmed Bread

(a) The historical development(b) The origin of the Passover(c) The origin o/the feast of LJnlemmzed Bread(d) Their coonn~cCm t&h the history of s&o&m

2. The feast of weeks3. The Jeaxr of Tents ,.

(a) The namer of the feat: irs in~porlance(b) Its historical development(c) 1rs dares(d) The origin ofthejeasr

4. War there a New Yearjnrt?5. wur there afearr qfrhr Enrhrorrmmr oJ Yahtueh?

18. THE LATER Fmsrs1. ‘The Day of A~o,te~m-nt

(a) The ritual of expiaticm(b) The goat ‘4, Azazcl(c) When wm the feast hrstiwed?

2. The feast of the Hanukkah(a) The origin ond history ?fthejeost(b) The rim: the Hmukkah and rhejast of Tent5(c) Was there my pafm in&mtce in the origin o, rhc

Hanukkah?3. The feast of Purim

(a) 11s date and it3 rites(b) Purim and Be Book of&her(c) The origin ofrhejeat

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XX”

XIV

Ii

1X

lxiii

lxvxiv

INTRODUCTION

Nomadism and its Survival

I. The Background

AT the beginning of their history the lsraelites, like their ancestorsbefore them, lived as nomads or semi-nomads, and when they cameto settle down as a nation, they still retained sane characteristics of

that earlier way of life. Consequently, any study of Old Testament insdtu-tions must begin with an investigation into nom&m. The biblical recordspreserve many ancient traditions about the early life of the Israelites, andthese are of first importance in our study; but since this evidence has been tosome extent systematized by later editorsof the books, great care is needed ininterpretin g these records. We have other sources of infottnation too: textsabout the Atabs in pm-Islamic times, and ethnographical studies about theArabs of w-day. These nomad Arabs, by race and countty, are closely relatedto the Israelites, and what we know of pre4atnic. modem and contem-porary Arab life can help us m undentand mire clearly the primitiveorganizaion of Israel. on the other hand, one must beware of hasty corn-parisons which may overlook essential di&ences.

The fan is, that even in the comparatively small area of the Middle East,there have always been different types of nomads, and what is true of onetype is not necessarily true of another. Even to-day, these differences persist(though one wonders how much longer any form ofnomadism can survive).

(I) The real nomad, or true Bedouin (the word means ‘man of the desert’)is a camel-breeder. He cm live in, 01 at least traverse, regions which arestrictly desert, i.e. where the annual rainfall is less than 4 inches. He travelsenortnous distances with his herds in search of grazing. and has very littleccxxact with settled people.

(2) A nomad, however, may breed only sheep and goats, and these flocksare not so hardy; they need m drink mcxe often and catma survive on therough pastures which are sufficient for camels. This type of Bedouin livesmainly in the half-desert region (where the rainfall is 4-m inches), and thedistances he travels from one grazing ground to the next are necessarilyshorter. Sometimes he does covet considerable ground, but then he mustfollow a mute where the watering-places are not tw distant from oneanother. He has far mote contact with the settled regions, for his grazing liesalong their borders.

(3) Once he begins to raise cattle as well as flocks, the shepherd ceases m bea true nomad. He settles in one place, begins to cultivate the land and to buildhouses. Among the group, however, some will continue to live in tents withthe flocks, at least during the winter and the spting. Depending on the extentto which he is tied to the land, such a man is either half a nomad or half asettler.

In and between these main types ofsociety there are ofcourse intermediate

4 lNTRODUCnON

stages and hybrid forms. A camel-breeding tribe may possess flocks of sheepalso, or even land at the far ends of the track of its migration, or oases culti-vated by serf-labour.

Neither the Israelites nor their ancestors were ever true Bedouin, that is,camel-breeders. Their fathers kept sheep and goats, and when we first meetthem in history, the Patriarchs are already becoming a settled people. This isone factor which puts limits on the comparisons which can be drawn fromthe Bedouin whom ethnographers have studied.

These modem writers have also studied sheep-breeding tribes who arebeginning to settle down. The latter represent the same social type as theearliest Israelite groups, and here the comparison has greater truth in it. Butagain there is a difference. The sheep-breeders of to-day, half nomad or halfsettler, were formerly camel-breeders. They no longer wander so far afieldfor pasture, and are now gradwally settling down, but they retain the memoryand some of the customs of that life of liberty in the open desert. The Israel-ites had no such memories, because neither they nor their ancestors had everknown this life. Besides, in their time, there war no real ‘desert civilization’to lay down codes of behaviour; in their eyes the desert was the refuge ofoutlaws, the haunt of brigands, the home of demons and wild beasts. Weshall return to tbi_s subject when discussing what has been called the ‘nomadicideal’ of the Old Testament.

Nevertheless, the fact remains that the Israelites or their ancestors did livefor a time in the desert as nomads or semi-nomads. Naturally, such a lifeentails a distinct pattern of sodety, and enjoins a code of behaviour all of itsown; we are therefore justified in using, with due reservation, the organiu-tion and custcnm of the Arabs for comparison.

In the desert, the unit of society must be compact enough to remainmobile, yet strong enough to ensure its own safety; tbir unit is the tribe. Inthe desert, an individual who is separated from his own group must be able tocount without question on a welcome from the groups through which hepasses or which he joins. Anyone may have need of this help, and thereforeeveryone mwt give it; this is the basis of the law of hospitality and asylum.Finally, in the desert there is no police force or court ofjustice with authorityover the tribes; consequently, the group as a whole is held responsible forcrime, and liable for its punishment--the law of blood-vengeance. Therethree sociological facts, which arc the most obvious characteristics ofnomad-irm, must now claim our attention for a time.

2. Tribal Orpirarion

(a) The constifution o/a tribeA tribe is an autonomous group of families who believe they are descended ’

from a common ancestor. Each tribe is called by the name or surname of that

l*RODUCnON 5

mcestor, sometimes, but not always, preceded by ‘sons of’. Arab examplesare innumerable. In the Bible. the descendants of Am&k. Edom and MoabUC called Amalck, Edom and Moab without the addition of ‘sons of’. Onthe other hand, we find both ‘Israel’ and ‘sons of Israel’, both ‘Judah’ and‘sons of Judah’ and so on. but always ‘sons of Amman’ (except in twoinstances, one ofwhich is textually uncertain). Instead of ‘sons’ we may find‘house’, in the sense of family or descendants: ‘the house of Israel’. forexample. and especially ‘the house ofJoseph’. As~yr&te~t&&w the sameusage in references to Aramaean groups who lived in conditions similar tothose of the first Israelites: bit (house of) Yakin and mar (sons of) Yakin, or bitAdini and mar Adini; the terms are even used, long after the settlement, forIsraelites in the northern kingdom after Omri: bit I&nri and mar I+&nnri.

What unites all the tribesmen, then, is this blood-rela$on%. real orsupposed; they all consider themselves ‘bro&@T $~~~~e~@c. Abimeleksays to the entire clan ofhis mother, ‘Remember that I am of your bones andof your flesh’ (Jg 9: 2). All the members of David’s clan are, in his eyes, his‘brothers’ (I S 20: w), and he goes so far as to tell all the elders ofJudah,‘Youare my brothers, you are of my flesh and of my bones’ (z S 19: 13). Everytribe has its traditions, too, about the ancestor from whom it claims descent.These traditions are not always historically true, but whatever their value,the important fact is that the nomad believes he is of the same blood as therest of his tribe, and that the relationship between different tribes is also ex-plained in terms of kinship. In bis eyes, the whole social organization of thedesert is summed up in a genealogy.

It was this idea which, in the early days of Islam, led to the composition ofthose great genealogies catalogued by Wiisrenfeld. Each tribe descends froma single ancestor, and two allied tribes descend from two ancestors who werebrothers in the strict sense. These genealogies, however, though they may beaccurate for a small group, inevitably become arbitrary and artificial once anattempt is made to extend them in space and time. In the Mid-Euphratesregion there is a group of small sheep-breeding tribes called the ‘Aged% i.e.‘Confederates’. whose name signifies clearly enough just how the group wasformed; but this political and economic union has since been expressed in agenealogical table. This procedure leads to the invention of eponymousancestors. We know of a tribe called the Khoza‘a (‘Separated’), because itseparated from the Azd at the time of the great Yemenite dispersion, but thegenealogists have assigned it a .personal ancestor, whom they call Kboza’a.Simiirly the Kholoj (‘Transported’) are so called because Omar I trans-ferred them from the ‘Adwan to the Al-Ha& whereas, according to thegenealogisrs, Kholoj is a surname of Qais, the son of Al-I$rith.

In practice, other factors besides cmnmcm descent may help to constitute atribe. The mere fact of living in tbc same region leads groups of families tojoin together. Weak elements are absorbed by stranger neighbours;

6 XNTRODuCnON

alternatively, several weak groups combine to form a body capable ofremaining autonomous, that is, of standing up to attack. Individuals, too.can be incorporated into a tribe either by adoption into a family (as oftenhappens with freed slaves), or through acceptance by the sheikh or the elders.

But even here the principle is safeguarded, for the newcomer is attached‘in name and in blood’ to the tribe; this means that he acknowledges thetribe’s ancestor zs his own, that he will mxry within the tribe and raise up hisfamily inside it. The Arabs say that he is ‘gmealogized’ (root: nasaba). Witha whole clan the fusion takes longer, but the result is the same, and the new-comers are finally considered as being of the same blood. A text of Al-B&puts it neatly: ‘And the Nahd ben Zaid joined the Bent al-Harith, becameconfederate with them and completely united with them; and the Jarm benRabbin joined the Ben& Zubaid, attached themselves to them and livedtogether, and the whole tribe with its confederates was attached to the sameancestor (nusibot).’

The tribes of Israel were not exempt from such changes, and they absorbedgroups of d&rent origin. Thus the tribe of Judah eventually welcomed toits own ranks the remnant of the tribe of Simcon, and incorporated foreigngroups like the Calebites and Yerahmeelites. The Bible gives a clear pictureof the process in its referencer to the C&bites. They were originally outsidethe Israelite confederation, for Caleb wzs the son of Yephunneh the Qeniz-itc(Nb32: 12; Jos 14: 6,14; camp. Gn 15: ‘9; 36: I I), but theyhadcontactwith Israel from the time of the sojourn at Qadesh, where Caleb was namedas Judah’s representative for the exploration of Canaan (Nb 13 : 6). Theirintegration into this tribe is recorded in Jos 15: 13: cf. Jos 14: 6-15, and in theend Caleb is genealogically attached to Judah. The son of Yephunnchbecomes the son of Hesron, son of Peres, son of Judah ( I Ch 2: 9. 18, 24)and brother of Yerahmeel (I Ch 2: 4z), another foreign group (I S 2.7: 10)also attached to the line ofJudah (I Ch 2: 9). There can be no doubt that simi-lar fusions took place frequently; eipecially in early days, and that the veryconcept of the ‘Twelve Tribes’ contains some elements of systematic arrange-ment, though one cannot say precisely how far tbis system is artificial. In anycase, the number and order of the tribes, sometimes even their names, varyfrom text to text, and these variations prove that the system which fmallyprevailed was not reached straightaway.

(b) 77ze union, division: and disappearance of tribes

The Twelve Tribes of Israel were a federation, and parallel examples arefound among Arab tribes. Sometimes it is merely an association of smalltribes which unite to present a common front against powerful neighboun,like the ‘Ag&t, the ‘Confederates of the Mid-Euphrates, mentioned above.At other timcs, a tribe may be compelled to split up when its numbersbecome too great; these new groups, all originating from the common stock,

lNmVm”CTION 7

&n become autonotnous, though the extent of their independence mayvuy. Nevertheless, they do retain a feeling of family solidarity; when they,&e for common enterprises, such as migrations or wars, they recognizea chief to be obeyed by some or all of the groups. These patterns of societyill be studied in our own day in the two great rival federations of the syrian&crt, the ‘Anezeh and the Shammar. During its years of wandering in thedesert and its struggle for the conquest of Canaan, Israel lived in similar con-ditions, conditions which persisted after the settlement, in the period of theJudges. The system of the Twelve Tribes has been compared with thenmphictyonies which united a number of Greek cities round a sanct,,xy.The comparison, though interesting, should not be pressed too far, for.unlike the amphictyonies, the Twelve Tribes were not ruled by a permanentbody, and, in their system, were not subject to the same mwure of effectivepolitical control. The importance of the Israelite confederation was primarilyreligious; it was not only the feeling of kinship, but also their common faithin Yahweh, whom they had all agreed to follow (Jos 24), which united thetribes around the sanctuary of the Ark, where they assembled for the grca,feasts.

On the c&r hand, when a nomad group becomes too numerous to con-tinue living together on the same grazing grounds, it sometimes divide! intotwo groups which then live quite independently of one another. This was thereason why Abraham and Lot separated (Gn 13 : s-13): But the claims ofkin-ship still hold good, and when Lot was carried off a prisoner by the fourvictorious kings, Abraham went to his help (Gn 14: 12-16).

The numbers of a tribe may, however, diminish instead of increasing untilit finally disappears. Thus Reuben grows weaker (cf. Gn 49: 3-4 and Dt 33 :6). and the civil tribe of Levi disappears (Gn 34: 25-30; 49: s-7). to be re-placed by the priestly tribe ‘dispersed throughout Israel’ (cf. Gn 49: 7).Simeon disappears, and at an early date the remnants were absorbed byJudah (JOE 19: r-9; Jg I: 3f.); it is no longer mentioned in the Blessings ofMoses (Dt 33). which may perhaps be earlier than the reign ofDavid.

(c) The organization andgovernment of a tribeA tribe, though it forms a single unit, has an internal ag~~atii which is

also founded on blood-tii: Among nomadic.Arabs, the limits and names of_.~the~~divtstons fluctuate somewhat. Th! ba+ ~~~~~~_~a~r~y~t(‘nhel), a concept which has a fairly wide meaning. Several related families.c_o”stit~~:~a c&&a&on~9f a~tribe,alled, according to the locality, eitherkamu”leh or ‘ashirch. The tribe itself is called a qabileh, but formerly it wascalled a b..w or a kayy, two words expressing that unity of blood on whichthe tribe is founded.

The Israelites had a vety similar organization. The b&k ‘nb, the ‘house ofone’s father’, was the family. which comprised not only the father, his wife

8 INTRODUCTlON

or wives and their unmarried children but also their married sots with theirwives and children, and the sewants. Several families composed a clan, tbcmishpnhoh. The latter usually lived in the sxnc place. and its members alwaysmet for common religious feasts and sacrificial meals (I S 20: 6, 29). In par-ticular. the clan assumed the responsibiiity for blood-vengeance. Each elmwas ruled by the heads “firs families, the r’qenfm or ‘elders’, and in time ofwar it furnished a contingent, theoretically a thousand strong, commandedby a chief, iar. In Jg 8: 14 the ‘chiefs’ of Sukkoth arc distinguished from the‘elders’. In Gn 36: 4c-43 there is a list of the chiefs of the clans ofEdom, whobore the special name of ‘alliph, perhaps etymologically connected with‘eleph (‘a thousand’), A group of clans, of mishpah& formed a tribe, shebeor mo!gh. two words with the same meaning, which also denote the corn_mander’s staff and the royal sceptte. The tribe therefore embraced all thosewho obeyed the same chief.

The hierarchy of the three terms, l&h ‘ab, mishpahah and &be!, is clearlyexpressed in Jos. 7: 14-18, but one term may sometimes he used for another,as in Nb 4: 18 and Jg 20: IZ (Hebrew text). Similarly, M&it and G&ad,which arc clans of Ephraim, arc mentioned in the Song of Deborah on apar with the other ttibes (Jg 5: 14-17).

Among the Arabs a tribe is governed by a sheikb, who acts in conjunctionwith the principal heads of its families. This authority generally stays in the

j same family. but does not always pass to the eldest son, for the Arabs set greatstore by personality and character, and expect their sheikb to he prudent,courageous, noble-hearted and rich.

It is diffuult to say who, among the Israelites, corresponded to the shcikh,or what title he bore. Possibly it was the nasi’. This is the name given to theleaders ofthe Twelve Tribes during the time in the desert (Nb 7: z), with thefurther detail that they were *the chiefs of their fathers’ houses, the leaders ofthe tribes’ (cf. Nb I: 16, etc.). The same word denotes the chieftains ofIshmael (Gn 17: 20; 25: 16), and the Ishmaelites had twelve nar2’ for as manytribes (the parallel with Israel is obvious). The same word is used ofMidianiteleaders in Nb 25: 18 and Jos 13: 21. One could object that &se texts belongto the Priestly tradition, which is generally held to be the most teeent of all,and that the same word frequently recurs in Ezechiel; but it is also found intexts which ate certainly ancient (Gn 34: 3; Ex 21: 27). It has also been sugges-ted that the word denoted the deputy of a tribe to the Israelite amphictyony,but that is ass&going to it a religious sense which is not apparent in thepassages just referred to. On the other hand, if such an organization existedand was ruled by some kind of council, the tribes would naturally have beenrepresented in it by their chiefs. One should note, however, that the wordwas not employed exclusively for the chief of a tribe, but was used for theleaders of smaller sections too. The Arabs use the word ‘shcikh’ with thesame freedom.

9

Each tribe has a territory recognized as its own, inside which the cultivatedhd is generally ptivately owned, and pasture land is held in common.Boundaries arc sometimes ill defined, and groups belonging to different&ba sometimes live side by side in very fertile regions, if their ttibcs ate onfdemlly tcrmr. But the tribe which has the primary right of possession canlay down conditions and demand some form of payment for grazing rights.

This lack of precise law easily gives rise to disputes, especially over the useofwells ot cisterns. Everyone in the desert is bound to know that such andsuch a watering-place belongs to such and such a group, but from time totime a title may be disputed and quarrels break out between shepherds. It hasalways been so: Abraham’s he&men quarrel with Lot’s (Go 13: 7); Abimc-lck’s setvams seize a well dug by Abraham (Gn at: 25); Is.& is hard put to itto maintain his tights over the weUs he himself had dug between Getat andBeersheha (Gn 26: w-a).

If quarrels about routes of migration, grazing lands and watering-placesare not settled amicably, as in the biblical examples just mentioned, they leadto war. The sheikh takes the decision, and all the men must follow him. As arole, the booty is shared bctwccn the fighting men, but the chief has a rightto a special share, which was originally fixed at one-quarter of the total captoted, but later was left to the chief’s discretion. In Israel, in the time ofDavid, the booty was divided equally between the combatants and those whostayed at the rear, one portion being reserved for the chief (I S 30: zca~). Nb31: 25-30 dates this institution back to the petiod in the desert, and the chief’sportion is there considered as a tribute for Yahweh and the Lcviter.

Every Arab tribe has its war-cry and its standard. In addition, it carries intobattle a decorated litter, called ‘I&, or, mote recently, mcrkob or aba-Dhur.Nowadays, the litter is empty, but in days gone by the most beautiful girl inthe tribe rode in it to spur on the fighting men. Israel, too, had its war-cry,thct’~ah(Nbxo:~,g;jt:6;Jos6:~,zo;Jg7:z0-~t;tSt7:zo,~z;cf.AmI: 14; 2: 2; So I: 14, 16, etc.). This war-ety formed part of the ritual of theArk of the Covenant (I S 4: 5; 2 S 6: IS), which was the palladium ofIsrael;its presence in battle (I S 4: 3-1 I ; 2 S 1 t : t I) reminds us of the sacred litterof the Arabs. Perhaps, too, the tribes in the desert grouped themselves, incamp and on the march, under standards, ‘8th (Nb 2: 2).

When scvcral tribes join together to form a confcdcration, they adopt acommon standard, like the Hag of the Ptophct onfurlcd at Mecca and Mcdina.Here again WC may find a parallel with the Ark of the Covenant and thenane ‘Yahweh-Nissi’ (‘Yahweh is my banner’) given to the altar whichMoses crcctcd after his victory over the Am&kites (Ex 17: 15).

Raiding’is different from war, for its object is not to kill but to carry offplunder and to escape unharmed. It is the desert’s ‘sport ofkings’; it involves

10 INTROD”CTION

the “se of racing camels and of thoroughbred nures, and has its own clearly-dcfmed mlcs. Ancient Israel knew nothing quite like this. The nearestapproach is t” be found in those incursions of the Midianites and ‘sons of theEast’ in the days ofthe Judges: these invaders were mounted on camelr(Jg 6:3-6). On a smaller scale, one might point to David’s expeditions into theNegeb during his stay with the Pbilisrines (I S 37: 8-11).

Hospitality, we have said, is a necessity oflife in the desert, but among thenomads this necessity has become a virtue, and a most highly esteemed one.The guesr is sacred: the honour of providing for hi”1 is disputed, but gener-ally falls to the sheikh. The stranger can avail himself of this hospitality forthree days. and eve” after leaving he has a right to protection for a give”time. This time varies from tribe to tribe: among some it is ‘until the salt hehu eaten has left his stomach’; in big tribes like the Ruwalla of Syria it is forthree more days and within a radius of IO” miles.

Old Testament parallels spring to mind. Abraham gives a lavish receptionto the three ‘men’ at Mambre (Gn 18: I-S), and Laban is eager to welcomeAbraham’s servant (G” 24: 28-32). Two stories show to what excesses thesentiment of hospitality could lead: that of the angels who stayed in Lot’shouse at Sodom (Gn Ig:I-8). and the story of the crime at Gibeah (Jg 19:x6-24). Both Lot and the old ma” of Gibeah are ready to sacrifice the honourof their daughters in order to protect their guests, and the reason is stated inboth cases: it is simply because the latter have come under their roof(G” IO:S;JgIg:z3). _

~ _

Nomad life also gives rise, invariably. to a law of asylum. I” this type ofsociety is is impossible and inconceivable that a” individual could live iso-lated. unattached to a~ tribe. Hence. ifa man is cxoelled from his tribe after

I

a murder or some serious offence, or’if, for any reason whatever, he leaver itof his own free will, he has to seek the protection of another tribe. There hebecomes what modern Arabs call a da&i, ‘he who has come in’, and whattheir forefathers called a jir. The tribe undertakes to protect him, to defendhim against his enemies and to avenge his blood, if necessary. These cutomsare reflected in two Old Testament institutions, that of the fer (which is thesame word as the Arabic jz?r) and that ofcities of refuge.1

4. Tribal Solidarity and Rlood-Vengeance

The bond of blood, real or supposed. creates a certain solidarity among allthe memben of a “ibe. It is a very deep-rooted feeling, and persists long afterthe settlement in Canaan. The honour or dishonour of every member affectr

INTRO”“CnON II

&-entire group. A curse extends to the whole race, and God visits the sins of& fathers on the children to the fourth generation (Ex 2”: 5). A wholefvnily is honoured if its head is brave, while the group is punished for a fa”ltofim leader (t S 21: I) .

this solidarity is see” above all in the group’s duty to protect its weak andoppressed members. This is the obligation which lies behind the institution ofthe go’el, but as this is not conhned t” the nomadic state it will bc treated&ng with fanlily i”sti”“io”s.’

The most solemn responsibility of the Israelitegb’rl was to enforce blood-,.mgeance, and here we encounter another law of the desert, the @r of theArabs. The blood of a kbunun must be avenged by the death of the one whorbed it, or, failing him, by the bl o” o one of his f&y. Blood-vengeanced fdoes not operate witbin the group, but the guilty ma” is punished by hisgroup or expelled from it. The Arabs say, ‘Our blood has been shed.’ Inprimitive times this duty devolved on all the members of the tribe, and theextent of it served to determine the limits of the tribal group. In recent times,however, the obligation has become more restricted and does not extendbeyond the family circle, take” in a fairly wide sense. Moreover, to avoid aseries of assassinations, they try to substitute for the @r sane compensationwhich the victim’s family are compelled t” accept, whatever their feelingsabout blood-vengeance.

The same law existed in Israel. It is expressed with savage ferccity in thesong of Lamek (Gn 4: 23-24) :

‘I he killed a bill far a wound,A child for D bruise.The vcngunce for Cain rmy be sevenfold.But for Lamek, seventy-sevenfold!’

Lamek is the descendant of Cain, who was condemned to live in the desert.hnd Cain bears a ‘sign’, which is “or a stigma of condemnation, but a markwhich shows he belongs to a gro”p in which blood-vengeance is ruthlesslyexacted. This story (Gn 4: 13-16) states clearly the social basis for the instiru-

: tion. It is not simply to obtain compensation, ‘nvn for man, woman forwoman’, as the Koran puts it; rather, it is a safeguard. Where society is notcentralized. the prospect of the blood-debt which will have to be paid is adeterrent which restrains both individuls and the group.

,,t The custom persisted after the tribes had settled in Culaan. Thus Joab killsAbner (2 S 3 : 22-27 a”d 30) to avenge the death of his brother (2 S 2: 22-23).Legislation, however, endeavoured to mitigate this vengeance by the intro-duction of a system ofjustice. Though the laws about cities of refuge (Nb 3 5 :g-34; Dt 19: 1-13) sanction blood-vengemce, they hold it in check to someextent by requiring a preliminary judgment on the guilt of the accused and

1. Pp. 11-a.

IZ lNTR”DUCnON

by excluding cws of involuntary manslaughtcr.~ In contrast with Bedouinlaw, however, Israelite legislation does not allow compensation in money,alleging for this a religious motive: blood which is shed defiles the land inwhich Yahweh dwells, and must be expiated by the blood of bim who shedit (Nb 35: 31-34).

The law of blood-vengeance, we have said, does not operate inside thegroup itself. There appears to be a single exception, in 2 S 14: 4-11. To obtainthe recall of Absalom, banished after the murder of Amnon, the woman ofTeqoa pretends that one of her sons has been killed by his brother, and thather clansmm want to put the latter to death; the woman begs David tointervene so that the ‘avenger of blood’ may not slay her son. But the deci-sion of the clan is normal ifwe understand it as the punishment of the guilty,just as the banishment of Absalom was normal : it is the exclusion of the guiltyfrom the family. In this passage only the term ‘avenger of blood’ is abnortnal.and it may be used here in a loose sense.

thThough analogies from the life of Arab nomads may throw useful light one primitive organization ofIsrael, it is important to realize that nowhere in

the Bible are we given a perfect picture of tribal life on the full scale. Thetraditions about the Patriarchs concern families, or, at the most, clans; andno one can deny that in the accounts of the desert wanderings and of the con-quest the characteristic profile of each tribe hu been to some extent sub-ordinated to the wider interest of ‘all Israel’. Quite the most rewardingperiod to investigate is that of the Judges, where we read of tribes living. andtaking action, sometimes independently of one another, and sometimes inassociation with one another. But tbis is precisely the time when the tribeshave no individual chiefs; it is the elders who wield authority, and onesenses that the clan, the mishpohah, ishemming themost ~s&Lmit of

‘6-_ .dt_-T-’society. In short tn al otga&+ is beginning to~c;Eb& It is the price toe pan or ecoming a settled people; a mbe gradually turns into a terti-

torial group, which itself continues to sub-divide.Such an evolution is in fact commonplace. The Caliph Omar I cotnplaincd

that the Arabs who had settled in Iraq had begun to call themselves by thenames of their villages instead of their ancestors. In our own day, certainhalf-settled Bedouin in Palestine are called after their present homes, e.g. theBelqaniyeh of the Belqa, the Ghormiyeh of the Ghbr, et;; or after theirplace of origin, like the Haddadin of Ma’in, who come from Kh. @d&d.Similarly, in the Song of Deborah (Jg 5: 17), the ‘tribe’ of G&ad takes itsname from its homeland, and some authors ascribe a geographical meaningto the names of other Israelite tribes. We may note, too, that the Blessings of

I_ Cf. pp. 160F

lNTROD”CTION 13

Jsob (Gn 49) and of Moser (Dt 33) frequently allude to the territory occupiedby the tribes.

This territorial disposition of the tribes was itself modified by the admini-strative organization under the monarchy. True, everyone remembered towhich tribe he belonged, but the unit of society which survived, and whichto some extent retained the ancient customs, was the clan. III practice. afterthe settlement, the village stood for the clan, and in many of the genealogiesof Chronicles, names of villages tepkce names of ancestot~.

Amid these new surroundings, certain ancient cutotns survived, and thecomparisons we have drawn with Arab nomadirm often held good long afterthe settlement. Blood-vengeance is a desert law. but it bcclme a permanentinstitution, and the solidarity of the clan never disappeared.

Language is more conservative than custotn, and Hebrew retained severalj ttaces of that life of years gone by. For example, generations after the con-

quest, a house was called a ‘tent’, and not only in poetry (where it is frequent)but also in everyday speech(Jg 19: 9; 20: 8; 1 S 13: 2; I K 8: 66). Disbandedsoldiers return ‘every man to his own tent’ (I S 4: to; 2 S 18: 17). ‘To yourtents, Israel’ was the cry of revolt under David (2 S 20: I) and after the deathof Solomon (I K 12:16). On the other hand, this expression did not last, forshottly afterwards we read how every man retum~d ‘to his house’ (I K 22:17) ot ‘his town’ (I K a: 36). Again, to express ‘leaving early in the morn-ing’, a verb is often wed which means ‘to load the beasts of burden’ (Jg 19:9; I S 17: 20, etc.); nomads use the word to say ‘striking camp at dawn’.These expressions continued in use long after 1srae1 had settled in Canaan, andwhen their ideal was to live a quiet life ‘every man under his vine and his

f ig-tree’ .Though it is less significant, the frequent use, in Old Testament poetty, of

I metaphors borrowed from nomadic life should not pass unnoticed. Death,for example, is the cot tent-rope, or the peg which is polled out (Jb 4: 21). orthe tent itself which ir carried off (Is 38: 12). Desolation is represented by thebroken ropes, the tent blown down (Jr 10: zo), whereas security is the tentwith tight ropes and firm pegs (Is 33: 20). A nation whose numbers areincreasing is a tent being extended (Is 54: 2). Lastly, there are countless allo-sionr to the pastoral life, and Yahweh or his Messiah are frequently repre-

’ sentcd as the Good Shepherd (Ps 23; Is 40: II: Jr 23: 1-6; Ez 34, etc.).

7. The ‘Nomadic Ideal’ ofthe Prophetsi In spite of these surviving ttace~, _out oldest b$&&t~x~ s!m_w_ little~--~--T

admiration for the nomana~life. The story of Cam (Go 4: 11-16) is a con-dcmrutiono~~g~~nomadirm. Cain is driven into the desert in punishment

g:.

14 INTRODUCTlON

for the murder of Abel: he will he P wanderer and a vagabond, marked_ _~_with a sign, the warm of the desert nomad. Doubtless, Abel was a herdsman(Gn 4: z), and has all the narrator’s sympathy, but the text makes it clear thatit was sheep and goats that he looked after; in other words, he is supposed mhave led the same sort of life as the Hebrew Patriarchs, on the border of thereal desert. Before his crime Cain was a farmer (Gn 4: 2). So, in this story. thedesert is presented as the refuge of disgraced settlers and outlaws, as in fact itwas before the rise of the large camel-breeding tribes who founded a desertcivilization, one which had its greatness indeed, but which the Israelitcr neverknew.

The same unfivourable mne recurs in the story ofIshmae1: ‘His hand willbe against everyone. everyone’s hand will be against him; he will settle downaway from his brethren’ (Gn 16: 12). The desert is the home of wild beasts,monsters and demons (Is 13: 21-u; 34: II-IS), and the scapegoat is drivenout there, loaded with all the sins of the people (Lv 16).

On the other hand, we do encmmter what has been called the ‘nomadicideal’ of the Old Testament. The Prophets look back to the past, the time ofIsrael’s youth in the desert, when she was betrothed to Yahweh (~12: 2; OS13: 5; Am 2: IO). They condemn the comfort and luxury of urban life intheir own day (Am 3: 15 ; 6: 8. etc.), and see salvation in a return. at somefuture date, to the life of the desert. envisaged as a golden age (OS 2: 1617;12: IO).

There is, in this attitude. a reaction against the sedentary civilization ofCanaan, with all its risks of moral and religious perversion. There is also amemory of, and a nostalgia for, the time when God made a Covenant withIsrael in the desert, when Israel was faithful to its God. But nomadism iuelfisnor the ideal; rather, it is that purity of religious life and that faithfulness tothe Covenant, which was associated in Israel’s mind with its former life in thedesert. If the Prophets speak of a return to the desert, it is not because theyrecall any glory in the nomadic life oftheir ancesmrs, but as a means ofescapefrom the corrupting i&uence of their own urban civilization. We shallencounter this mystique ofthe desert again in the last days ofJudaism, amongthe sectaries of Qumran, when Christian monasticism still lies in the future.

8. The Rekabites

The ideal which the prophee exalted, but never tried m put into practice,was actually carried out by a group of extremists. the Rekabites. We knowof them cbidy through Jeremias. To give an object lesson to the people, theprophet invited the members of Rekab’s family to the Temple, and offeredthem a drink of wine. They refused it, saying that their ancesmr Yom&b,son of Rekab, had given them tbis conunand: ‘Neither you nor your sonsshall ever drink wine, and you must not build how-es. or sow seed. or plant

lNTROD”CTKlN IS

vines, or own property. on the contrary. you are to dwell in tents all yourlife, so that your days may be long in the land where you live as aliens(#m).’ This a.gc-ald fidelity to the commands of their ancesmr is held up asyl example to the Jews who do not obey the word of Yahweh (Jr 3 5).

It is interesting m compare this passage with a remark ofJerome of Cardiaabbour the Nabatcans at the close of the fourth century B.C. ‘It is a law amongthem not to sow corn or to plant fruit-trees, not m drink wine or m build ahouse; whoever does so is punished with death’ (cited in Diodorus Sic&nXIX, 94). In these two passages. so curiously alike, we have the essential con-trast between nomadic life and the life of a settled farmer. The Rekabites hadchosen to live far away from urban civilization, and only exceptional circum-stances accmmt for their presence in Jerusalem; they had taken refuge thereto escape from the Chaldeans (Jr 33: II).

Normally they lived as nomads, unattached m the land.‘But at the sametime they were fervent worshippers of Yahweh: all the Rekabite names weknow are Yahwistic names (Jr 3 5 : 3). Jeremias holds them up as examples, andYahweh promises them his blessing (Jr 3 5 : 19). Like nomads, they are organ-izcd as a clan; they are the b’nf Rekab and form the b&h Rckab, but they alsoconstitute a religious stct, and their ancnt~r Yonadab is a religious legislator.

This Yonadab ben Rekab is known to us for his part in Jehu’s revolution(2 K IO: 15-24). Jehu, on his way to exterminate the cult ofBaal at Samaria,takes Yonadab with him to witness his ‘zeal for Yahweh’ (v, 16). Yom&b,then, must have been a convinced Yabwist, and his uncompromisiig faithmust have been known to all. This incident allows us to date the origin of theRekabites about 840 B.C., and, according m Jeremias, they were still faithfulm the same way of life 250 years later.

Some would go even further, and cwnect the Rekabites with the Qenites.that group of non-Israelite origin which lived P semi-nomadic life on theborders of Israel, or in its midst (Jg I: 16; 4: II; 5: 24; I S 15: 46; 27: IO),and from whom, according to some authors, the Israelites first learned thename of Yahweh. This connection between the Rekabites and the Qenitesdepends on tv.w texts in Chronicles (I Ch 2: 53 and 4: 12). From the criticalpoint of view, these texts are uncertain, yet it is strange that they mentionRckab or the be”rk Rekob but not Yonadab. At the best, they mean that theChronicler has used the fiction of a genealogical link to camect two corn-munities who lived more or less the same kind of life.

Our history of the Rekabites begins under Jehu and ends in the time ofJeremias. We are notjustified in regarding them as survivors of an age whenIsrael led a nomadic life, and the Bible states explicitly that their rule wasatablished by Yonadab only in the ninth century B.C. It was not a survival ofearlier days but a reactionary movement.

PART I

FAMILY INSTITUTIONS

T H E F A M I L Y

I. Ofwhat *ype w~ls the I~~elitejmtify?

ET H N O G R A P H E R S diitinguish several types of family. In afiatiiorchote, for example, the eldest brother is the head of the family,and this authority is handed on, along with the property, from

brother to brother. Evidence of this type of society has been found among theHittita and Hurritcs in Assyria and Elam. It has bem claimed that there aretraces of it in the Old Testament, e.g. in the institution of the levinte (whichwill be discussed under marriagel), in the action ofJacob’s sons to avenge theqx oftheir sister Dinah (Gn 34). and in the part Laban plays in the ammgcment of the marriage of his sister Rebecca (Gn 24). Though none of theseexamples seems conclusive, we must admit the possibility of Assyrian andHwrite inlluence on the customs of Aram Naharaim; and among &se twopeoples the existence of a fratriarcharc, in early times, is now admitted, atleast as a hypotbcsis. We cannot, therefore, exclude the possibility of itsintluence on the letirate institution, and there may be tracer of it in the storyof Rebecca.

As a type of family, matriarchate is much more common in primitivesocieties. The characteristic mark oftbis type ofsociety is not that the motherexercises authority (this is rare), but that a child’s lineage is traced through themother. The child belongs to the mother’s family and social group, and is notconsidered as related to iu father’s connections; even rights of inheritance uefixed by maternal descent. According to the ethnographical school ofGraebner and Schmidt, a matriarchate is associated with small+calc c&iv.+tion, while pastoral civibzvion is patriucbal.

Many authors, however, following Robertson Smith, believe that amatriarchal regime was the original form of the family among the Semites.Certain old Testament customs and stories, they hold. indicate the presenceof this regime among the Israelites. In Gn 20: IZ Abraham is excused forpassing off Sarah a, his sister, because she was in fact bis half-sister, whom hehad married. Similarly, 3 S 13: 13 gives u( to understand that Amnon andTamar could have been married, because, tbougb both were David’schildren, they were born of different mothers. Mvtigc with one’s step-sister, either on the father’s or mother’s side, is forbidden by the laws of

m I: NLMLY *NSTrTUTl”NS

Lv,8:9;zo:17;Dt27:2~;cf.E=22:1,, butthehsttwotexuindicatethatthis had not always been so; and from this the above-mentioned authors con-clude that consanguinity was originally reckoned only through the mother.They point out,~ too, that the name of a baby was genetally~~e&~_~t!z

ii,&r,GiXihahat the two sons ofJoseph, who were born ofEgyptivl wives,were not acknowledged as children of lsrael until they had been adoptedby Jacob (Go 48: 5).

-, These arguments do not prove the point at issue. The passage aboutJoseph’s children has not the meaning they attribute to it, as the next vetseshows (Gn 48: 6). The texts about Sarah and Tamat prove only that marriagewith a half-sister was not yet forbidden. Thirdly, it was not always themother who gave the child its name (Gn 16: 15; 17: 19; 38: 29-30).

Some would also see in the Bible, especially in the marriage of Samson toTirmu(Jg 14). a tare type of marriage in which the wife does not leave herclan but brings her husband into it; this, too, would be a relic ofa matrinrch-ate. The question will be treated under mattiagc.l

Prehistoric Israel is to us a closed book; but whatever may bc true of thatepoch. dute is no doubt that from the time of ouI oldest documents, at anyrate, the ~staclite family is patriarchal. The proper word to dcscribc it is b&h‘ab, the ‘ house of one’s father’; the genealogies are always given in the father’sline, and women arc rarely mentioned; and rhe nearest relation in the col-lateral line is the paternal uncle (cf. Lv 25 : 49). In the normal type of Israelitemarriage the husband is the ‘master’, the ba’al, of his wife. The father had ,

.~~absolute authority ovet his children, even over his matricd~.~~s if they liv@dwith him, and over their wives. In early times this authority included eventhe po+,w over life tid death: thus Judah condemned to death his daughter-in-la+ Tamat when she was accused~of misconduct (Gn 38: 24). ‘~.~’ ‘-~

The family consists of those who are united by common blood and com-mon dwelling-place. The ‘family’ is a ‘home’; to found a family is ‘to builda house’ (Ne 7: 4). Noah’s family includes his wife, his sons and theit wives(Gn 7: I and 7); Jacob’s family comprises three generations (Gn 46: 8-26).The family included the servants, the resident aliens ot &mm, and the ‘state-less petsons’, widows and orphans, who lived under the protection of thehead of the family, Jephthah, an illegitimate son expelled by bis brothers,still claimed to belong to his ‘father’s house’ (Jg II: 1-7).

Again, the term b&h ot ‘house’, like the word ‘family’ in modern lan-guages. is very flexible and may even include the entire nation (the ‘house ofJacpb’ ot the ‘house of Israel’), ot a considerable section of the people (the‘lioose ofJoseph’ OI the ‘hourc ofJudah’). It may denote kinship in the widesense: Yxazanyah, the dcxendant of Rekab, his brothers and all his sons formthe b&h Rekab(Jr 3 5 : 3) ; the heads of ‘ families' in the Chronicler’s lists some-

I : THE FAMILY 21

times stand as the heads of very numerous groups ( I Ch 5: ,5. z4; 7: 7, 40;8:6.ro,13;9:9;23:24;24,6,etc.);andtheheadsof’families’whoretumfrom Babylon with Esdras are each accompanied by anything from twenty-tight to three hundred men (Esd 8: 1-14).

in tbis wide sense, the family was the same group as the clan, the mirhpohah.The latter concentrated in one area, occupying one ot more villages accord-ing to its size, like the mishpahah of the Danites at Sore& andEshtao1 (Jg 18:II); alternatively, several mirkp&tk might live together within a city, likethe groups from Judah and Benjamin listed in the census of Jerusalem byNehemias (Ne II: 4-8) and by the Chronicler (I Ch 9: 4-9). The clan hadceuunon interests and duties, and its members were conscious of the blood-bond which united them: they called eaclrofher ‘brothers’ (I S 20: 29k

On the religious level, too, the family played its part as a unit of society.The Passover wad a family festival kept in every home (fix 12: 3-4. 46),and year by year Samuel’s father took the whole family on pilgrimage toshiioh(~ S I: 3f.).

2. Family solidarity. The go’el

The members of the family in this wider sense had an obligation to help,,and to protect one another. There was in Israel an institution which definedthe’&casions when this obligation called for action; it is the institution ofthego’el, from a root which means ‘to buy back or to redeem’, ‘to lay claim to’,but fundamentally its meaning is ‘to protect’. The institution has analogiesamong other peoples (for example, the Arabs), but in Israel it took a specialform, with its own terminology.

The go’el was a redeemer, a protector, a defender of the interests of theindividual and of the group. If an Israelite had to sell himself into slavery inorder to tepay a debt, he would be ‘redeemed’ by one of his near relations(Lv 25 : 47-49). If an Israelite had to sell his patrimony, the go’el had priorityover all other purchasers; it was his right and duty to boy it himself, to pre-vent the family propetty from being alienated. This law is codified inLv q: 25, and it was in his capacity asgo’ef that Jeremias bought the field ofhis cousin Hanamecl (Jr 32: 6f.).

The story of Ruth is yet another illustration of this custom, but here thepurchase of the land is rendered mote complicated by a case of levitateNaomi had some property which, because of her poverty, she was forced tosell; and her daughter-in-law Ruth was a childless widow. Boaz was ago’elof Naomi and Ruth (Rt 2: zo), but there was a closer relative who couldexercise this right before bim (Rt 3: I?.; 4: 4). This first go’?/ would havebought the land, but he would not accept the double obligation of buyingthe land and marrying Ruth, because the child of this union would bear thename of the deceased husband and inherit the land (Rt 4: 4-6). So Boazbought the family property and married Ruth (Rt 4: 9-10).

d

j

22 I: PAMILY lNSlTrUTIONS

This story shows that the right of the go’el followed a certain order of kin-ship, an order which is specifxd in Lv 25 : 49: first, the paternal uncle, thenhis son, then other rclnrions. Further, the go’el could renounce his right ordcciine his duty without blame. By taking off one shoe (Rt 4: 7-8) a nunproclaiimcd that he was forgoing his right; Dt 25: 9 describes a similar actionin the law of levirate, but there the procedure is meant TO bring the brother-in-law into disgrace. Comparison of this law with the story of Ruth seems toindicate that the obligation of the l&rate was at first undertaken by the clan,like the redemption of the patrimony, but was later restricted to the brothcr-in-law.1

One of the gravest obligations of the go’el was blood-vengeance, but wehave already enmined this in connection with tribal organization, because itis rooted in desert custom.’

The term go’d passed into religious usage. Thus Yahweh, avenger of theoppressed, and saviour ofhis people, is called ago’rl in Jb 19: 23; Pa 19: 15;78: 35; Jr 50: 34. etc., and frequently in the second part of Is&s (Is 41: 14;43: 14; 4.4: 6, 24; 49: 7; 39: 20, etc.).

The firmness of these family ties was an inheritance from tribal organiza-tion The transition to settled life, and still more the development of townlife, brought about social changes which affected family customs.

The family ceased to be self-suificienr, because the standard of material wel-fare rose, and the development of industries led to a specialization of acdvi-ties. W, blood will have its say, and crafts were probably handed on, just asinEgypt, from fathcr to son; the reservation of the priesthood to families ofthe tribe of Levi was, no doubt, only an extreme instance of a generalpractice. There can be no doubt, also, that certain villages were composed ofwoodworkers or ironfounders (I Ch 4: 14; cf. Ne II: 35). while othervillages sp-xialized in linen (I Ch 4: 11) or pottery (I Ch 4: 23). These guildsofartislnswcre ruled by a ‘father’, and were~called mishpa@th, implying thattheir members WC~E united by kinship, or at least that they were groupedlike families.3

Oftbose great patriarchal families which unitedseveral generations aroundone head, few, if any, remained. Living conditions in the towns set a limit tothe numbers who could be housed under one roof: the houses discovered byexcavation are small. we rarely hear of a father surrounded by more than hisunmarried children, and, when a son married and founded a new family, hewas said to ‘build a house’ (Ne 7: 4). The prolague to the book ofJob is apastiche of a patriarchal story, but it betrays its period when it describes Job’s

I. on IhC Icvinlr, CT p. I,.I. P. II.1. Cf. p. 7,:

I : m PAMILY 23F&f<): ‘,,,,~A ,:L~ ronr u attending feats by turns in one another’s houses @ I: 4. 13. 18).,.*,,, *_~

: ~,,mon and Abulom, too, had their own homes, away from the p&e“’ &re David lived with their unmarried sister Tamar (2 S 13: 7. 8, 20).

Slaves were still counted as members of the family, but they were not son~erous; instead, another social clvs made its appearance-that of wage--en. A world which consisted merely of family groups, where the ser-wts lived with the master of the house, passed away, and in its place thereme P society divided into king and subjects, employers and workmen, richmd poor. This transformation was complete, both in Israel and Judah, by the

d&h century B.C.‘, By then the authority of the heaa of the family was no longer unlimited.A father could no longer put his son to death, and judgment-even on&nces against a father or mother-was reserved to the elders of the town

(Dt 21: 18-21). Even in David’s day, a member ofa clan had yright of appeal‘,. fmm the judgment of his clan to the king himself (2 s 14: 4-1 I).

So, as the feeling of solidarity grew weaker, the individual person began toemerge from the family group. The principle of individual responsibility is

,$ stated in Dt 24: 16 and applied in 2 K 14: 6; it is confirmed in Jr 3 I : 29-30 and,~; developed in Ez 14: IZ-20; 18: ro-20. At the same time, however, the duty

ofmutual assistance was neglected by relatives, and the prophets had to pleadthe cafe ofthe widow and orphan (Is I: 17; Jr 7: 6: 22: 3). The obligation of

“:the levirate was no longer as biding as it appears in the story ofJudah andTamar (Gn 38), and the law of Dt 25: 3-10 shows that this obligation could

I,’‘::,

be rejected. Even the practice of blood-vengeance was circumscribed by theadvent of forensic justiceand by the legislation on cities ofrefuge(Nb 35 : g-z.g;

Dt 19 : 1-13).‘,

1

CHAPIER Two

M A R R I A G E

THE story of the creation of the first two human beings (Gn 2: 21-24)presents nmnogamous marriage as the will of Gad. The patriarchs ofSeth’s line (e.g. Noah in Gn 7: 7) are said to bc monogamaus, and

polygamy first appears in the reprobate line of Cain, when Lamek takes twowives (Gn 4: rg), Such war the traditional story of the origins of man.

In the patriarchal age, Abraham had at first only one wife, Sarah, and it wasbecause she was barren that he took her handmaid Hagar, at Sarah’s ownsuggestion (Gn 16: 1.2). Abraham also married Qeturah (Gn 25: I), but sincerbis is related after the death of Sarah (Gn z3 : I-Z), Qeturah could have beenhis lawful, wedded wife. (Against thin view, however. Gn 25: 6, whichspeakr of Abraham’s concubines in the plural, seems to refer to Hagar andQeturah.) Similarly, N&r, who had children by his wife Milkah, also had aconcubine, Reumah (Gn a: x-24) ; and Eliphaz, son of Esau, had both awife and a concubine (Gn 36: 11-12).

In all this the patriarchs are following the customs of the time. Accordingro the Code of Hammurabi (abour 1700 B.C.), the husband may not take asecond wife unless the first is barren, and he loses rbis tight if the wife herselfgives him a slave as concubine. The hnsbmd can, however, himself t&c* aconcubine, even if his wife has borne him children; but the concubine neverhas the same rights as the wife, and hc may not take another concubiieunless the first is barren. 1n the region of Kirk& in the fifiecnth centuryB.C., the same custonn obtained, but it scans that there the barren wife wasunder an obligation to provide a concubine for her husband.

In alI these instances there is relative monogamy, for there is never motethan one lawful, wedded wife. Bu: other examples show that these resaic-tions were not always observed. Jacob married the two sisters Leah andRachel, each ofwhom gwc him her maid (Gn 29: 15-30; 30: I+), andEwhad three wives who were of equal rank (Gn 26: 34; 2.8: 9; 36: I-S). It wouldseem that the patriarchs followed a less stringent code of conduct than thatwhich prevailed in Mesopotamia at the same time, but the latter too was scmnrelaxed. At the end of the second millennium B.C., the Assyrian Code of Lawassigns an intermediary place, between. the wife and the concubine who is a

2: MARNAGB 23

slave, to the esirtu, or ‘woman of the harem’ : a man may have several_arieu, and an e&u may be raised to the rank of wife.

I,, Israel, under the Judges and the monarchy, the old restrictions fell into&use. Gideon had ‘many wives’ and at least one concubine (Jg 8: 3c-31).Bigamy is recognized as a legal fact by Dt 21: 15-17. and the kings some-rimes kept a large harem.1

There was, it seems, no limit to the number of wives and concubiies a- might have. Much later, the Talmud fixed the number of wives at fourfur a subject and eighteen for a king. In practice, however, only toy&y couldafford the luxury of a large harem, and commoners had to be content withone wife, or two at the tnost. Samuel’s father had two wives, one of whomwas barren (I S I : 2) ; and, according to 2 Ch 24: 3. the priest Yehoyada hadchosen fwo wives for King Joas. It is hard to say whether bigamy of this kind,referred ro in Dt 21: 15-37 also, was very common, but ?i was probably nomore frequent than with the Bedouin and fellahs of modern Palestine, who,for all rhe liberty allowed by Moslem law, are rarely polygamous. Sometimesself-interest leads a man to take a second wife, for he thus acquires anotherservant; mote often, it is the desire for many children, especially when thefirst wife is barren, or has borne only daughters. There is also the fact that theEvrern woman, being married very young, ages quickly. The same motivesplayed their part, no doubt, in ancient Israel.

The presence of several wives did not make for peace in the home. Abarren wife would be despised by her companion (e.g. Anna and Peninnah,in I S I : 6), even ifthe latter were a slave (cf. Sarah and Hagat, in Gn 16: 4-5) ;and the barren wife could be jealous of one with children (as Rachel was ofLeah, Gn 30: I). The husband’s preference for one of his wives could makethis rivalry more bitter (Gn 29: 30-31; I S I: 5). until eventually the law(Dt 21: 15-17) had to intervene to prcvcnt the children of his favourite fromrrccciving more than their fair share of the inheritance. The attitude has leftits mark on the language, which calls the wives of one man ‘rivals’ ( I S I: 6;cf. Si 37: 12).

1t is clear, however, that the most common form of marriage in Israel wasmonogamy. It is noteworthy that the books of Samuel and Kings, whichcovet the entire period of the monarchy, do not record a single case ofbigamy among commoners (except that of Samuel’s father, at the verybeginning of the period). The Wisdom books, too, which provide a pictureof society in their age, never mention polygamy. Except for the text of Si 37:II, just cited, which might be interpreted in a wider sense, the many passagesin these books which speak of a wife in her home all yield a better meaningagainst the background of a strictly monogamous family (~6, for example,Pr 5: 15-19; Qo 9: 9; Si 26: t-4 and the eulogy of a perfect wife whichcloses the book of Proverbs, Pr 31: IO-31). The book of Tobias, a family

26 1: F.4hm.Y MSTmmONS

talc, never refers to any but monogamous families, that of the elder Tobiu,that of Raguel. and that founded by the younger Tobias and Sam. Theimage of a monogamous marriage is before the eyes of those propheu whorep-t Israel as the one wife chosen by the one and only God (OS 2: 4;Jr 2: 2; Iz 50: I; 54: 6-7; 62: 4-5). and Ezechiel develops the same metaphorinto an allegory(Ez 16). It is true that the same prophet compares Yahweh’sdealings with Samaria and Jerusalem to a marriage with two sisters (Ez 23 ;cf. also Jr 3: 6-u). but this is merely to adapt the allegory of chapter 16 tothe historical conditions which prevailed after the political schism.

2. The typical Inaelite mania~e

Just as the onmarried woman was under the authority of her father, so themarried woman was under the authority of her husband. The Dccalogue(Ex ~0: 17) lists a wife among a man’s possessions, along with his servants andmaids, his ox and his ass. The husband is called the b/al or ‘master’ of hiswife, just as he is the ba’d of a house or field (Ex 21: 3, 22; 2 S II: 26;Pr 12: 4, etc.); a married woman is therefore the ‘possession’ of her ba’al(Gn M: 3; Dt a: 22). Indeed, ‘to marry 2 wife’ is expressed by the verbb#d. the root meaning ofwbich is ‘to become master’ (Dr 21: I); 24: I).

The question immediately arises, whether this usage indicates that the wifewa really considered as her husband’s property; in other words. had she beenbought by him? It has often been suggested that the Israelites practised a formof ‘marriage by purchase’ (ethnographers have certainly shown its existenceamong other peoples). The argmnenr is based partly on the vocabularyemployed, and partly on the story of Rachel and Leah (who complain thattheir father has sold them, Gn 3 I : I 5). But one need not give a formal, jwidi-Cal sense to words spoken by women in a moment of anger. However, thesupporters of the purchase-theory appeal above all, and with more reason, tothe custom of the nwkar.

The m&r was a mm of money which the fiancC was bound to pay to thegirl’s fither. The word occurs only three times in the Bible (Gn 34: 12; Exa: 16; I S 18: 25). The amount could vary; it depended on the girl’s father(Gn 34: IZ), and on the social standing ofthe family (I S 18: 23). For a com-pulsory marriage after a virgin had been raped, the law prescribed the pay-ment of fifty shekels of silver (Dt 22: 29). But. since this was a penalty, theordinary tnohm must have been less. Besides, fifty shekels is roughly the mmpaid by the Pharaoh Amenophis III for the women of Gczer destined for hisharem. According to Ex 21: 32, thirty shekels was the indemnity due for thedeath of a female servant, but this too was a penalty. The law on the fidfil-ment of vows (LV 27: 4-5) valued a woman at thirty shekels, and a girl undertwenty years of a.ge at ten shekels.

A fianc& could compound for the payment of the mohar by service. as

,“,

.,

,;..“i!

2: MdllRl‘wB 27

JW~ did for both his marringa (Gn 29: 15-30), or by accomplishing anappomted wk, as David did for Mikal (I S 18 : 25-27) and Othniel for Caleb’s&&hter(Jos 15: ‘6=Jg I: 12).

this obligation to pay a sum of money, or its equivalent, to the girl’sf&y obviously gives the Israelite marriage the outward appearance of apo&ase. But the mokr seems to be not so much the price paid for thewoman as a compensation given to the family, and, in spite of the apparentraemblance. in law this is a different consideration. The future husbandhereby acquires a right over the woman. but the woman herself is notbought and sold. The difference becomes clear if we compare themohar&age with another type of onion, which really was a purchase: a girlCould be sold by her father to another man who intended her to be hisown, or his son’s, concubine; she was a slave, and could be m-sold, thoughnot to an alien (Ex 21: 7-11). Furthermore, it is probable that the fatherenjoyed only the omfruct of the mohar, and that the latter reverted to thedaughter at the time of succession, or if her husband’s death reduced her topenory, This would explain the complaint of Rachel and Leah againsttheir father, that he had ‘devoured their money’ after having ‘sold’ them(Gn 31: IS).

A similar custom, with the same name (mahr), is found among the Palatin-ian Arabs of to-day. The mahr is a mm of money paid by the fiancC to thegirl’s parents. Its amount varies from village to village, and according to thefamily’s income; the amount depends. too, on whether the girl is marryingwithin her kin or outside the clan, whether she is of the same village or fromsome other place. Those concerned do not regard this payment as a real pur-chase, and pan of the sum goes towards the bride’s trousseau.

A parallel, though not identical, custom existed in ancient Babylonianlaw: the tirbatu, though not a necessary condition of the marriage, wasusually paid over to the girl’s father, and sometimes to the girl herself. Theamount varied greatly, from one to fifty shekels of silver. This sum wasadminisrtired by the father, who enjoyed the usufrucr of it; but he could notalienate it, and it reverted to the wife ifshe was widowed, or to her childrenafter their mother’s death. In Assyrian law, the tirhnru was given to the girlherself. 1t was not a purchase price, but, according to two very probabletheoria, either a compensation to the girl for the loss of her virginity, or adowry intended to assist the wife if she lost her husband. There is a closeparallel in the marriage<ontracrs found in the Jewish colony .at Elephantine;there the mohar is counted among the wife’s possessions, though it had beenpaid to the fatber.

The gifts presented by the bridegroom on the occasion of the wedding arequite different from the mohar: the two things are clearly distinguished in Gn34: 12. These presents offered to the girl and her family were a reward fortheir accepting the proposal of marriage. So, as soon as Rebecca’s marriage

28 I: FAMlLY lNSTIT”TIONS

had been agreed on, Abraham’s servant brought outjcwelr and dresses for thegirl, and rich presents for her father and mother (Gn 24: 53).

The same custom is found in Mesopotamia. According to the Code ofHammurabi, the bridegroom distributed presents m the girl’s parents, and ifthey broke off the engagement, they had to restore twice what they badreceived. By Assyrian law, where the tirhatu was a gift of money madepreviously m the bride, the man gave her ornaments also and made a presentto her father.

Was there. in addition, a dowry, a contribution on the part of the brideat the time of the marriage? It is difficult to reconcile any such custom withthe payment of the mohar by the bridegroom. In fact, there is no mention ofany mohar in those texts which mention what seems like a dowry: thePharaoh gave Gezet as a wedding gift to his daughter when Solomon marriedher (I K 9: 16); and when Tobiar married Sarra, her father gave Tobias halfof bis fortune (Tb 8: 21). Solomon’s marriage, however, follows Egyptiancustom, and he is above convention, while the story of Tobias is set in aforeign land. Besides, since Sarra war an only child, this grant appears to bean advance of the inheritance. In Israel, parents might give presents to theirdaughter at her wedding--a slave, for example (Gn 24: 59; 29: 24, 29), or apiece of land (Jos IS: 18-19), though the latter present was made after thewedding. In general. the custom of providing a dowry ncvcr took root inJewish territory. and Si 23: 22 seems even to repudiate it: ‘A woman whomaintains her husband is an object of anger, of reproach and of shame.’

In Babylonian law, however, the father gave the young bride certainpossessions, which belonged to her in her own tight, the husband having onlythe use of them. They reverted to the wife if she were widowed or divorcedwithout fault on her part. Assyrian law seems to contain similar provisions.

By marriage a woman left her parents, went m live with her husband,and joined his clan, to which her children would belong. Rebecca left hctfather and mother (Gn 24: 58-59), and Abraham would not allow Isaac to goto Mesopotamia unless the wife chosen for him agreed to come to Canaan(Gn 24: s-8). A few marriages mentioned in the Bible seem, however, to beexceptions to this general rule. Jacob, after marrying Leah and Rachel, con-tinued to live with his father-in-law, Laban; when hc stole away, Labmreproached him for taking away Leah and Rachel, protesting that they were‘his’ daughten and their children ‘his’ children (Gn 31: ~$43). Gideon hada concubiie who continued to live with her family at Shcchcm (Jg 8 : 3 I), andher son Abimclek asserted the relationship which united him to his mother’sclan (Jg 9: t-z). When Samson married a Philistine woman ofTim&, thewoman continued to live with her parents, where Samson visited her(Jg 14: St; 15: t-z).

Some think these marriages are a type ofunion in which the wife does notleave her father’s house; instead, the husband takes up residence in bet home,

2: MARRIAGE 29

yld scwrs his connections with his own clan. Etbnographetr calI it a beenamarriage, from its name in Ceylon. where their research has been principallycatred. But the comparison is not exact. Jacob’s fourteen years of servicewere equivalent to the mohar. He stayed a further six years with his fatber-in-law (Gn 31: 41) simply because he was afraid of Erau’r vengeance (Gn 27:42-45) and because he had a contract with Laban (Gn 30: 25-31). It was not.in fact, on the plea of matrimonia law that Laban opposed Jacob’s departurewith his wives (Gn 30: 2sf.); he merely blamed him for running awaysctetly (Gn 31: 26-28). He would have spoken differently if Jacob, by hismattinge, had become a member of his own clan. As for Gideon, the text~frews that the woman was a concubine. The story of Satmon’~ marriage ismore to the point, but it must be noted that Samson did not stay at Timtnhwith hio wife; he only came to visit her, and he was not incorporated intoher clan, so that this too is not a beena marriage.

,.

Gideon’s marriage should be compared, rather, with the fadiqa union of theancient Arabs. It is not so much a marriage as a liaison sanctioned by custom:&iqa means ‘lover’ or ‘mistress’. Samson’s marriage has close similaritieswith a form found among Palestinian Atabs, in that it is a true marriage butwithout permanent cohabitation. The woman is mistress of her own house.and the husband, known asjoz musanib, ‘a visiting husband’, comes as a guestand brings presents. Ancient Assyrian law also provided for the case where amarried woman continued to live with her father, but it has not been provedthat this kind of marriage (called erebu) crnrtitutcs a special type of marriage.

3. Choosing the bride

The Bible gibes no information about the age at which girls were married.The practice of martying the eldest first was not universal (Gn 29: 26). On theother hand, it seems certain that girls, and therefore presumably boys too,were married very young; for centuties’tbin has been the custom of the East,and in many places it still obtains to-day. The books of ‘Kings, however,usually give the age of each king ofJudah at his accession, followed by thelength ofhis reign and the age ofhis son (normally the eldest) who succeededhim. From these figures tie can deduce thatJoiakin mattied at sixteen, Amonand Josiar at fourteen; but the calculations are based on figures which are notalI reliable. In later days the Rabbis fixed the minimum age for marriage attwelve years for guls and tbirreer. for boys.

Under these circumstances it is understandable that the patents took all the -

decisions when a m&age was being arranged. Neither the girl nor, often,the ycmtb was consulted. Abraham sent bis servant to choose a wife for Isaac,and the serw.nt arranged the contract with Rebecca’s brother, Laban (Gn 24:33-53).1 Her own consent was asked only afterwards (w. 57-58). and, if

I. Thhr nxnrion of B&“d, Rcbccu‘r fatha m V. 5.2. ban r.uuon. Bclhvl WY &ad. 2nd Llbln w11the had orlk f.mily (CT “Y. 11. II. II, 19,.

30 I: FllMlLY LwmUnONS

WC interpret this by analogy with certain Mesopotamian texts, her consentwas asked only because her father was dad, and because her brother, not herfather. had authority over her. When Abraham expelled Hagar from hiscamp, she took a wife for Ishmacl (Gn a: 21). and Judah arrvlged themarriage ofhis Grst-born (Gn 38: 6). Altematively, the father might guide hisson’s choice. as, for example, when Isaac sent Jacob to marry one of hiscousins (Gn z.8: I-Z). Hamor asked for Dinah as a wife for his son She&m(Gn 34: 4-6), and Samson, when he fell in love with a Philistine woman,asked her parents for her (Jg 14: z-3). Even the independent-minded Esautook his father’s wishes into account (Gn 28: 8-9). Caleb decided on hisdaughter’s nurr+e(Jos 15: 16), as did Saul (I S 18: 17. ,9,x,27; 25: 44).At the end of the Old Testament, the elder Tobias advised his son on thechoice of P wife (Tb 4: u-13), and the marriage of young Tobias withSara was agreed on with the father of Sun, in her abxncc (Tb 7: 9-12).

Once the proposal of marriage had been put to the girl’s parents. they dis-cussed the conditions, especially the amount of the mohar (in 29: ~sfi; 34:12). In short, cvcn in those days marriageable daughters caused as muchanxiety to their parents as to-day (Si 42: 9).

Nevertheless, parental authority was not such as to leave no room for thefeelings of the young couple. There were love marriages in Israel. The youngman could make his preferaces known (Gn 34: 4; Jg 14: z), or take his owndecisionwithout consulting his parents, and even against their wishes (Gn 26:34-35). It WY rarer for the girl to take the initiative. but WC do read of Saul’sdaughru Mikal falling in love with David (I S 18: 20).

Actually, young people had ample oppommity for falling in love, and forexpressing their feelings, for they were very free. 2 M 3 : 19. it is true, spaksof the young girls of Jerualem beiig confined to the house, but this textrefers to the Greek period and to an exceptional state of affairs. The veilingof women came even later. In an&m times young girls were not secludedand went out unveiled. They looked after the sheep (Gn 29: 6). drew thewater (Gn ~4: 13; I S 9: II). went gleaning in the Gelds behind the rapas(Rt 2: zf.) and visited other people’s houses (Gn 34: I). They could talk withmen without any embarrassment (Gn 24: 15-x; 29: II-U; I S 9: 11-13).

This freedom sometimes expwd girls to the violence of young men (Gn34: I-Z), but the man who seduced a virgin was band to marry his victimand to pay an enhanced mohm; and he forfeited the right to divorce her(Exzx 15; Df 22: 28-29).

If was the custom to take a wife from among one’s own kith and kin; thecustom was a relic of tribal life. So Abraham sent his servant to find Isvc awife among his own family in Mesoporvnia (Gn ~4: 4), and Isaac in turnsent Jacob there to find a wife (Gn 28: 2). Laban de&red that he wouldrather give his daughter toJacob than to a stranger (Gn 29: 19), and Samson’sfarhcr was saddened bccausc his son did not chwse a wife from his own clan

2 : MARRIAGGE 31

(~g 14: 3) ; Tobias, too, advised his son to choose P wife within his tribe

(Tb 4: 1.2).-ges between first cousins were common, e.g. the marriage between

w and Rebecca, and those of Jacob with Rachel and Leah. Even to-day,,,& marriages are common among the Arabs of Palestine, where a young-has a strict right to the hand of his cousin. According to Tb 6: 12-13 and,: 10, Tobias’ request for Sara’s hand could not be refused, because he wash-at kinsman; it is ‘a law of Moses’ (Tb 6: 13; 7: 11-12). The Penta-&, however, contains no such prescription. The text in Tobias must&r either to the accounts of the marriages of Isaac and Jacob (cf. especiallye 24: 50-5,). or perhaps to the law requiring heiresses to marry within theirfarha’s clan, to preclude the alienation of family property (Nb 36: 39)). forSm was Raguel’s only daughter (Tb 6: 12). The same considerations ofpatrimony and blood-relationship were the basis of the omgation of the Ievbm,vards his widowed sister-in-law.’

Marriages did take place, however, between persons of different families,md even with foreign women. Esau married two Hittire women (Gn 26:34). Joseph an Egyptian (Gn 41: 45) and Moses a M&mite (Ex 2: 2x).Naomi’s two daughters-in-law were Moabites (Rr I : 4) ; David had a Caleb-ite and an Aramaean among his wives (2 S 3 : 3). and Solomon’s haremincluded, ‘besides the pharaoh’s daughter. Moabires, Ammonites, Edomites.Sidoniam and Hit&s (I K I I: I; cc 14: 21). A&b mar r i ed Jezebel, aSidonian (I K 16: 31). Israelite women, too, were married to foreigners,Bathsheba to a Hittire (2 S I I: 3), and the mother of Hiram the bronze-worker to P Tyrian (I K 7: 13-14).

These mixed marriages, made by kings for political reasons, became com-mon among subjects also, after the settlement in Canaan ug 3 : 6). They notonly tainted the purity of Israel’s blood, but also endangered its religiousfaith (I K II: 4), and were therefore forbidden by law (Ex 34: 15-16; Dt 7:3-4). An exception was made for women captured in war, whom Israelitescould marry after a ceremcmy symbolizing the abandonment of their countryof origin @r 21: 10-14). Scant respect was paid to these prohibitions, how-ever, and the community which returned from the Exile continued tocontract mixed marriages (Ml 2: II-U); Esdras and Nehemias both had totake suict measures, which, it seems, were not always very effective (Esd9-m;Ne10:31; 13:23-27).

Within the family, marriages with very close relations were forbidden,bcuuse one does not unite with ‘the flesh of one’s body’ (Lv 18: 6). affitybeing held to create the same bond as consanguinity (Lv 18: 17). These bansamount to the prohibition of incest. Some are primitive, others representlater additions to the law; the main collection of precepts is found in Lv 18.An impediment of consanguinity exists in the direct line between father and

I. sic P. IS.

32 I: FOAMILY INS~TlJ~0NS

daughter, mother and son (Lv 18: 7). father and granddaughter Qv 18: IO),and in the collateral line between brother and sister (Lv 18: 9; Dt 27: 22).Marriage with a half-sister, which was permitted in the patriarchal age (Gn20: 12) and even under David (z S 13: 13), is forbidden by the laws ofLv 18:II; 20: 17; marriage betweenanephew and aunt, hke that from which~oseswas born (Ex 6: 20; Nb 26: 59). is prohibited by Lv 18: 1z-r3; 20: 19. Theimpediment of &nity exists between a son and his step-mother (Lv 18: 8).between father-in&v and daughter-in-law (Lv 18: 15; 20: 12; cf. Gn 38:26). between mother-in-law and son-in-law (Lv 20: 14; Dt 27: 23), betweena man and the daughter or granddaughter of a woman he has married (Lv I 8 :17). between a nun and his uncle’s wife (Lv 18: 14; 20: zo), between brother-in-law and sister-in-law (Lv 18: 16; 20: 21). Maxiage with two sisters, whichmight seem to be authorized by the example of Jacob. is forbidden byLv 18: 18.

Members of the priestly line were subject to special restrictions. Accordingto LV 21: 7, they could not take a wife who had been a prostitute, or divorcedby her husband. Ez 44: 22 adds also widows, unless they were widows of apriest. The rule was even stricter for the high priest: he could marry only avirgin of Israel.

Engagement, or betrothal, is a promise of marriage made some time beforethe celebration of the wedding. The custom existed in Israel, and Hebrew hasa special word for it, ‘am& which occurs eleven times in the Bible.

The historical books provide little information. The engagements ofIsaac and Jacob are rather peculiar. Though Rebecca was promised to Isaac inMesopotamia, the wedding took place only when she joined him in Canaan(Gn 24: 67); Jacob waited seven years before marrying, but he had a specialcontract with Laban (Gn 29: IS-X). The story of David and Saul’s twodaughters is clearer. Merab had bten promised to him, but ‘when the timecame’ she was given to another man (I S 18: 17-19); M&al was promised toDavid on payment of a hundred foreskins from the Philistines, which hebrought ‘before the time had passed’ ( I S 18: z&27). On the other hand,T&ii married Sarra as soon as the terms of the marriage contract wereagreed (Tb 7: 9-16).

Legal teas, however, show that engagement was a recognized custmnwith juridical consequences. According to Dt 20: 7. a man who is engaged,though not yet married to a girl, is excused from going to war. The law ofDt 22: 23-27 makes provision for the case in which a betrothed virgin is tic-lnted by a man other than her fiancC. If the crime was committed in a town,the girl is stoned along with her seducer, because she should have cried forhelp: ifshc was assaulted in the country. only the mm is put to death, becausethe woman might have cried without being heard.

2 : MARRlAGE 33

The gloss in 1 S 18 : 21 probably preserves the formula spoken by the girl’s&d,er to make the engagement valid: ‘Today you shall be my son-in-law.the amount of the mohar was discussed with the girl’s parents at the time of&engagement, and was no doubt paid over at once if: as usually happened,it was paid in money.

The custmn existed in Mesopotamia also. An engagement was concludedby the payment of the tirhalu, the equivalent of the mohar, and it entailedj&ical consequences. A certain interval elapsed, between the engagementmd the marriage, during which either pa.rty could withdraw, but at theprice ofa forfeit. Hirtite law contained similar provisions.

1t is interesting to note that both in Israel and in Mesopo&nia, marriagewas a purely civil contract, not sanctioned by any religious rite. Malachy, it istrue, calls the bride ‘the wife of thy covenant’ (b’rltlt: Ml 2: 14), and b’rithis often used for a religious pact; but here the pact is simply the contract ofmarriage. In Pr 2: 17 marriage is called ‘the covenant of God’, and in theallegory ofEz 16: 8 the covenant of Sinai becomes the contract of marriagebetween Yahweh and Israel.

The textsjust cited may well allude to a written contract; apart from thesereferences, the Old Testament mentions a written marriage contract only inthe story of Tobias (Tb 7: 13). We possess several marriage contractsoriginating from the Jewish colony at Elephantine in the fifth century B.C.,and the custom was firmly established among the Jews in the Graeco-Roman era. How far back it dates is hard to say. The custom existed in veryearly times in Mesopotamia, and the Code of Hammurabi declares that amarriage concluded without a formal contract is invalid. I” Israel, acts ofdivorce were drawn up before the Exile (Dt 24: l-3 ; Jr 3 : 8), and it wouldbe surprising ifcontracts ofmarriage did not exist at the same time. Perhaps itis merely by accident that they arc never mentioned in the Bible.

The formula pronounced at marriage in given in the Elephantine contracts,which are made out in the name of the husband: ‘She is my wife and I amher husband, from this day for ever.’ The woman made no declaration. Anequivalent formula is found in Tb 7: II, where Sarra’s father says ro Tobias:‘Henceforth thou art her brother and she is thy sister.’ In a contract of thesecond century after Christ, found in the desert of Judah, the formula is:‘Thou shalt be my wife.’

Marriage was, of course, an occasion for rejoicing. The chief ceremonywas the entry of the bride into the bridegroom’s house. The bridegroom,wearing a diadem (Ct 3 : II ; Is 61: IO) and accompanied by his friends withtambourines and a band (I M g: 39). proceeded to the bride’s house. She wasrichly dressed and adomedwithjcwels (Ps4s: 14-15; 1~61: IO), hut she wore

34 I: FUIILY tNsIIT”nONs

a veil (Ct 4: I, 3; 6: 7), which she took off only in the bridal chamber. Thisexplains why Rebecca veiled herself on seeing Isaac, her fiancC (Gn 24: 63),and how Laban was able to substitute Leah for Rachel atJacob’s first marriage(Gn z.9: 23-25). The bride, escorted by her companions (Ps 45: IS), was con-ducted to the home of the bridegroom (Ps 43 : 16; 6. Gn 24: 67). Love songswere rung in Praise of the bridal pair (Jr 16: 9). examples of which survive inPs 45 and in the Song of Songs, whether we interpret them literally ordlcgorically.

The Arabs of Palcstine and Syria have preserved similar customs-theprocession, the wedding songs and the v&g of the bride. Sometimes,during the procession, P sword is carried by the bride or in front of her, andsometimes she performs the dance of the sabte, advancing and retiring beforeit. Some have compared this with the dance of the Shulamite in Ct 7: I. Insome tribes the bride pretends to escape from the bridegroom. and he has tomake a show of capturing her by force. It has been suggested that thesegames are a survival of marriage by abduction; the story of the men ofBenjamin and the girls who danced in the vineyards of Shiloh would be anexample from the Old Testament (Jg 21: 1~3). There seems to be littlefoundation for these comparisons. The brandishing of the sword is symbolic:it cuts away bad luck and drives off evil spirits. There is nothing to suggestthat the Shulamite’s dance was a sabredance, and the incident at sbilohis explained by exceptional circumstances which are recorded in thestory.

Next came a great feast (Gn 29: 22; Jg 14: IO; Tb 7: 14). In these threepassages the feast took place at the home of the bride’s parents, but the cir-cumstances were cxceptiona.I. As a general rule it was cettlinly given at thebridegroom’s house (cf. Mt 22: z.). The feast normally lasted seven days (Gn29: 27; Jg 14: IZ), and could even be prolonged for two weeks (Tb 8: 20;10: 7). But the marriage was consummated on the first night (Gn 29: 23:Tb 8: I). The blood-stained linen of this nuptia night was presetved; itproved the bride’s virginity and would be evidence if she were slandered byher husband @r 22: 13-21). The same naive custom still obtains in Palestineand other Moslem countries.

6. Repudiation and divorce

A husband could divorce bis wife. The motive accepted by Dt 2.4: I is‘that he has found a fault to impute to her’. The expression is very vague,and in the Rabbinical age there war keen discussion on the meaning of thistext. The rigorist school of Shammai admitted only adultery and misconductas grounds for divorce, but the more liberal school ofHillel would accept anyreason, however trivial, such as the charge that a wife had cooked a dishbadly, or merely that the husband preferred another woman. Even before this

4

2: MbRBlAGE 351%. Si 23: 36 had told the husband: ‘If thy wife does not obey thee at a,+al and a glance, separate from her.’

she form ofdivorce was simple: the husband made out a declaration con-&&g that which had sealed the marriage contract: ‘She is no longer mywife and I am no longer her husband’ (OS 2: 4). In the colony at Elephantinehe pronounced in front of witnesses the words: ‘I divorce my wife’ (literally:‘I hate my wife’). In Assyria he said: ‘I repudiate her’ or ‘You are no moremy wife.’ But in Israel, Mesopotamia and Elephantine, the husband had todrnwupawritofdivorce(Dtz4:t,3;Is~a:t:Jr3:8)whichallowedthewwnan to remarry (Dt 24: 2). A writ of divorce dating from the beginningof the second century of our era has been found in the caves of Murabba’at.

The law laid few restrictions on the husband’s right. A man who had&Ixly accused his wife of not being a virgin when he married her couldnever divorce her (Dt 22: 13-19). nor could a man who had been compelledto marry a girl he had violated (Dt a: 28-29). If a divorced wife remarried,and later regained her liberty by the death of her second husband or bydivorce from him, the first husband could not take her back (Dt 24: 3-4; cf.Jr 3: I). Osee’s double marriage (OS z-3)-if, as it reems, he did t&e back awife he had divorced-is not forbidden by this law, for in the meantime shebad not remarried, but had become a prostitute. Nor did the law apply toh4ikal, first married to David, then given to another man and Mly takenback by David (I S 18: x-27; 23: 44; 2 S 3: 13-r6), bccaureDavidhadneverdivorced her.

We do not know whether Israelite husbands made much use of thio right,which seems to have been very far-reaching. The Wisdom books praiseconjugal fidelity (Pr 3: 13-19; Qo 9: 9), and Malachy teaches that marriagemakes the two partners one person, and that the husband must keep the oathsworn to his partner: ‘I hate divorce, says Yahweh, the God of Israel’ (Ml 2:14-16). But not until New Testament times do we fmd the proclamation, by

Jesus, of the indissolubility of marriage. He uses the same argument as‘Malachy: ‘what God has joined together, let no man separate’ (Mt 3: 31-32;

19: 1-9 and parallels).Women, on the other hand, could not ask for a divorce. Even at the

beginning of the Christian era, when S.&me. the sister of Herod, sent herhuband Kostabar a letter of divorce, her action was held to be againstJewishbw. If the Gospel envisages the possibility of a woman divorcing her bus-band (Mk IO: 12, but not in the parallels). it is certainly with reference toGmtilc customs. The Jewish colony of Elephantine, which was subject toforeign inIluence, did allow a woman to divorce her husband. 1n Palestineitself the custom is attested in the second century of our era by a documentfioom the desert ofJudah.

In Mesopotamia, according to the Code ofHammum,bi, the husband coulddkmrce his wife by pronouncing the appropriate fotmula, but he had to pay

L

36 I: FM.lILY INST,TUTIONS

her compensation, varying according ro the circumstances. The wife couldobtain a divorce only after a judicial decision recogruzing the husband’sguilt. ~a Assyrian law the husband could repudllte his wife without anycompensation, but the wife could nor obtain a divorce at all. The situationrevealed by Assyrian marriage conrracrs is still more complicated, forrhey often stipulate still more onerous conditions for the husband: whenarranging the marriage, the wife’s parents might protect her interests byspecial clauses.

Though rhe Old Testament makes no mention of them, it is likely that inIsrael roe, cc&n financial conditions were attached ro divorce. Accordingto the marriage contracts of Elephantine, the husband who repudiated hiswife could nor reclaim the mohar; he paid the ‘price of divorce’. Similarly,the wife who separated from her husband paid the same ‘price of divorce’.but took away her personal property, which presumably included the mohar.

The condemnation of adultery in the Decalogue (Ex 20: 14; Dt 3: 18) isPlaced between rhe Prohibitions of murder and stealing, among acts whichinjure one’s ncighbour. In Lv 18 : 20 tr is ranked among sins against marriage:it m&s a Person ‘unclean’. in Israel, then, as everywhere in the ancientEast, adultery was a sin against one’s ncighbour, but the rexr of Lv 18: 20 addsa relieious consideration, and the stories of Gn 20: 1-13; 26: 7-11 representadultery as a sin against God.

If a mm commits adultery with a married woman, both the pamers inc r ime are put to death (Lv 20: IO; Dt 22: 22), and, on &is co~nr! a girlengaged to be married is treated exactly like a woman already marned (Dr22: 23C), for she belongs to her fnncC in exactly the same way as a marriedWD- belongs ro her husband. According toDr 32: z3f.;Ez 16: 40 (cf. Jn 8:5). rbc pen&y was death by stoning, but it is possible that in ancient times itwas de& by burning. Judah condemned his daughter-in-law Tamar to bebumed alive (Gn 38 : zd), because he suspected she had given herself to a manat a rime when she was the widow of his son Er, and, by the law of levirate,promised to his other son Shclah.

The latest collection of proverbs (Pr 1-9) &en puts young men on theirguard qainst the seductions of a woman who is unfaithful ro her husband.She is called the ‘strange woman’, meaning Simply the wife of another mm(Pr 2: &rg; 5: z-14; 6: 23-7: 27). Such love leads to death (2: 18; :: 5; 7.:&17), but this ‘death’ is generally synonymous with moral percbtmn: lrappears once as &revenge of the injured husband (6: 34). never as the legalpunishment of adultery.

The older parts of Proverbs rarely refer to adultery (Pr 30: 18-20) butthey rank it side by side with prostitution (23 : 27). The man who goes after

2: MARRI*GE37

prostitutes dissipates his we&h and 1 oses his strengrh (Przg: 3; 31: 31, but hecommits no crime in the eyes of rhe law. Judah, for example, is not blamedfor taking his pleasure with one whom he rhinks is a prosriture (Gn 38: IS-19): his only faulr is in not observing the law oflevitate towards his daughter-in-law (Gn 38: 26).

The husband is exhorted to be faithful to his wife in Pr 5: 15-19, but hisinfideliry is punished only ifhe violates the righu ofanother man by faking amarried woman as his accomplice.

In conrrast with the licence which the husband enjoyed, the wife’s mis-conduct was punished severely: it is the ‘great sin’ mentioned in certainEgyptian and Ugaritic texts, the ‘great sin’ which the king of Gerar almostcommitted with Sarah (Gn 20: 9; cf. the metaphorical use of the same termwith refcrcnce to idolatry, in Ex 32: 21, 30. 31; a K 17: ax). per husbandcould, indeed, pardon her, but he could also divorce her, and her ptishmententailed disgrace (OS 2: 5, n-12; Ez 16: 37-38; 23: zp). WC have no informa-tion about unmarried women, except that a priest’s daughter who turned roprostitution was to be burned alive (Lv 21: 9).

According ro a law of Dt 25: 5-10, if brothers live together and one ofthem dies without issue, ox of rbc surviving brothers takes his widow towife, and the tint-born of this new marriage is regarded UI law as the son ofthe deceased. The brother-in-law can, howcvcr, decline this obligation, bymaking a declaration before the elders of the town; but it is a disbonaurableaction. The widow takes o&s shoe and spits in his face, because ‘he does notraise up his brother’s house’.

This institution is called levirate, from the Latin lair, rranskting rhcHebrew yabam (‘brother-in-law’). Only two examples ofit occur in the OldTcsrament, both of them difiicult to interpret and only imperfectly corrcs_pending ro the law in Deuteronomy: the stories ofTamar and Ruth.

Judah’s first-born son, Er, dies without having a child by his wife Tama(Gn 38: 6-7). It is the duty of bis brother Onan to marry the widow, butOnan dots nor want ro have a child who would not be, in law, hs own so,,,so he frustrates his union with Tamar; for this sin, Yahweh brings about hisdeath (Gn 38: &IO). Judah ought now ro give Tamar his youngest sonShclah, but he shirks this duty (38: II); so Tamar tricks her father-in-law intohaving intercourse with her (38: 15-19). This story of ancient times Presentsthe obligation of the lcvirate as much stricter than in the law of Deurer_onomy; the brother-in-law may not de&c the duty, and it passes to a~ thesurviving brathcrs in rum (cf. Mt 22: 24-27). Tamar’s inrcrcoursc wirbJudah may bc a rrlic of a rime when the duty oflcviratc fell on the farhcr_i,,_law if he had no other sons, a practice which is found among sonle Peoples.

“I

core probably, it is the desperate act of a woman who desires childten of thesame s-m& 1s her husband.

The story of Ruth combines the custom of the levitate with the duty ofredemption which fell on the go’rf.1 The law of Dt 25 does not apply, forRuth had no mote brothers-in-law (Rt I: II-12). The fact that some nearr&rive must marry her, and that this obligation proceeds in a certain orderRt. 2: 20; 3: IZ), no doubt indicates P period ot a milieu in which the lawof lcvinte wu a matter for the clan rather than for the family in the strictsax. III any case, the intentiom and effects of the marriage were those of aletiatc martiagc, for it was made ‘to perpetuate the name of the dead’(Rt 4: 5. IO; cf. 2: 20). and the child born of it was considered the sonof the deccvcd (Rr 4: 6; d 4: 17).

There are paraUeb to thii custmn among other peoples, and especiallyamong Irtael’r neighbows. Though the Code of Hammurabi does not men-tion it, the Assyrian laws devote several articles to it. Though they do notexpressly state that the widow had to be childless, this may be due to a gapin the text. on the other hand, they tteat engagement, for this purpose, injust the same way as a consummated marriage; if a betrothed man dies, hisf&n& must marry the dead man’s brothcr. Some of the Hittite laws alsomention the levitate, but they ate less detailed. The custom also existedammw the Hurtites of Nuzu and perhaps in Elnm, and there is evidence of itat UgL-it also.

Discussion about the purpose of the levitate seems to he endless. Some haveregarded it as a means of pcrpetwting ancestor-worship. others as an indica-tion of a fratriarchd society. But, whatever may be ttue of other nations, theOld Testament gives its own cxplulation, which seems sufficient. Th’eessential putpox is to perpetuate male descent, the ‘name’, the ‘home’. andtherefore the child (probably only the first child) of a levirate marriage wasconsidered the child of the deceased man. It was not mete sentiment, but anexprasion of the importance attached m blood-ties. A secondary, but similar,purpose was m prevent the alienation of family property. This considera-tion appear in Dt zj : 5, which makes it a condition of the levitate that thebrothers should be living together, and it explains why, in the story of Ruth,the tight of redeeming the land is linked with the duty of marrying thewidow. The same motive is found in the legislation about the Jubilee (Lv ZS),and in the law about daughters who are heiresses (Nb 36: 29).

I. %c D.1T

CHAPTER THREE

T H E P O S I T I O N O F W O M E N : W I D O W S

IT has already been said that the wife called her husband ba’nl or ‘master’;she also called him ‘ad& ot ‘lord’ (Gn 18: 12; Jg 19: 26: Am 4: I); she Iaddressed him, in fact, as a slave addressed his master, ot a subject his

king. The Decalogue includes a man’s wife among his possessinns, along withhis house and land, his male and female slaves, his ox and his ass (Ex 20: 17;Dt 5: 21). Her husband can repudiate her, but she cannot claim a divorce: allher life she remains a minor. The wife does not inherit from her husband, nordaughters from their father, except when there is no male heir (Nb 27: 8). Avow made by a girl w married woman needs, to be valid, the consent offather or husband and if this consent is withheld, the vow is null and void(Nb 30: 4-17).

For all this, the wife of an Israelite was by no means on the level of a slave.A man could sell his slaver, or even his daughter (Ex 21: 7). but he couldnever sell his wife, even though he had acquired her as a captive in war (Dt21: 14). The husband could divorce his wife, but she was protected by theletter of repudiation, which restored her freedom. Most probably, themarried woman kept, if not the use, at least the ownership, of part ofthe mohar and of whatever she received from her parenrs (cf. Jos 15: 19;J g 1:‘s).

All the hard work at home certainly fell to her; she looked after the flocks,worked in the fields. cooked the food, did the spinning, and so on. All thisappaxnt drudgery, however, fat from lowering her stams, earned her con-sideration. Sometimes, in exceptional circumstances, a woman could eventake part in public affairs. Israel honoured Deborah and Jack as heroines (Jg4-5). Athaliah reigned wet Judah for several years (2 K I I); Huldab theprophetess was consulted by the king’s ministers (2 K 22: 14t): and the booksofJudith andEsther tell how the nation was saved by a woman.

Within the family, respect for a wife increased on the birth of her firstchild, especiallyifthechildwerea boy (Gn 16:4and Gn 29: 31-30: 24; notethe explanation of the names which Leah and Rachel gave m their children).Her husband became mote attached to her, and her children owed herobedience and respect. The law condemned the faults of children againsttheir mother as much as offences against their father (Ex 21: 17; Lv 20: 9;Df 21: 18-21; 27: 16), and the Decalogue (Ex 20: 12) commanded equal

$0 1: Fm.m.Y lNErnUTI”NS

honour to be given to father and mother (d Lv 19: 3). The Wisdom booksinsist on the respect due to one’s mother (Pr 19: 26; 20: 2.0; 23: 2.2: 30: 17;Si 3 : 1-16). And those tare passages which give us a glimpse into the intimacyof family life show that an Israelite wife was loved and listened to by her hus-band, and treated by him as an equal: Samuel’s mother, for example ( I S I:@, z-23), and the woman of Shunem (t K 4: 8-24), ot the two aged couplesin the bwk ofTobias. And there is no doubt that &is was the normal picture.1t was a faithful reflection of the teaching enshrined in Genesis, where God issaid to have created woman as a helpmate fat man, to whom he was tocling (in 2: 18, 24) ; and the last chapter of Proverbs sings the praises of agood housewife. blessed by her children, and the pride ofher husband (PC 3 I :Ic-31).

The social and legal position of an Israelite wife was, however, inferior tothe position a wife occupied in the great countries round about. InEgypt thewife was often the head of the family, with alI the rights such a position en-tailed. In Babylon she could acquire property, take legal action, bc a patty tocontracts, and she even had a certain share in her husband’s inheritance.

In the colony at Elephantine, under such foreign influence, the Jewish wifeacquired certain civil rights. We have already said that she could obtain adivarcc. She could also own property, and thereby became liable to taxation(in a long list of taxpayers, there ate thirty-two names of women). Deeds ofexchange and donations, etc., also survive, in which the contracting partieswere women.

The position of widows calls for some special remarks. A vow made by awife continued to bind her after her husband’s death (Nb 30: IO). By thelevirate law, a childless widow could continue as part of her husband’sfamily. If then were no levir, she could re-marry outside the family (Rt I :9). spending the interval before her second marriage with her own father andmother (Rt I: 8: Gn 38: II; cf. Lv .a: 13). The stoty of Tamar, however,shows that even during this period her father-in-law retained authority wether (Gn 38: 24). The widow wore mourning, at least for a time (Gn 38: 14;2 S 14: 2; Jdt 8: 3; 10: 3). How long the periodof mourning lasted is notknown. but to spend more than three years mourning, as Judith did, seemsexceptional (Jdt 8: 4).

Judith was a rich widow. More commonly widows, especially those withchildren to support, were in a piteous condition (I K 17: 8-15; 2 K 4: 1-7; cf.the widow in the Gospel, Mk 12: 41-44; Lk a: t-4). They were thereforeprotected by religious law and commended to the charity of the people,together with orphans and resident &x-all those, in fact, who no longerhad a family to assist them (Ex 22: 21, and emphatically in Deuteronomy to:18; 24: 17-zr: 26: u-13; 27: 19; cf. Is I: 17; Jr 22: 3; note in contrast Is I:23; Jr 7: 6; cf. also Jb 29: 13). God himself is their protector, according toPs 146: 9.

C H I L D R E N

%_/.’T a peasant or Bedouin wedding in modem Palestine, a pomegran-A ate is sometimes split open on the threshold of the house ot at the

opening of the tent: its grains symbolize the ma& children theirfriends wish them.

In ancient Israel, to have many children was a coveted honour, and thewedding guests often expressed the wish that the couple would be blessedwith a large family. As Rebecca leaves her family, she is blessed with tbcwords: ‘ 0 sister of ours, become the mother of thousands of ten thousands’(Gn 24: 60). When Boaz marries Ruth, the wish is expressed that his youngwife may be ‘like Rachel and Leah, the two who built up the house of1srae1’ (Rt 4: 11-n). First Abraham and then Isaac received the promise thattheir posterity would be countless as the stats in the sky (Gn 15: 5; 22: 17;26: 4). God promised Hagar, too, that her posterity would be pastcounting(Gn 16: IO). Children arc ‘the tmwn of man’ (Pr 17: 6). and sons are ‘oliveplants around the table’ (Ps 128: 3), ‘a reward, like atrows in the hand of ahero; happy the man who has his quiver full of them’ (Ps 127: 3-5).

Sterility, on the other hand, was considered a trial (Gn 16: 2; 30: 2; I S I:5) or a chastisement from God (Gn 30: IS), or a disgrace, from which Sarah,Rachel and Leah all tried to clear themselves by adopting the child whichtheir maids bore to their husbands (Gn 16: 2; 30: 3.9).

AU these texts show that the Israelites wanted mainly sons, to perpetuatethe family line and fortune, and to preserve the ancestral inheritance.Daughters were held in less regard; they would leave the family when theymarried, and so the strength of a house was not measured bv the number ofits daughters.

Among the sons, the eldest enjoyed certain privileges. During his f&et’slifetime, he took precedence of his brotben (Gn 43 : 33). On his fatbet’s deathhe received a double share of the inheritance (Dt 21: 17) and became the headof the family. With twins, the first to see the lieht was reckoned the elder(Gn 25: 24-26; 38: 27-30; &houghZerab’s hand\asscen first. Peres war theelder+f. I Ch 3: 4-because he war the first to emerge from his mother’swomb). The eldest could lose his right of primogeniturc for a grave offence,

qa I: F*MILY INSTITUTIONS

xs Reuben did by his incest (Gn 35: a.; cf. 49: 3-a and I Ch 5: I), or he couldsurrender it, as Erau did by selling his birth-tight to Jacob (Gn 25: 29-34).But the eldest son was protected by law against favoutitism on the pat of hisfather (Dt 21: 15-17).

Nevertheless, the displacing of the elder son by a younger one is a themewhich often recurs in the Old Testament. Apart from Jacob and Esau, Peresand Zerah, many other examples could be quoted. Isaac inherits, notIshmael; Joseph is his father’s favourite, then Benjamin: Ephraim is preferredto Manasseh; David, the youngest in bis family, is chosen from among all bisbrothers and leaver his kingdom to Solomon, his youngest son. Some wouldtteat these instances as signs of a custom opposed to the right of the firstborn;such a custotn does exist among some peoples, and is known ar ultimogeni-ture, because the inheritance and the father’s tights pars to the youngest son.But the examples quoted from Israelite history are exceptions to the ordinarylaw, and merely emphasize the tension betweenjuridical custom and the lovewhich tended to make a father most fond of a son born in his old age (cf. Gn3,: 3; 44: 20). Moreover, the Bible states explicitly that these stories stress thefact that God’s choice is absolutely unmerited and quite gratuitous: he accep-ted Abel’s offering and rejected that ofhis elder brother Cain (Gn 4: 4-5): he‘loved Jacob and hated Esau’ (Ml I: 2-j; Rom 9: 13; cf. Gn 25: 23); hepointed out David (I S 16: IZ.) and gave thekiigdom to Solomon (I K 2: 15).

The fwtbom, because he was the first-fruits ofmarriage, belonged to God.The firstborn of a flock were sacrificed, but those of mankind were redeemed(Ex 13: 11-15; 22: 28; 34: 20). for the God of Israel abhorred the sacrifice ofchildren (Lv 20: 2-5, etc., and cf. the sacrifice of Isaac in Gn a). Instead, the~eviter were consecrated to God as substitutes for the firstborn of the people(Nb 3: 12-13; 8: x6-18).

2. Birth

According to a rather obscure text in Ex I : 16, a woman in kbour perhapssat on two stones placed at a slight distance from each other: these stoneswould be the equivalent of the chair of childbirth, mentioned in Rabbinicaltimes and still used in some parts of theEast. In Gn 30: 3. Rachel asks Bilhahto give birth on her knees; Gn 50: 23 says that ‘the children ofMakit, son ofMulasseh, were born on the knees ofJoseph’; and Job, cursing the day ofhisbirth, bewails the fact that he found two knees to receive him (Jb 3: 12).From this some authors have concluded that childbirth sometimes tookplace on the knees ofmother person, a midwife ot a relative, and this customis in fact found outside Israel. But there is probably a simpler explanation:the texts about Rachel and Joseph must be referring to adoption (cf. Gn 48:w), and Job 3: IZ refers to the knees of a mother who is suckling her child.

From Ex I: 19 we might deduce that the women of Israel had easyI. a. p. I’.

4: CHLLDREN 43

dclivety, as so often occurs among the peasants and Bedouin of palestineto-day. But this isolated text carries little weight when set side by side withthe curse pronounced against woman in Gn 3: 16: ‘I will multiply thy sor-rows when thou art with child; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children.’This was the common experience, and the pains of childbirth arc frequentlyused, in a metaphorical sense, by the prophets (Is 13: 8; 21: 3; 26: 17; Jr 4:31; 6: 24; 13: 21; a: 23; 50: 43: cf. &oEx 15: 14; Is 37: 3; 2 K 19: 3; 0st~:t3:Ps48:7).Themotherwasassistedbyamidwife(Gn35:r7;38:~8)and Ex I: 15 shows that there were professional midwives. According to Jr20: 15 (cf. Jb 3 : 3), the father war not present at the birth.

The baby was washed, rubbed with salt-Palestinian peasants still say ‘itmakes them strong’-and wrapped in swathing cloths (Ez 16: 4; cf. Jb 38:89). As a general rule, it was suckled by its mother (Gn 21: 7; I S I : x-z3 ;I K 3: 21; 2 M 7: 27), but sometimes a child would be en&ted to a nurse(Gn 24: 59; 35: 8; Ex 2: 7-9: Nb I I: 12; 2 S 4: 4; 2 K I I: z), as was thecustom in Mesopotamia and Egypt.

The child was weaned much later than nowadays (cf. for samuel I s I :xaj); according to 2 M 7: 27 a child w.xs weaned at the age of three; thiswas the custom in ancient Babylon also. Isaac’s weaning was celebrated by afeast (Gn zt : 8).

3. The nrlme

The child was given a name immediately after birth. This name was usuallychosenbythemother(Gnz9:jr--lo:z4; 35:18; IS ~:~o),butsometimesbythe father (Gn 16: 15; 17: 19; Ex 2: 22; cf. Gn 35: 18). The custom ofport-ponjng the naming until circumcision, eight days later, is not recordeduntil New Testament timer (Lk I: 59; 2: 21).

Among primitive peoples, and throughout the ancient East, the name de-notes the essence of a thing: to name it is to know it, and, consequently, tohave power over it. In the earthly paradise, when God allowed men to namethe animals (Gn 2: 19-zo), it was a sign that he war putting them under man’spower (cf. the parallel story in Gn I : 28). To know the name of a person is tobe able to hurt him (hence ‘taboo names’ among primitive peoples, andsecret names among the Egypt&$, or to bc able to do him good (e.g.Moses, whom God knew by natnc, Ex 33: 12, 17). This is the teason why itis so important for the belicvcr to know the true name ofhis God (Ex 3: IJ-15; cf. Gn 32: 30). and this is a feature found in all Eastern religions. Finally,since the name defines the essence, it reveals the character and destiny of thebearer. The name becomes the expression of a hope, ot a symbol which mentry to decipher by rough etymologies.

Sometimes a particular circumstance of the birth provided the inspirationfor a child’s name. It might conccm the mother who bore the child: Evecalled her firstborn Cain (ad%) because she had ‘acquired’ (+,noh) a ma,,

&:,).ThI: mM,LY INSmtJnONI

e namc~ ofJacob’s sons tell a similar story (Gn 29: 31-w: 24):Rachel, dying in childbirth, called her son Ben-Oni, ‘son of my sonow’. butJacob changed this name of ill omen to Benjamin, ‘son of the right hand’(Gn 35: 18). Less often, the name concerns the &her: Moses called his sonGershom. because he was born when Moses was a xer, living in a foreignland (Ex 2: a). The child himself might provide the occasion: Jacob was socalled became, while still in his mother’s womb, he grasped the heel. ‘aqeb, ofhis twin (Gn 25: ~6). whom he displaced, ‘aqab (Gn 27: 36; OS 12: 4); Pereswas born by opening a breach, pew (Gn 38: ~9). Finally, the circmnstancemay be an event contemporary with the birrh: the wife of Phinehas, hearingthat the Philistines have captured the Ark, brings to birth a son whom shecalb Ikabod, meaning ‘Where is the glory?’ (I S 4: 21). We may comparewith the last example the symbolic names which Osee and Lwias gave totheir children (0s I: 4.6, 9; IS 7: 3; 8: 3).

In the explanation of these names, the Bible often gives a popular ety-mology, made up after the event and justified by some imaginary feature ofthe person named. This is certainly tme of a number of examples, but it is notalways and necessarily so. The same custom of calling a child after the circum-stances ofits birth obtains among many peoples, including presentday Arabs.Thus a woman who had borne only daughterr called the fourth za‘uleh(‘Irritating’), and rhecighthTam~m(‘Enough!‘), and a man whosedaughterwas born on a morning of heavy dew called her Endeyeh (‘Full of dew’).Names taken from a child’s physical appearance are quite rare: Nahor means‘the morer’, Qareab ‘the bald’ and Paseah ‘the lame’. With these we mzycompare a modem example: a woman from the district of Jerusalem ex-claimed, on seeing her son, ‘But this child’s a negro (habash)!’ So they calledhim Habash.

. Names of animals were commonly used, especially in the early ages:Rachel means ‘sheep’, Deborah ‘bee’, Yona ‘dove’, Aiiah ‘vulture’,Shephuphan ‘viper’, Caleb ‘dog’. Nabash ‘serpcnt’,Egkh ‘heifer’, Akbor‘mouse’ and so on. some authors have maintained that there were originallynames of clam, and&t the names are evidence ofprimitive totemism. In fact,however, they are names of individuals, not ofclans, and date from an epochwhen no otber trace of totemism is found. Moreover, similar names wereknown among the ancient Arabs and are found among the Bedouin to-day.Some are descriptive, or expressive of a wish: a girl called Deborah will be asbusy as a bee, a boy called Caleb, Shephuphvl or Aiiah will be strong 01terrible to his enemies, lie 2 dog, a viper or a vulture. Again, 1 child may becalled after the first animal seen at the time of its birth; the cwom stillobtains with modem Bedouin.

Names taken from plants arc much rarer: ElBn meam ‘oak-tree’, Zeitan‘olive’, Qds ‘thorn’ and Tamat ‘palm-tree’. These names are to be ex-plained in the same way as names of animals.

4: CHtLDRBN 45The most important category ofnames is the ‘theophoric’, i.e. those which

contain some divine name or title. Some are formed with ‘Baal’; this mayat times be an epithet of Yahweh, for ba‘al means ‘master’. but it is often thename ofthe Canaanite God. The proportion oftbese names is especially highin the ostraka,of Samaria, which date from a period when the religion of thenorthern kingdom was corrupted by syncretism. They disappear after themonarchical period. Under the influence of Yabwism, some of these names

were altered in the texts, ‘ Baal’ being replaced by ‘El’ or ‘Yahweh’;alternatively, they might be emended for the purpose of public reading. aswhen Ishbaal was cbanged into Ishbosheth, Yerubbaal into Yerubbosheth,and Meribbaal into Mepbibosheth.

But far more common than these are names derived from Israel’s nationalGod, denoted by his names of El or Yahweh (in shortened forms) or by someepithet or attribute. The names are composed of this di&e word and averb (or, less frequently, a noun or an adjective). They express a religiousidea, the power or the mercy ofGod, the help expected from him, the feelingof kinship with him. No doubt the everyday use of these names tended toweaken their significance, but they became much more common in periodsof religious revival, and some reflect the particular religious situation of anage, for example, that ofthe Exile or ihe Return. These facts prove that theirreal significance had not been forgotten.

Theophoric names could be abridged, the divine element being under-stood (‘hypochoristic words’): e.g. Nathan, ‘he has give,,‘, instead of‘Nathanyabu’, ‘Yahweh has given’: Mattan ‘Gift’, instead ofMvlattany&u,‘Gift of Yahweh’.

At the close of biblical times there arose the custom &giving a patronymicname, i.e. the child was called after its grandfather (less often its father),greatgrandfather, or uncle. There is evidence of it first at Elephantine, thenin Judaea in the third century B.C., and it seems to have been common atthe beginning of the Christian era (cf. Lk I : 59).

O,ccasio~Uy, Israelites or Jews by birth have foreign names, not only inthe colonies outside Palestine, but in Palestine itself. Aramaic names appearafter the Exile and are very common in the New Testament period: Martha,Tab&, Bar-Tolomai, etc.

In the Graeco-Roman period a person might have a Greek or Romanname in addition m a Jewish one: e.g. S&me Alexandra, John Mark. Some-times the name was translated into Greek (Mattanyah became Theodotos), orthe Semitic name given a Greek form (such as Jesus or Maria).

A perscm could change his name when he grew up. The Bible ascribessome of these changes to divine intervention. Jacob’s name war changed toIsrael for wrestling with God (Gn 32: 29; cf. 35: IO). The names of Abramand Sarai were changed into Abraham md Sarah (Gn ,7: 5, 15); these ateonly dialect forms of the same manes, but if one recalls the significance of

46 1: FAMfLY “isTtTUTl”NS

names &cussed above, a change of name would mark a change in the pct-son’s destiny (cf. Gu 17: 6.16). We have also observed that to name a petsonis to assert one’s authority over him, and this explains the changes of nameimposed by a mater. The pharaoh gave Joseph the name of Saphemth-pane& (in 4r : 45). The chief eunuch changed the names of Daniel, Ananias.Misael and Azarias into ~altassar, Shadrak, Meshak and Abed Nego (Dn I :67). When the pharaoh installed Elyaqim as ring of Judah, he made himt&thenameofJoiaqim(z Kz3: 34). and sunilarly Nabuchodonosor changedthe name of Mattanylh, whom he set on the throne, to Sedecias (2 K 24: 17).These last .zamples involve the problem of the coronation name in Israel, asubject which will be considered in counection with the king.’

4, Circumcision

Circumcision is the removal of the foreskin. The ceremony was to be pet-formed on the eighth day after birth, according to the law of Lv 12: 3 andthe Priestly account of the covenant with Abraham (Gn 17: 12). The sametradition says it was actually on the eighth day after his birth that Isaac wascircumcised (Gn 21: 4). According to Ex 4: 25 and Jos 5: z-3, flint kniveswere used, &ich shows how ancient the custom is; later, however, metalinstruments came into use.

The operation was carried out by the father [Gn 21: 4), in the exceptionalcase ofEx 4: 25 by the mother, or. in later times, by a physician or a special-ist (I M I : 61). There was no ruling about the place where it was to be per-formed, but it was never done in the sanctuary or by a ptiest. With adults, thewound healed ouly after several days of rest (Gn 34: 25; Jos 5 : 8).

The Israelites were commanded to circumcise not only their children, butalso their servants, both native and foreign (Gn 17: tz-13). Only circumcisedforeignerr, whetha servants or resident aliens, could share in the Passover,the fast of& tsraelite community (Ex 12: 43 :49). According to the biblicalnarrative, circumcision war first practiscd by Abraham’s clan after its entryinto Canaan; God ordered it as a sign of the covenant he had made withAb&am (Gn 17: 9-14, 23-27). The Patriarchs contiuued to observe thecustom (Gn 34: 13-24). and Jos 5 : 4-5 tells us that it was maintained through-out the sojourn in Egypt. On the other hand, Moses was not circumcised,acco&ug to the story of Ex 4: 24-a% The custom was forgotten in thedesert, but resumed on entering the Promised Laud (Jos 5: 4-9).

1t is d&cult to determine the extent of the practice of circumcision in theancient East, for the available evidence is uncertain and contradictory. InEgypt, bar-&& bear witness to the custom from the third millennium B.C.,texts mention it, Herodotus speaks of it, and yet some of the mummies arenot circutncixd. it certainly seems to have been obligatory for the priests.

1. cf. pp. w-108.

4 : CHILDPEN 47YetJon 5 : P appears to describe uncircumcision as ‘the disgrace ofEgypt’. Onthe other hand, Jr 9: 24-25 mentions the Egyptians, along with Judah, Edom,

and the Arabs as being circumcised in the flesh but uncircum-cised in heart. Ez 32: 21-30 consigns Fhharaoh and his army to Sheol~with theuncircumcised, along with the Assyrians, the Elamites, the hordes of Meshekand Tubal, the Edomites, all the princes of the North and all the Sidonians.Flavius Josephus says that the ldumeans (Edomites) were compelled to acceptcircumcision by John Hyrcanus. But, if we are to believe Herodotus, all thePhoenicians and Syrians of Palestine were circumcised; Aristophanes assertsthe same of the Phoenicians. According to the pre-Islamic poets, the ancientArabs wete circumcised, and the Pseudo-Bardesauus says that the Remanstried to forbid this practice in Arabia.

Among the peoples with whom the Israelites had direct contact inPalestine, the philistines were uncircumcised (I S 18: 25; cf. yg 14: 3; I S 17:26, 36) and the tetm ‘uncircumcised’ (without any addition) is sometimesenough to describe them(Jg 15: 18; I S 14: 6; 31: 4). Thir distinguishes themfrom the Canaanites, who are never so described, and must therefore havebeen circumcised. There is, of coutse. the episode of the Shechemites whowere compelled to circumcise themselves in order to marry tsraelite maidens(Gn 34: 13-24). but, according to Gn 34: 2, the Shechemites were ‘Hivvites’(‘Horites’ in the Greek text); this implies that they constituted a non-Semitic enclave among the population.

It seems, then, that the Israelites were not distinguished from the Semiticpopulation which they displaced, or with whom they mingled in Palestine,by the fact of their circumcision. On the contrary, they appear to haveadopted this custom when they settled in Canaan (cf. Gn 17: g-14. ~3-2~;JOE 5: z+), but with them the practice took on P patticular religious sipni-ficance.

Odgina.Uy, and as a general rule, circumcision seems to have been aninitiation-tire before marriage; consequently, it also initiated a man into thecommon life of the clan. This is cettainly true of many A&can tribes whichpractise it to-day, and very probably true ofancient Egypt, where it was pet-formed at the age of puberty. The custom must originally have had the samepurpose in Israel: the stoty of the Shechemites expressly connects it withmarriage (Gn 34); the obscure episode of Ex 4: 24-26 seeflls to refer tomarriage also, for the pretence of circumcising Moses makes him a ‘bride_groom ofblood’. We may add that the Hebrew words for bridegroom, son-in&w and father-in-law are all derived from the same toot, batan, whichmeans in Arabic ‘to circumcise’.

The metaphorical uses of the word confirm this interpretation: the‘uncircumcised heart’ (Jr 9: 2s) is a heart which does not understand (con-trastDt10:16;3o:6;Jr4:4).The’uncitcumcisedear’isanearwhichdoesnot listen (Jr 6: IO); ‘uncircumcised lips’ are those which cannot speak (Ex 6:

4s I: PllMLY *NST,TnT,ONS

12, 30). Circumcision, therefore, is regarded as that which makes a man fitfor normal sexual life; it is an initiation to marriage.

This significance mmt have died out when the operation wa performedscat after birth. Above all, religion gaye the tire a more lofty significance. Itwas a sign ofincorporation into the life ofthe group. into the community ofIsrael (cf. Gn 34: 14-16; Ex 12: 47-48). Hence it is prescribed as an obligation,and as a sign of the covenant which God made with Abraham and hisdercendantr (Gn 17: 9-14: from the Priestly tradition).

The religious importance of circumcision, however, gained ground onlygradually. The laws of the Pentateuch make only passing references m it, inconnection with the Passover (Ex 12: 44,48), with the pur&cation of womenafter childbirth (Lv 12: 3) and as a term of comparison with the first fruits oftrees (Lv 19: 23). It was only during the Exile that circumcision became thedistinctive mark of a man who belonged to Israel and m Yahweh. Theexplanation is not hard to fmd: the exiles lived among peoples who, did notpnctisc it, while, at the sime time, apparently, the custom was bemg pm-gressively abandoned among the nations surrounding Palestine. This wouldaccount for certain ancient references: Ez 32: 30 count the Sidonians amongthe uncircumcised; so also were the Ammonites, according to Jdt 14: 10; andaccording to Josephus, John Hyrcanus compelled the ldumeans to circumcisethemselver. The same author ad& that in his time, the first century of ouraa, the Jews were the only inhabitants of Palestine who had themselvescircumcised.

The importance of circumcision as a sign of the covenant with God wastherefore all the more strongly emphasized. Proselytes were obliged maccept it (6. the first Jewish-Christian controversies, Ac rj : sf ; 16: 3 ; Gal 2:3). The first references m pagans being circumcised when they accepted theJewish faith are found in Jdt 14: IO and Est 8: 17 (Greek), both late docu-ments. 1n New Testament times the duty of circumcision took precedence ofthe law of the sabbath (Jn 7: 2% 23).

This custom aroused the scorn of the pagans (Martial, P&us, Horace) andhad to contend with the invasion of Greek conventions, which did not acceptit. Antic&us Epiphanes forbade it in Palestine, and in&red cruel punishmenton those who resisted his orders (I M I : 6041; 2 M 6: IO). Indeed, Jews whofollowed HeUcnistic fashions tried to hide the marks of their circumcision( I M I: 13; cf. I Cot 7: IS).

5. Education

During bis early years a child wa left m the care of his mother or nurse,even after he had been weaned (2 S 4: 4) and was learning m walk (OS I I : 3).The little Israelite spent most ofhis time playing in the streets or squares withboysandgirlsofhisownage~r6:11;g:zo;ZaS:~;MtII:16).Theysangand danced, or played with little clay models, slmples of which have been

4: CmLDRmi 49found in excavations; little girls, it would seem, have always played withdolls.

It was the mother who gave her children the first rudiments of educaion,especially of their moral formation (Pr I: 8; 6: 20). She might continue madvise her children even in adolescence (cf. PI 31: I), but as the boys grew upm manhood, they were usually entrusted to their father. 0ne of his mostsacred duties was to teach his son the truths ofreligion (Ex IO: 2; 12: 26; 13:8; Dt 4: 9; 6: 7.2of.; 32: 7,46) and m give him a general education (PI I: 8;6: 20. and especially Si 30: 1-13). The whip and the rod played their part inthis training (Pr 13: 24; 22: 15; 29: 15. 17; cf. Dt 8: 5; 2 S 7: 14; Pr 3: 12;Si 30: I) .

Writing was in common use at an early date. Besides the professionalscribes, like those employed at the coutt for administration (2 S 8: 17; xx: 25;I K 4: 3. etc.), and private secretaries like Baruch (Jr 36: 4), &embers of theruling class could write, judging by the stories ofJezabe1 (I K 21: 8) and ofIsaiah (Is 8: I). But these were not the onlj, ones: a young man of Sukkothwas able to give Gideon, in writing. the names of all the chiefs of his clan(Jg 8: 14), and the commandment of Dt 6: g; II: 20 presumed that everyhead of a family could write.

Most teaching, however, was done by word of mouth. The teacher toldhis story, gave explanations and asked questions; the pupil repeated thestory, and asked or answered questions (Ex 13: 8; Dt 6: 7, zaf.; Ps 78: 3-4.etc.). This method of teaching continued under the Rabbis, and obtains evento-day in Koran? schools.

The content of the instruction was very general. The father handed on tohis son the national traditions (which were also religious traditions), and thedivine commands given to their forefathers (Ex IO: 2 and the other texts justquoted). children were also taught literary passages, such a David’s lamentover Saul and Jonathan (2 S I : I 8), which was still being recited in the days ofthe Maccabces (I M g: 20-x).

The father also gave his son a professional education; in practice, tradeswere usually hereditary, and the crabs were handed down in the familyworkshop. A Rabbi was to say: ‘He who does not teach his son a usefultrade is bringing him up to be a thief.’

This educational rdle of the father explains why the priests. whose missionwas m teach, are called ‘father’ (Jg 17: IO; 18: 19). It also explaim howJoseph, who became the pharaoh’s counsellor, was l&e a ‘father’ m him (Gn45: 8), and how Aman, vizier to Assuerus, could be called his ‘second father’(EL 3 : 13 or 8: 12). Similarly, the relationship between teacher and pupil wasexpressed by the words ‘father’ and ‘son’ (2 K 3: 12, compared with 2 K 2:3; cf. the frequent use of’myson’, ‘my sons’and ‘Hear, my son’inthe bookof Proverbs).

Apart from the education he received at home, the young Israelite had

50 I: F*M”.Y MSnlvnONS

ample opportunity for learning. In the caravans and by the wells, he heardmen sing of the ‘justices of Yahweh’ (Jg 5: x-11). At the village gates hewould listen to the palavers of the elders, to the settlement oflawsuits. and ‘0the arrangement of commercial transactions. The child accompanied huparents to the sanctuaries (I S I : 4.21) or to the temple at Jerusalem (cf. Lk 2:41f.), where he would hear the chanting ofthe Psalms and the recounting ofthose historical episodes which were connected with each great festival. As inthe Middle Ages, the liturgy was a powerfid medium of religious instruction.

Certain men had a special mission to instruct the people. First of all camethe priests, guardians and teachers of the Law, the T&ah, which by ety-mology tneans ‘directive ,’ ‘instruction’. Some didactic teaching was prob-ably given at an early date in the centres of worship: the boy Samuel wasen-ted to Eli the priest ( I S 2: 21, 26), and Joas was instructed by thepriest Yehoyada (2 K 12: 3).

The prophets, too, had a mission to instruct the people; this was at least asmuch a part of their task as foretelling the future. And prophetic inspirationlent to their preaching the authority of a word of God. It is certain that underthe monarchy the prophets were the religious and moral teachers of thepeople; and, we may add, the best of all their teachers, if not always the mostheeded. Along with them ‘wise men’ taught men how to live a good life;theii influence increased after the Exile, when wise men and scribes becameidentical terms, and moral education was combined with study of the Law.Their teaching was handed down in the gatherings ofthe elders (Si 6: 34). inthe conversation at festive meals (Si 9: 16), in the open air, at the city gates, inthe streets and at the cross-roads (Pr 1: zof. ; 8: z f.) They expressed theirteachings in epigrams, which were preserved in oral tradition and laterpreserved in written collections (Pr IO: 1; 22: 17; z.5: I, etc.).

Apart from this teaching, given, as it were, when occasion offered, andfrom which anyone could benefit, the prophets and teachers of wisdomgathered pup& around them to whom they gave a more continuous training(PI 8: 32; IS 8 : 16; 50: 4). It is probable, too, that schools for scribes existed atan early date in the two capitals, where the civil servants were trained; sitni-lx training-schools existed in Mesopotamia, in Egypt and among the Hit-titer. There is, however, no proof of an organized system of schools until alate period. The word ‘school’ (bAh-midrash) occws for the first time in theHebrew text of Si 51: 23. According to a Jewish tradition, it was only in A.D.63 that the high priest Joshua ben Gimla decreed that every town and villageshould have a school which all children would have to attend from the age ofsix or seven. This tradition is contested by some scholars who date the institu-tion of public instruction froti the time ofJohn Hyrcanus, about 130 B.C.

The preceding paagraphs concern only the education of boys. Girls re-mained under the control of their mothers, who taught them what theyneeded to know for their duty as wives and housekeepers.

6. Adoption

Adoption is an an by which a man or woman acknowledges a person ofdifferent blood as his or her son or daughter, with the legal rights and dutiesof a true child. Adoption was practised in Mesopotamia from a very earlytime. Its object was to secure for barren couples the benefit of children, andthus to provide them with help and support in their old age. In the middle ofthe second millennium B.C., at Nuzu, in the region of Kirk&, contracts offictitious adoption \;ere used to cover all mmner of economic transactions.

The Old Testament laws contain no directives about adoption. The his-torical books record no example of adoption in the strict sense, ix. the legalacknowledgement of one born outside the family as having the rights of achild born into the family. Thus we cannot regard as real adoptions theinstances ofMoses, who was treated as a son by Pharaoh’s daliihter (Ex 3: IO),or of Genubath, who was brought up among Pharaoh’s c:,ddren (I K I I : a,),or of Esther, to whom Mardochai gave a home when she had no father ormother (Est 2: 7. 15). Moreover, these three examples all occur on foreignsoil. The story of Abraham’s planning to leave his go& to his servantbecause he had no child (Gn 15 : 3) bar been explained as the adoption of aslave, in conformity with a custom attested by the Nuzu texts; if this ex-planation is correct, it reveals the influences of a Mesopotamian custom in thepatriarchal age, but it does not prove that the custom took root in Israel, andthe Bible itself does not represent the act as an adoption.

Some other examples are clearer. Rachel gives Jacob her servant Bilhah. sothat Bilhah may bear a child on her knees, and that Rachel may thus have achild, through B&h: Bilhah’s two children are. in fact, named by Racheland regarded as her sons (Gn 30: 3-8). Jacob considers Joseph’s two sons,Ephraim and Manasseh, as his own (Gn 48: 5) and puts them ‘between h+knees’ (Gn 48: 12). We are told, too, that the children of M&r, Manasseh’sson, ‘were born on Joseph’s knees’ (Gn 50: 23). Finally, Naomi takes Ruth’snewborn child to her breast and says: ‘A son is born to Naomi’ (Rt 4: 16-17).We are almost bound to see in all these cases one and the same rite expressingadoption: the child was laid on or between the knees of the man or womanwho adopted it. But these are not adoptions in the full sense, for they all takeplace within the family and in the direct line, the child being ‘adopted’ by itsstepmother (cf. without any mention of the rite Gn 16: 2; 30: 1-13). itsgrandfather or its grandmother. The legal consequences of such an adoptionare therefore not far-reaching.’

We might see a reflection of customs of adoption in those passages wherethe relations between Yahweh and Israel are expressed as those of father andson(Ex4:22;Dt3~:6;Is63:16;64:7;Jr3:19;31:9;0~11:1~et~.),butthese are hardly mote than metaphors. in which the idea ofdivine fatherhood

I_ B”f cf. p. I).

i:“’

52 1: FAMILY INSTlnlIlONE

fade into background before that ofGod as Master and Creator. Only in theNew Testnment will it be brought into full relief, Mote significant isNathan’s prophecy about the king ofDavid’s line: ‘I shall be a father to him,and he shall b,e a son to me’ (2 S 7: 14. with the other passages de et&m onit,tCht7: 13;~~: ro;~8:6:Ps8~:27).Onlyonetextisexplicit. %atofPs2:

7, ‘Thou at my son: w-day I have begotten thee’, which certainly seems tobe using a formula of adoptical

we may conclude that the notion of adoption. in the juridical sense, warknown in Old Testament times, but had little influence on daily life; it ~1%unknown in later Jewish law.

I. cf pp. 111-11,.

\,

SUCCESSION AND INHERITANd

IN ancient Israel there was no such thing as a written will or testament.But before he died, a father used to ‘set his house it, order (2 S 17: 23;2 K w: I; Is 38: I). i.e. he gave verbal inrtructions about the distribution

ofhis property (cf. Dt 21: 16; Si 14: 13; 33: 24). However, he had to con-form to law and custom Only two legislative texts refer toinhcritance (Dt21: 15-17 and Nb 27: r-11. taken in conjunction with Nb 38: Q-9). and theyconcern particular cases. They need to be supplemented by incidentalinformation from the biblical narratives, and these narratives are not alwavseasy to interpret.

The fundamental rule is that sons alone have a tight to the inheritance.Among the sons, the eldest had a privileged position1 and received a doubleshare ofhis father’s eoods iDt 21: I,: cf. z K 2: o. metaohoricallvl. The sameprovision in made ii the Assyrian l&s, at Nuziand a; Mari. ?ie law safe-guards the right of the eldest by forbidding the father to show favour to theson of the wife he prefers at the expense of the eldest son (DC ZI : 15-17). (Thislaw retrospectively condemns Abraham for expelling Ishmael [Gn 21: rot]and David for preferring Solomon to Adonias [I K I: 17. d 2: IS].) Prob-ably only the movable chattels were shared, and the house, with the ancestralholdings, would be allotted to the eldest, 01 at least not divided. This wouldkeep the family property intact, and might explain the text ofDt 25: 5 aboutbrothers who ‘live together’.

In the early days of Israel, and, indeed, as a general rule in Mesopotamianlaw-codes, the sons ofconcubines who were slaves had no share in the inherit-ance, unless their father had given them equal rank with the sons of free-bornwives, by legal adoption. Sarah did not want Ishmael, the son of the slave-woman, to share the inheritance with her son Isaac (Gn 31: IO), and in theevent Abraham left his goods to Isaac, and only made presents to the sons ofhis concubines (Gn 25: s-6). But Sarah pretended she had forgotten herpromise that Hagat’s children should be recognized as her own (Gn 16: 2):lshmael therefore, had a right to the inheritance, and Abraham was down-hearted at sending him away (Gn 21: II). The sons of the slave-womenBilhah and Zilpah were given equal rank with those of Rachel and Leah (Gn49: 1-28) and had an equal share with them in the land of Canaan, which

54 t: FAMILY MsctTunONs

was Jacob’s inheritance. But the reason is that they had been adopted byRachel or by Leah (Gn 30: 3-13). Later usage reemr to have been less sttict.The case of Jephthah, excluded from his father’s inheritance by his half-brothers. is sometimes quoted (Jg I I : a), but Jephthah was an illegitimateson, born of a prostitute and not of a concubine (Jg II: I).

Daughters did not inherit, except when there were no male heirs. Thisprecedent was established at the instance of the daughters of Selaphchad(Nb 27: I-E), but with the proviso that they were to fmd husbands from aclan aftheir father’s tribe, and so prevent the family property from passing toanother tribe (Nb 36: I+). Under this law the daughters ofEleazar marriedtheir cousins (I Ch 23: zz), and this, too, is probably that ‘law of Moses’ towhich Tb 7: II refers.

There is one notable exception. Job’s three daughters received a share of theinheritance along with their seven brothers (Jb 42: I 3-15). This may representInter custotn, for the book of Job is past-Exilic, ot perhaps it was thenimagined that in patriarchal timcs, in which the story is ret, the father hadabsolute freedom in the distribution of his property. Indeed, perhaps thepurpose was to show the enotmou~ wealth ofJob and the ideal happiness ofz, family in which all the children were treated equally.

If a man died without issue, the property passed to his male kinsmen on hisfather’s side, in the following order: his brothers, his father’s brothers, bisnearest relative in the clan (Nb 27: g-11). His widow had no right to theinheritance. By contrast, Babylonian law and the usage of Nuzu both laiddown that a widow did have a share in the inheritance, or at least that she wasto keep what she had contributed to the marriage and the gifts she had re-ceived from her husband. The contracts of Elephantine allow a childlesswidow to inherit from her husband. In Israel, a childless widow eitherreturned to her father (Gn 38: II; Lv 22: 13; Rt I: E), or remained a tnetn-bet of her husband’s family by a levirate marriage.~ If a widow had grown-up children, they provided for her support. If the children were still young,she may have managed the property left to them as their trutee (this wouldexplains K 8: 3-4). The money owned by Mikayehu’s mother(Jg 17: 1-4)~~perhaps her own personal property, distinct from the legacy left by herhusband. The cae of Naomi, o&ring for sale a piece ofland which had beenthe property of her &ceased husband (Rr 4: 3. g) is difftculr to explain, butwe should at least notice that in Rt 4: 9 the land is regarded as the jointproperty ofher two sons, Kilyon and M&km. Thcsc two were also dead. andNaomi appears to be acting as the guardian of their rights. Judith had re-ceivcd from her husband quite a fortune, including both movable andimmovable goods (Jdt 8: 7), and she disposed of it quite freely before herdeath (Jdt 16: 24); this story, however, dates from an age when cusmtn hadgrown much more liberal, and when the way was already being prepared for

5: S”CCEsSION AND INHmIT*ANCB55

that recognition of a widow’s rights which was eventually sanctioned byJewish law.

tbThe episode of Nab& (I K a: IS) bar led some writers to conclude thate property of tnen condemned to death reverted to the king; but it may

simply be an instance ofarbitrary confiscation. Some late passages show thatthe father could make advances of the inheritance long before his death (Tb8: 21; Si 33: 20-24; cf. Lk 15: 12).

CHAPTnR SIX

DEATH AND FUNERAL RITES

TH E distinction between soul and body is something foreign to theHebrew mentality, and death, therefore, is not regarded as theseparation of these two elements. A live man is a living ‘soul’ (wph-

rrh),andadeadmanisadead’saul’,adead‘nepherh’(Nb6:6;Lvat:~r;cf.Nb r9: 13). Death is not am&&on. So long as the body exists and thebones at least remain, the soul exists, like a shade, in a condition of extremeweakness, in the subterranean abode of Sheol (Jb 26: j-6; Is r4: 9-10; Ez 32:

17-32).These ideas account for the care bestowed on the corpse and the impor-

tance of honourable burial. for the soul continued to feel what was done tothe ba,dy. Hence to be left unburied, a prey to the birds and the wild beasa,wasrhewotstof111cunes(~Kt4:11;Jr16:4;az:t9;Ez~9:~).Yetthecorpse which was doomed to corruption, and the tomb which contained it,were both considered unclean, and conveyed uncleanness to those whotouched than (La 21: t-4; ~2: 4; Nb 19: 11-16; Ag 2: 13; cf. Ez 43: 7).

In Gn 46: 4 there is an alhuion to the custom of closiig the eyes of thedead; this almost universal custom is perhaps simply explained by theresemblance of death to sleep. The nearest relatives embraced the body (Gn50: I). It is probable that it was then prepared for burial, but we have noinformation earlier than the New Testament (Mt 27: 59 and par&b; Jn II:44; 19: 39-40). The pins and other ornaments found in excavated tombsshow that the dead wete buried fully clothed. Samuel came up from Sheolwith his cloak around him (I S 28 : x4), andEz 32: 27 tells us that soldiers werelaid to rest in their amtour, with their swords under their heads and theirshields under their bodies.

Embahning was never pracdsed in Israel: the two examples known, thoseofJacob and Joseph, ate explicitly ascribed to Egyptian custom (Gn 50: z-3).The corpse WT, not placed in a coffin (cf. 2 K 13: ZI), but carried on a bier(2 S 3 : 3 I ; cf. Lk 7: 14). Joseph’s body was placed in a coffin; but it is the onlyexample recorded, and this also in to be explained by Egyptian custom(Gn 50: 26).

We do not know the interval which elapsed between death and burial.The seventy days’mouming before the transfer ofJacob’s body is exceptional,for the Egyptians accorded the Patriarch a royal funeral. The precept of Dt21: a-23 concerns only the bodies of those who had been executed: theyhad to be removed before nightfall. Th e d 1 ye a was probably very short, as itstill is in the East; it is probable that, as a general rule, burial took place on theday of death.

There is no evidence that corpses were cremated in Palestine, except indays long before the coming of the Istaelites, ot among groups of foreigners;the Israelites never ptactised it. On the contrary, to bum a body was an out-rage, in&ted only on notorious criminals (Gn 38: 24: Lv 20: 14; a: 9), orupon enemies a man wanted to annihilate for ever (Am 2: e). There remainsone d&cult instance: the people of Yabesh in Gilead burnt the bodies ofSaul and his sons before burying their bones (I S 3 I : 12) ; it seems to havebeen a departure from traditional usage, and the parallel passage in I Ch IO:IZ omits this point. In addition we must not co&se with cremation thereferences given in Jr 34: 5; 2 Ch 16: 14; 21: 19. which speak of a fire beinglit at the death of a king who died in peace with God: this is certainly notcremation, but incense and perfumes were burned neat the body.

The normal type of Israelite tomb is a burial chamber dug out of soft rock,or making use of a natural cave. The entty is a narrow passage opening onone of the sides: on the other three sides are ledges on which the bodies werelaid. There is sometimes a cavity in which the bones of skeletons were placed,to make way for new burials. These tombs are, in fact, ccxnmon tombs, usedby a family or clan wet a considerable period. There does not seem to havebeen any fixed rule about the position of the bodies. Some personal belong-ings and pottery were put beside the corpse. These funeral offerings, intendedfor the use of the dead, are not so nunemus or rich as in the Canaanite pctiod,and. at the end of the Israelite period, are confined to a few vases ot lamps.Men’s ideas on the fate of the dead had progressed, and their offerings hadonly symbolic value.

In the Hellenistic period a new type of tomb appean; instead of ledges,narrow niches are cut perpendicularly into the wall, and the corpses plncedinside. For at least two hundred years, from IM) B.C. to A.D. 100, the bonerwere laid to rest in coffers of soft limestone: great numben of these ossuarieshave been discovered in the ncighbourhood ofJerusalem. In Palestine, othermethods of burial, such as shafts opened in the rock, stone sarcophagi andwooden or leaden coffins, are later than Old Testament times.

Not every family could afford the expense of owning and maintainingsuch tombs. The poor were simply laid to rest in the ground, and at Jctu-s&n, in the K&on valley, there was a ‘tomb of the sons of the people’, a

cl

4,.,

_

SB I: EAMILY INSTIlUTlONS

common trench, where the bodies cf ‘stateless persons’ and condemnedctiminah were thrown (Jr 26: 23 ; ci. 2 K z3 : 6). The rich, on the other hand,provided themselves during life with burial-places worthy of their rank(Is z.2: 16; cf. Jb 3: 14). and the remains of well-tended tombs, belonging toimportant persons in Jerusalem, can still be seen at Sbiloah. The nectopolis ofthe kings ofJudah, where David and his succcssots until Achaz were buried,lay inside the ramparts, in the old city of David (I K 2: IO; 11: 43; 14: 31.down to 2 K 16: 20, but cf. 2 Ch. 28 : 27). Excavations have brought to lighttwo galleries in the rock, which may be the remains of these tombs; theyhave been opened several times, and were later wrecked by quarrying.

The site of a tomb might be marked by a pillar: thus, Jacob set up a stelcover Rachel’s tomb (Gn 35: 201, and Absalom, who had no son ‘to make’hisname remembered’, had a stele prepared for himself near Jerusalem (2 S 18:t8). Some s&e were definitely funeral rnonutnentr, and swlae wcte alsoerected on the high places, the bamo”rh; this raises the question whether a cultof the dead was not practiscd on the high places. This suggestion can claimthe support of a few biblical texts which have been corrupted ot badlyunderstood. Is 53: 9 should read, according to the Qumran manuscript:‘They set his grave among the wicked, and his bamah (here: the place ofhistomb) with the rich (or: with evildoers)‘; Jb 27: 15, with a very simplechange of vowels, reads: ‘Their sutvivon will be buried in batdth, and theirwidows will not weep for them’; Ez 43 : 7 needs no correction: ‘Never againwill they defile my holy name with their prostitutions, and with the funeralstelae (p&r) of their kings in their barn&h. But the construction of a manu-ment over the tomb or in connection with it is a late practice. The firstwritten mention of it occurs in connection with the tomb of the Maccabecsat Modin (I M 13: 27. 30). The tombs in the Kc&on valley which havemonumetxs over them (the sc-zdled tombs of Absalom, Jasaphat, St Jamesand Z&arias) all date from the end of the Greek or the beginning of theRoman period, according to the expetts.

Except for the kings of Judah, there is no evidence that the dead wereburied inside the towns. The tombs were scattered over the surroundingslopes, or grouped in places where the natwe of the sail was favourable. Thetomb was family property, whether it stood on land hclonging to thefamily(Jos 24: 30, 32; I S 15: I: t K 2: 34). orin apiece ofland bought as aburying place (Gn 23). It war thus that family tombs were established: thecave of Macpclah, which Abraham bought for the burial of Sarah (Gn 23)became in later days the tomb of Abraham himself (Gn 25: p-to), of Isaacand Rebecca, ofJacob and Leah (Gn 49: 29-32: 50: 13). It was normal for aman to be buried ‘in the tomb ofbin fathcr’(Jg 8: 32; 16: 31; 2 S 2: 32: 17:23); they hoped for it during life (2 S 19: 38), and David made this gesture asa last tribute to the bones of Saul and his descendants (2 S zt: 12-14). Con-versely. to be excluded from the family tomb was a punishment from God

6: DEATH *ND PUN- BITES 59(I K 13: x-x.). The expressions ‘to sleep with one’s fathers’ and ‘to be re-united with one’s own’, which record the deaths of great Old Testlmentfigures, patriarchs and kings of Israel or Judah, perhaps referred otigimlly tothis custotn of a family tomb; but the original meaning later took on adeeper sense, and the words became a solemn formula signifiing death, andat the sane time emphasizing that the tics ofblood reached beyond the grave.

3. Mourning rites

The deceased person’s relatives, and those present at the death and funeral,went through a certain ritual, many items of which were customary onoccasions of great sorrow, in public calamities and in seasons ofpenance.

At news of the death, the first action was to tear one’s garments (Gn 37:34;2S1:11;3:31:13:3t;Jbt:2o).Then’sackcloth’wgspuron(Gn37:34; 2 S 3 : 3 I) ; it was a coarse material, usually worn next to the skin, aroundthe waist and below the breast (cf. 2 K 6: 30; 2 M 3: 19). (The ‘nakedness’ ofMi t : 8 means this rudimentary garment, in spite of the parallel of Is 20: 2-4.)The mourners took off their shoes (z S 13: 30; Ez 24: 17. 23; Mi I: 8) andheaddress (Ez 24: 17. 23). Yet, on the other hand, a man covered his beard(Ez 24: 17.23) ot veiled his face (z S 19: 5; cf. 15: 30). It is probable that toput one’s hands on one’s head was a regular sign of mourning: the Biblespeaks of this gesture as an expression of sorrow or shame (2 S 13 : 19; Jr 2:37). and it is the pose of weeping women in certain Egyptian bas-reliefi andon the sarcophagus of Ahiram, king of Byblos.

The mourner would put earth on his head (Jos 7: 6; I S 4: 12; Ne 9: I;aMm:zs; 14: ts;Jbz:1~;Ez~7:3a);hewouldroUhishead(Jb16:1~).oreven his whole body (ti I : IO) in the dust, and lie or sit among a heap ofvh~s(Est4:3;Is58:5;Jr6:26;Ez27:30).

Mourners would also shave their hair and beard, at least partly, and makecuuontheirbodies~bt:zo;Isz~:1~;Jtt6:6;4t:~;47:~;48:37;E~7:18; Am 8: IO). These rites, however, are condemned by Lv 19: 27-28; cf.31: 5, and by Dt 14: I, for the taint of heathenism they preserve. Lastly,mourners refrained from washing and using perfumes (2 S 12: 20; 14: 2;Jdt to: 3).

David kept a day’s fast for Saul and Jonathan (2 S I : 12) and also for Abner(2 S 3 : 3 s), and people were surprised that he did not fast for his dead child(2 S 12: 20-x). After burying the remains of Saul and his sons, the inhabit-ants ofYabesh fasted for seven days ( I S 31: 13). the usual period of strictmourning(Gnso:to; Jdtt6:24;Sizz: tz;bufcf.jB:t7).ThefactthatJudithcontinued to fast, except on feast days, throughout her widowhood, is notedas something exceptional (Jdt 8: 54).

60 1: FAMILY INsnTUTlONS

Neighbows or friends brought mourning bread and the ‘cup of consola-don’tothcrclativaofthcdcceascd(Jrr6:7;Ez~4:17,~~;cf.Or9:4),forthe unclanners which was attached to the house of rhe dead prevented foodfrom being prepared there.

On the orher hand. some texts mention, though in mockery, the makingof food-offerings to the dead person (Ba 6: 26). which might be placed on histomb (Si 30: 18 [Greek: in Hebrew ‘before an idol’]). Excavations show thatthere was a time when the Israelites followed the Canaanite custom ofdcpositig food in the tomb. In Tb 4: 17 the elder Tobias counxls his son tobe lavish with bread and wine on the tomb of rhe just, but rhis precept istaken from the pagan book entitled The Wisdom oJz4hiqur. and, in rhe imme-diate context of the book of Tobias, could be interpreted of alms given on theoccasion of a funeral Whatever be the rrne interpretation of this text, suchand similar customs continued for a long time, and still do conrinue in partsof the Christian world; they indicate nothing more than a belief in survivaltiter death and a feeling of affection towards the dead. They are not acts ofworship directed towards the dead, for that attitude never existed in Israel.Prayer and sacr&ce of expiation for the dead (borb incompatible with a cultofthe dead) apppenr at the very end of the Old Testament, in 2 M 12: 38-46.

Perhaps we should explain the very awkward text of Dt 36: 14 by refer-ence to the same customs. The Israelite there declares that he has taken norh-ing as mourning food, nor made any offering to the dead, our of the tithe,which is holy and reserved ro the poor (v, 13); either use would have madethe entire tithe unclean.

5. TkeJimeral lamcnrarions

The chief f?meral ceremony was the lament&m for rhe dead. In itssimplest form it was a sharp, repeated cry, compared in Mi I : 8 to the call ofthe jackal or the ostrich. They cried, ‘Alas, alas!’ (Am 5: 16). ‘Alas, mybrother!’ or. ‘Alas, my sister!’ (I K 13: 30). or, if it were a member of theroya family, ‘Alas, Lord! Alas, Majesty!’ (Jr 22: 18; 34: s), A father wouldall on his son by name (a S 19: I, 3). For the death of an ody son, thelamentation was particularly heart-rending (Jr 6: ~6; Am 8: IO; Za 12: IO).These cries were uttered by the men and women in separate groups (Za 12:11-14); it was the duty of close relations (Gn 23: 2; 50: IO; 2 S I I: 26),thougheveryoneprerenrjainedin(~ S 25: I; 28: 3; 2 S I: 11-12; 3: 3r,erc.,where to ‘make mourning’ means ‘to perform the lamentation’).

These cxclamatians of IOIIOW could be developed into a lament, a qinah,composed in a special rhythm (2 S I: 17; Am 8: IO). The oldest and freest isthat sung by David far the death of Saul and Jonathan (2 S I : 19-27). Davidwrote one for Abner, too (2 S 3 : 33-34). But these laments were usually mm-posed and rung by Professionals, men or women (2 Ch 35: 25; Am 5: 16)~especially women (Jr 9: 16f.; cf. Ez 32: 16). It was a trade or profession which

6: DEATH AND FUNERAL RITES 61

they taught their daughters (Jr 9: 19). There were fixed forms, and P stocknumber of themes, which the wailers then applied to the individual. Thus thelament OYL’I Judas Maccabce, the beginning of which is quoted in I M 9:21, repeaa the words of the lament over Saul and Jonathan. The mournerspraised the qualities of the dead man and bewailed his fate, but it is a moststriking fact that the examples preserved in the Bible never have a religionscontent. In the elegy on Saul and Jonathan, for example, there is deep humanemotion, but nor a word of religious feeling.

In the Prophets we find imitations of these funeral hymns, which they meto depict the misfortunes of Israel, of its kings and of ia enemies (or 9: 9-11,16-x; Ez 19: 1-14; 26: 17-18; 27: z.9, 25-36; 28: 12-19; 32: z-8; Am 5:I-Z). The best example of all is the book oflament&ns.

I.6. Interpretation ojrhese rites

These funeral rites have sometimes been explained as evidence for P cultof the dead. Somerimes the argument is that the deceased person was feared,and that the living therefore wanted to protect themselves from him, or tosecnre his goodwill; at other times, it is argued that the living attributed akind of divinity to the dead. There is no foundation for either opinion in theOld Testament.

At the other extreme. it has been held that these rites were merely theexpression of sorrow at the loss of a dmr one. It is true that many of theserites were used in times of great sorrow and national disaster; they were not,then, restricted to funeral services. But to say that the rites are merely theexpression of sorrow is not su&ient, for some of them (wearing sackcloth,for example, or fasting) are found as penitential rites, and can therefore havea religions meaning. The self-mutilation and shaving of the head which theLaw condemned (Lv 19: 27-28; Dt 14: I) certainly had a religious signifi-cance, even though we cammt now define it. The food-offerings express, atthe very least, belief in a life beyond the grave. Finally, these ceremonieswere regarded as a duty which had to be paid to the dead, as an act of pietywhichwasrheirdue(I S31: 1.z;~ Sz.1: I3-I4;Tb I: 17-19; Si7: 33;~~: II-12). For children, these rites formed part of that duty to their parents enjoinedby the Dccalogne. We conclude that the dead were honoured in a religiousspirit, hut that no cult was paid to them.

PART II

CIVIL INSTITUTIONS

POPULATION

IT would help to a better understanding of the institutions of Israel, if wecould determine the size of its population. A demographic survey isessential for any sociological research, but, as usually happens when

ancient civilizations are the subject, the lack of accurate statistics makes theproblem complex.

There is, of course, some numerical information in the Bible, but it is notvery helpful. According to Ex 12: 37-38,600,~iw foot-soldiers came out ofEgypt, besides their families and a mixed multitude who went with them.Before the departure from Sinai (Nb I : x-46), a detailed count of the tribesgives 603,550 men over twenty years of age (cf. Ex 38: 26); the Levites arecounted separately, and there are ~w.z.z over a month old (Nb 3 : 39). and8,580 between the xga of thirty and fifty years (Nb 4: 48). In the plains ofMoab (Nb 26: s-~1). the total strength of the tribes is 601,730 men overtwenty, and there are 23,ca Levites over a month old (Nb 26: 62). There isno great discrepancy between these various figures, but they presuppose atotal population of several millions leaving Egypt and living in the desert,which is impossible. They are merely the expression of the way in which menof a much later age imagined the wonderful increase of the people, and therelative importance of the original tribes. In particular, Judah is the strongestand Simeon the smallest.

Another census is recorded, for the time of David (2 S 24: I+). This is arecord of the kingdom at its widest extent, when it included Tramjordan andstretched as far as Tyre and Sidon and the Oronrer. It lists 8~0,000 menliable for military service in Israel, and gao,ooo in Judah. In the parallelpassage (I Ch ZI : 1-6) the Chronicler has put the figure for Israel even higher,though he excludes non-Israelite territories. The lower total, in 2 S, is stillfar too high: 1,3co,ooo men of military age would imply at least five millioninhabitants, which, for Palestine, would mean nearly twice as many peopleto the square mile as in the most thickly populated countries of modemEurope. Moreover, to interpret these figures (or those of Numbers) as includ-ing the women and children is to go against the explicit statements of thetext. We must simply acknowledge that there figurer are artificial.

More reliable evidence is found in 2 K 15: 19-20. In 738 B .C . Tiglath-P&X III imposed on Israel P tribute of P thousand talents of silver; in order

66 n : ClyIL lNSTlTUnONs

to pay it, Menahcm levied a tax of fifty shekels each from all thegill&! hnrlofhis kingdom. Ifwc rcckan three thousand shekels to the talent,’ this meansthat there were in lsracl, at that time, sixty thousand heads of families whoenjoyed a certain prosperity.2 This would give us, with their wives andchildren, between three and four hundred thousand souls. To them must beadded the lower classes, the artisans and the poor (their number is uncertain,but they were fewer than the gibb&! hail), foreigners and slaves (also uncer-tain, but fewer still). The grand total, then, would not amount to 800,oooinhabitants for the whole kingdom of Israel, and would scarcely pass themillion mark even with the addition of Judah, for the latter was only one-third as large a Israel, and much of it was mote sparsely populated.

This estimate of the population of Judah may be confumed by a non-biblical document from approximately the same date. The Annals ofSennacherib record that in the campaign of 701 against Ezechias, forty-sixtowns and innumerable villages were captured, and that .a~,150 men,women and children were taken from them as prisoners of war. If this re-ferred nor to a deportation of captives, but to a census of the defeated enemy.the number would give us the total population ofJudah except for Jerusalem,which was not captured. Unfortunately the text, as in parallel passages of theAnnals, is clearly referring to captives carried offas prizes by the victors, andthe number is then too high, The inscription is probably an error for ~,IYI

The ‘towns’ of the Bible were not large. It is astonishing to xc fromexcavations just how small they were. Most of them could easily be fittedinto Trafalgar Square, and some would scarcely fill the courtyard of theNational Gallery. The Annals of Tiglath-Pileser III give a list of the towns inGaliiec conquered in 73~; the number of captives varies bctwcen hw and6gc--and this king used to deport entire populations. They were, then,villages like those of to-day, and no bigger. Certain centres were larger, ofcourse. According to the estimate of its excavator, Tell Beit-Mirsim, theancient Debir, contained two or three thousand inhabitants during the timeofits greatest prosperity, and it was a relatively important city.

For Samaria and Jerusalem other sources of information are available.Sargon II says that he carried offzT,2go persons from Samaria. This deporta-tion affected mainly the capital, and was wholesale, but it must have includedthose who had taken refuge there during the siege. The archaeologists whohave excavated it also assert that the town must have contained about thirtythousand inhabitants.

For Jerusalem. the figures of Nabuchodcmosor’s deportations are ditficult;they are d&cult to establish, and d&cult to interpret, for the texts have pre-served varying traditions. According to L K 24: 14, ten thousad men of rankand station, with all the blacksmiths and locksmiths, were exiled in 597, bnt

1: POPULAT,ON 67

the doublet in 2 K 24: 16 reckons only seven thousand persons of quality anda thousand blacksmiths and locksmiths. Finally, according to Jr 52: 28-30,Nabuchodonosor deported 3,0x3 ‘Judeans’ in 597 B.C., 8~ citizens ofJeru-s&m in 587, and 745 ‘Judeans’ in 583, making 4,600 in all. This last list,which is independent, no doubt concerns special classes of captives. Thefigures given in 2 K 24: 14 and 16 should not be added together, and areroughly equal: about ten thousand were deported. These represent only partof the population, but, on the other hand, they may include outsiders whohad merely taken refuge inside the city walls. This makes all calculationprecarious. Nor can we rely on 2 M 5: 14. according to which AntiochusEpiphanes put to death 40,coo in Jerusalem and sold as many again as slaves.The figures of the population of Jerwakm given by the Pseudo-Hecataeusand Josephus are still more exaggerated. At a reasonable ,~st~tnatc, in ourLord’s time the city had about twenty-five or thirty thousand mhabitants. Afew years ago this was just the population of the Old City within the walls,and in roughly the same space. The populaticm cannot have been muchbigger in Old Testament times.

The population of the country must have varied from time m time. It iscertain that the territorial conquests and the assimilation of Canaanite en-claves which took place under David, and still more the economic prosperityof Solomon’s reign, produced a sharp rise in population; this continuedduring the following two centuries, thanks to the progress of commetce.industry and agriculture. Even so, at the height of this prosperity, in the firsthalfof the eighth century B.C., the total population of Israel and Judah cannothave been much more than one million. By way of comparison, we maynote that at the British census of 193 I, before the great Zionist immigration,P&tine had 1,014.000 inhabitants. It is questionable whether the countrycould ever have supported many more people in ancient times, without theassistance of those artificial resources which modem economy provides.

CHAPma Two

THE FREE POPULATION: ITS DIVISIONS

I. Social evolution

IN a nomad civilization there are simply families. They may be rich orpoor, but the ttibe is not divided into different social classes. Some tribesare ‘nobler’ than others, but all Bedouin regard themselves as ‘noble’

compared with the settled cultivators. Even slaves do not constitute a c1a.s~apart: they form part of the family. From all that we can discover it was thesame with Israel so long as it led a semi-nomad life.

Settlement on the land, however, brought about a profound social tram-formation. The unit was no longer the tribe hut the clan, the mishpa!rah.rettled in a town which was usually no mote than a village. Social life becamea life of mull towns, and it is relevant to tmte that the old, and basic, frame-work of Deuteronomy is largely municipal law: e.g. the rules about the citiesof refuge (Dr 19), unknown murderers (21: I+)), rebellious som (21: I&zt),adultery (a: I@). and the levitate (25: s-m). This organiudon, based onthe clan, survived to some extent under the monarchy,’ and was still a livingforce at the return from the Exile (Ne 4: 7; Za 12: 12-14).

The centtalizatian of the monarchy, however, brought about importantchanges.

The king’s o&i& civil ot military, whether grouped in the two capitalsor posted in the provinces as representatives of authority, formed a kind ofcaste, detached from, and sometimes opposed to, municipal interests. Aboveall, the play ofecanamic life, business deals and the sale of land, destroyed theequality between families, some of whom became very rich while others sankinto poverty. But it would be a mistake to see in ancient Israelite society thecontrasts found in other societies, past ot present, between ‘nobles’ and‘plebciuts’, ‘capitalists’ and ‘ptbletatiat’. 1n Israel, there never really existedsocial classes in the modem sense of groups conscious of their particularinterests and opposed to one another. It is to avoid such misleading compati-sons that we prefer to speak here of ‘divisions of the population’. But it is notso easy to define them, owing to the variety and uncertainty of the vacabu-Iary in use.

2: THE PRPg PoP”r.AmON: ITS “M,“3N, as2. The men of rank and inq%ence

In the texts from Deuteronomy quoted above, municipal affairs are in thehands of the +‘qcnEm. Some think this term means all the adult men-thosewho wore a beard, zagan-gathered in popular assembly. It is much motelikely that they are the ‘elden’ (the corresponding adjective means ‘old’),the heads of families, who form a sott of council in cvety village (I S 30:26-31).

In Nb 22: 7 and 14 and in Jg 8: 6 and 16 they appear alternately with thef&m, the ‘chiefs’. The same two words appear side by side, as synonyms, inJg 8: 14. where we learn that there were seventy-seven of them at Sukkoth.The two words appear M be synonyms in Is 3: IQ also. The same wordf&m denotes the heads of families, explicitly in Esd 8: 29 and probably inEsd. 8: 24C In Jb 29: 9 the i&i sit at the gate of the town, l&e the ‘elders’ ofPI, t : 2,. The two terms are therefore to some extent equivalent.

&rim may have this meaning in some other texts too, but it often clasheswith another sense. The s’arin~ ate sometimes the offuets or oficizls of theking, both in foreign kingdoms (Gn 12: IS; Jr 25: 19; 38: t7f.; Est t: 3; 2:18; Esd 7: 28) and in Israel. Often they are military officers, commanders ofa unit ot of the whole army (I S 8: 12; 17: 18, 55: 2 S 24: 2, 4; I K 9: 22;2 K I: 14; I I : 4, etc.). Often too they ate civil o&i&, such as Solomon’sministets (I K 4: 2). governors (I K 20: 14; 22: 26; 2 K 23: 8), or off&h ingeneral (Jr 24: 8; 36: mf.; 34: 19, 21, etc.).

In relation to the kiitg, these officen were merely ‘Setvants’ (2 K 19: 5;22: 9, etc.).1 But among the people they enjoyed a privileged position. Theking sometimes gave them lands (I S 8: 14; 22: 7).

They were specially numerous in the capitals, Samaria and Jerusalem.where they formed a powerful body with which the kiig had to reckon (it38: 24-25), for they might even plot against their master (2 K 21: 23). Theywere men of influence, and in many cases are indistinguishable from theheads ofthe great families, from whose tanks they were often recruited.

In Nb 21: 18 and PI 8: 16, for&n alternates with n’dlbfm, the ‘excellent’men. These bad a seat of honout in the assemblies (I S 2: 8; Ps 113: 8); theywere rich and powerful (Ps 118: 9; 146: 3; Pr 19: 6).

In Is 34: IZ and Qo to: 17 the f&n are parallel with the lior&n, and in Jr27: 20 horlm takes the place of iarlm in the corresponding text of 2 K 34: 14.This word, always used in the plural, is quoted alongside z’qenlm in I K 21:8, II, and alongsidegibbM hail (see below) in 2 K 24: 14. According to themm and its derivatives in languages related to Hebrew, these are ‘free men’,‘men of good birth’.

These words are therefore almost synonymous and denote the ruling classof the monarchical period, administraton and heads ofinAuentia1 families-in

I, CT p. 110.

70 I,: CNn lNSIlT”TtONS

short, the men of position. In other texts, they arc simply called the ‘great’,thegdollr,, (2 K IO: 6, I I; Jt 5: 5; Jon 3: 7).

After the Exile other tutnes appear, denoting the same group. In Jb 29:g-to, the n’gidint are equated with the iarlm, and in I and 2 Ch the two are inpractice equivalent. gut the pte-cxilic texts use only the singular, nagfd, andapply it to the king appointed by Yahweh ( I S 9: 16; to: I; 2 S 5: 2; 7: 8:1 K 14: 7; 16: 2; 2 K 20: 5). On the other hand, we have the .Qganfm men-tioned with the Eorim in Ne 2: 16; 4: t3,13, and with the iarEm in Esd 9: 2, andthis word is frequently used in the Memoirs of Nehentias for the influentialpeople. One feels that in his vocabulary this word replaces z’qenlm, ‘theelders’. which he does not use. But in the earlier texts the word means‘governor’ and is borrowed from the Babylonian.

2: THE FREE POPUL4TION: IIS DtYNONS 7t12-t,, ‘the people of the land means the Hittiter, the citizens of Hebran, bycontrast with Abraham, who is only a resident stranger there.

In Gn 42: 6 it means the Egyptians, in contrast with the sons ofJacob; inNb 14: 9 it means the Canaanites who are masters of the land. in contrastwith the Israelites (cf. the parall e1 frotn Nb 13: 28, ‘the people who dwell ot,the land’). Ex 5: 5 teems to contradict this interpretation, for in the Massor-etic text the Pharaoh calls the Hebrews ‘the people of the land’. This wouldjustify translating it by ‘the common people’, but it is very tempting toadopt the Samaritan reading: ‘they are more nttmeroos than the people ofthe land’.

Turning now to Israel, three periods may be discerned in the use of thisexpression. Before the return from the Exile, ir was used principally by 2 K,Jr and Ez. The ‘people of the land’ are distinguished from, or contrastedThese men of influence and position can no doubt be called ‘nobles’ in a

broad sense, but they do not form a nobility in the proper sense of a closedclvs to which one belongs by birth, which enjoys certain privileges and ownsa large part of the land.

with, (a) the king or the prince, 2 K 16: r~; Ez 7: 27; 45: 22; [b) the king andhisservants,Jr~7:~;(c)~echiefsandthepriests,Jr~:t8;~4:tg;44:~~;(d)the chiefs, the priests and the prophets. Ez a: 24-29. They arc never con-trasted with another class of the people.Some authors used to regard thcgibbM boil as a class of landed proprietors,

a sort of squirearchy. They relied mainly on 2 K TV: 20, where Menahemtaxes thegibbsri !~a?! of his kingdom in order to pay tribute to the Assyrians.But it seems that this term meant originally (and often does mean in theChronicles) the valiant men, the brave warriors, the gallant knights, likegibb&lm on its own, even if they possess no property of their own (Jos 8: 3;

According to 2 K 24: 14, Nahuchodonosor left ‘only the poorest of thepeople of the land’ in Jerusalem, and the qualification inscrted indicates thatthe term itself does not stand for the poorer classes (cf. also ES 22: zg). This

I emerges also from the texts just quoted, P.R. Jr I : 18 : ‘ against this whaleland, against the kings of Judah, their chiefs (&trim) their priests and all the

I Jg I I: I) . people of the land’.

The term was then applied to those who wete boundto armed service and, The law of Lv 4 distinguishes the sin-offerings which have to be o&cd:

having to provide their own equipment, enjoyed a certain standard of living. Y. 3 for the high priest, Y. 13 for the whole community of Israel, Y. 22 for a

This is the sense which best answers the text of 2 K tj: 23, where there atesixty thousand of them, of 2 K 24: 14. where they are contrasted with the

chiet v. 27 for anyone of ‘the people of the land’. The obligation of punish-ing certain offences rests upon all the ‘people of the land’ (Lv 20: z-4).

poorest people of the land, and of Rt 2: I, where Boaz is simply a man of The ‘people ofthe land’, then, stands for the whole body ofcitizens. That

substance, like Saul’s father in I S 9: 1. is why the expression, applied to the kingdom ofJudah, is used as an altema-tive for the ‘people ofJudah’: compare 3 K 14: 21, ‘All the people ofJudahchose Ozias’ with 2 K 23: 30, ‘The people of the land chose Joachaz.’ In thesame way, the ‘people of the land’ punished the murderers of Amon andproclaimed Jasias king, 2 K 21: 24. In 2 K I I : 14, 18, ‘all the People of theland’ acclaimed Joas and destroyed the temple of Baal: this was a nationalrevolution, directed against Athaliah and her foreign entourage. 1t is true thatv. 20 cotmasts the ‘people of the land’ with the city, that is, with Jcruralcm.But the reason for the distinction is that the court rcsidcd in Jcrusalctn, withall the oflicials and supportcrs ofthc rcgimc which had been overthrown. Thecontrast in Y. 20, therefore, implies no ntorc than the distinction between thepeople of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem in Jr 25: 2. Nowhere doesthe expression mean a party or a social class.

,. The ‘people ojrhe land’

The texts often speak of the ‘people of the land’, ‘ani ha’are:, an expressionwhich has been interpreted in several ways. Many believe it means the lowersocial class, the common people, the plebs as opposed to the aristocracy, orthe peasants as opposed to the townsfolk. Others, on the contrary, see themas the representatives of the people in the government, a sott of Parliament orHouse of Comtnons. Others, again, regard them as the body of free men,enjoying civic tights in a given territory.

Examination of the texts shows that the last explanation is the only onewhich can be accepted for the earliest period, but that the meaning of theterm gradually changed.

First. let us conridcr the texts where it tcfers to non-Israelites. In Gn zj:

At the return from the Exile it continued to he wed in this gcncral sense(Ag 2: 4; Za 7: s), and it is found cvcn in Dn 9: 6, where the enumcrarion of

72 1,: CNII. MsTITUIIoNs

‘our kings, our princes, our fathers, all the people of the land’ recalls those ofJeremiah and Ezechiel. But the meaning changes in Esd and Ne. The termis used in the plural, ‘the peoples of the land’ or ‘ofthe lands’, Esd 3: 3; 9: I,2, II; to: 2, II; Ne 9: 30; IO: 2% 31. 32. Here it denotes the non-Jewishinhabitants of Palestine, who hinder the work of restoration, hinder theobservance of the sabbath, and with whom mixed marriages are made. The‘peoples of the land’ are contrasted with the ‘people of Judah’ in Esd 4: 4.and with the ‘people of 1sne1’ in Esd 9: I. It is a complete reversal of thepre-exilic use, and again the explanation lies in the basic meaning of theexpression: the community of the Return are not the ‘people of the land’because they do not enjoy the political status accorded to the Samaritans,the Ammoniter and the Moabites. It is these latter who are the ‘people of theland’ or of ‘the lands’.

Thus the way was prepared for a third meaning. In the Rabbinical periodthe ‘people of the land’ are all those who are ignorant of the law or do notpractise it.

4. Rich and poor

In the early days of the settlement, all the Israelites enjoyed more or less thesame standard of living. Wealth came from the land, and the land had beenshared out between the families, each ofwhom guarded its property jealously(cc once more the story ofNaboth in I K 21: x-3). Commerce, and the buy-ing and selling of real estate for profit. were as yet unimportant factors ineconomic life, There were, of course, exceptions: Nabal, for instance, was arich stock-breeder in the highlands of Judah: he had 3,000 sheep and I.MX)goats and, in order to appease David, his wife Abigail could send 200 loaves,1~) bunches of dried grapes, 200 fig cakes, with skins of wine, bushels ofparched grain and dressed mutton, I S 25: z.. 18. Job’s wealth was evengreater: 7,000 sheep, 3,~ camels, 500 pair of oxen, 5” she-asses, Jb I: 3;but the story portrays Job after the manner of a great sheikh of the patriarchalage (cf. Abraham in Gn 12: 16; 13: 6; 24: 35). In contrart, the first two kingsof Israel came from only moderately well-to-do families. Saul’s father was agibb6r bil (cf. above), but he sent his son to look for the lost she-asses, I S 9:of., and Saul ploughed the fields himself (I S II: 5). David looked after theflocks (I S 16: II, cf. 17: 20, 28, 34f.). and his father sent him off to hisbrothers in the army, with a measure of parched corn, ten loaves and tencheeses (I S r7: 17). According to another tradition, when David was calledinto the king’s presence, he brought a present of five loaves, a skin of wineand a kid (I S 16: 20). All this represents a very modest standard of living,and we do not hear of any other families in the same circles being anybetter off.

Excavations in lsrarlite towns bear witness to this equality in standards ofliving. At Tirsah, the modem Tell cl-Farah near Nablus, the houses of thetenth century B.C. are all of the same size and arrangement. Each represents

2: Tm FREE PoPuL*TION: ITS DMSlONS73

the dwelling of a family which 1wed.m the same way as its neighbonrs. Thecontrast is striking whm we pass to the eighth century houses on the samesite: the rich houses are bigger and better built and in a different quarter fromthat where the poor hous are huddled together.

Between these two centuries, a social revolution had taken place. Themonarchical institutions produced, as we saw, a class of off&Is who drew aprofit from their posts and the favoun granted them by the king. Others, byhard work OI good luck, made vast profits from their lands. Prosperity wasthe order of the day. In OS 12: 9. Epkaim (Israel) says: ‘Yes, I have becomerich, I have amassed a fortune’, and Is 2: 7 says: ‘The land is full ofsilver adgold, and t~eaures past counting.’ The prophets condemn their contempor-aries for their luxury in building (OS 8: 14; Am 3: 15; 5: II), in entertin-ment (Is 5: II-12; Am 6: 4) and in dress (Is 3: 16-24). They condemn thebuying up of the land by those ‘who add house to how&and join field tofield till there is no room left’ (Is 5: 8). The wealth of the day was in factbadly distributed and often ill-gotten: ‘If they covet fields they seize them; ifhouses, they take them’, Mi 2: 2. The rich landlords would speculate anddefraud others (OS 12: 8; Am 8: 5; Mi 2: it). the judges took bribes (Is I:23; Jr 5: 28; Mi 3: I I; 7: 3), and the creditors knew no pity (Am 2:6-8; 8:6).

On the other side we have the weak, the small men, the poor, whosuffered from these burdens. The prophets took their cause in hand (Is 3 : 14-15; IO: 2; II: 4; Am 4: I; 5: 12; d Ps 82: 3-4). and the law too protectedthem. In days gone by, there had been the precepts of Ex 22: 24-26; 23 : 6.but Deuteronomy reflects the social conditions of its period. It promulgatesthe duty of almsgiving (Dt 15: 7-11). says that when a debtor is poor, hissecurity most be given back to him before sunset (Dt 24: 12-13, supplement-ing the law ofEx a: zs-26), and protects the hired labonrer (Dt 24: 14-15).

It was well understood that the poor would always be with them (Dt 15:,I, cf. Mt 26: II), but there were regulations which aimed at preventingpauperism and restoring a certain equality between Israelites, though it ishard to say how far they were actually put into practice.r In every sabbaticalyear, the produce of the land was lefr for the destitute (Ex 23 : II), and debtswere cancelled (Dt 15: I), ‘so that there may no longer be any poor manamong you’ (Dt IS: 4). In the Jubilee year a general emancipation was to beproclaimed and every man was to have his ancestral land restored to him(Lv 25: IO, with the commentaries in the rest of the chapter).

The rich were found mostly among the influential people, and manypassages in the Prophets condemn the two together. But the poor did notform a separate social class in contrast with them: the poor were individuals,and precisely because they were isolated, they were defenceless.

In themselves, the words ‘rich’ and ‘poor’ carry no moral or religious

I. cf. pp. v-1,,.

74 If: Clvu. lNsIIT”T*ONs

connotation. But they acquire moral overtones in two opposed lines ofthought. On the theory of earthly rewards, wealth is a reward of virtue andpoverty is a punishment; this we find in texts like Ps I: 3; IIZ: 1-3; Pr IO:15-16; 11: 6, a line against which Job protests. Another liie of thought statsfrom the more cantnon experience of life and from the facts denounced bythe prophets: there are wicked, impious rich men who oppress the poor, butthe poor are beloved by God (Dt IO: 18: PI 22: x-23), and his Anointed willdo them jmtice (Is I I : 4). Thus the way was prepared for the spiritual tram-p&ion of vocabulary which begins in Sophonias: ‘Seek Yahweh, all youhumble of the earth’(So z: 3. cf. 3: 12-13). The spirituality ofthe ‘poor’ wudeveloped in the second part of Isaias and the post-exilic Psalter, but by thenthe terms for poverty had lost their sociological associations: neither beforenor after the Exik were the poor a religious patty or a social class.

Besides the free citizens ofIsrael who formed the ‘people of the land’, andtravelling foreigners who could count on the customs of hospitality but werenot protected by law (Dt 15: 3; 33 : ZI), part of the population consisted ofresident foreigners, thcgerim.

Among the ancient Arab nomads, thejnr was the refugee or lone man whocame seeking the protcction of a tribe other than his own.’ In the same waythe fer is essentially a foreigner who lives mote or less permanently in themidst of another comnnmity, where he is accepted and enjoys certain rights.

The word may be used of individuals or groups. Abraham was a zer atHebron (Gn 23: 4), and Moses in Midian (Ex 2: 2.~; 18: 3). A nun ofBe&&-hem went with his family to settle as ager in Moab (Rt I: I). The Israeliteswere gerZm in Egypt (Ex .a.: 20; 23: 9; Dt I O: 19; 23: 8). The people ofBeeroth had taken refuge in Gittayim, where they lived asgcrim (2 S 4: 3).

When the Israelites had settled in Canaan, they considered themselves thelegitimate owners of the land, the ‘people of the land’; the former inhabit-ants, unless they were assimilated by marriage ot reduced to slavery, becamegcrhn, and to these were added immigrants. The ancient texts considered anIsraelite who went to live among another tribe as a ger: .a man of Ephraimwas a ger at Gibeah, where the Benjaminites live (Jg 19: 16).

Levites in general wete in the same class, becaw they had no land of theirawn (Jg 17: 79; 19: I). and the laws for the protection of society classLevites andgerim together (Dt 12: 12: 14: 29; 26: 12).

From the social point of view these resident aliens wets free men, notslaves. but they did not possess fill civic rights, and so differed from Israelitecitizens. They ma.y be compared with the perioikoi of Sparta, the original in-habitants of the Peloponncse, who retained their freedom and could own

I. Cf p. 10.

property. but had no political rights. The g&m of Israel, however, wete inthe beginning less fortunate. Since all landed property was in Israelite hands,thegnim were reduced to hiring out their services (DC 24: 14), as the Levitesdid for their own profession (Jg 17: 8-m). As a rule they were poor, and ategrouped with the poor, the widows and the orphans, all the ‘economicallyweak’ who were recommended to the Israelites’ charity. The fallen fruit, theolives left behind on the tree, the leavings of the grapes, the gleanings afterthe harvest were to be left for them (Lv 19: IO; 23: 22; Dt 24: 19-21, etc.,cf. Jr 7: 6; 22: 3; Ez a: 7; Za 7: IO). Like the rest of the poor, they wereunder the protection of God (Dt IO: 18: Ps 146: 9; MI 3: 5). The Israeliteswere to help them, remembering that they themselves had once beengerim in Egypt (Ex z.2: 20; 23 : 9; Dt 24: 18, x), and for the same teason theywere charged to love these aliens as themselves (Lv 19: 34; Dt ID: 19).

They wete to share in the tithe collected every third yeat’(Dt 14: 29), andin the produce of the Sabbatical year (Lv 25 : 6), and the cities of refuge wereopen to them (Nh 35: IS). In legal actions they were entitled to justice justlike the Israelites (Dt I: 16), but were liable to the same penalties (Lv 20: 2;24: 16,~~). In everyday life there was no battier between&n and Israelites.Somegerim acquired a fortune (Lv 25: 47; cf. Dt 28: 43). and Ezechiel fore-told that in the 1srae1 of the future they would share the land with the citizens(Ez 47: 22).

From the religious point ofview, though Dt 14: 21 says that ager may eata dead carcase, Lv 17: 15 forbids this tog&m as well as to Israelites. Otherwisethey are subject to the same laws of cleanness (Lv 17: S-13; 18: 26; Nb 19:IO). They must observe the sabbath(Ex 20: IO; Dt 5: 14). and fast on the dayofAtonement (Lv 16: 29). They can offersacrif~es (Lv 17: 8; 22: 18; Nb 15:15. 16, zg), and they take part in religious festivals (Dt 16: II, 14). They canEden celebrate the Passover with the Israelites, provided that they arecircumcised (Ex 12: 48-49; cf. Nb 9: 14).

It is noteworthy that nearly all these passages wcte written shortly beforethe Exile: Deuteronomy, Jeremias and the Law ofHoliness in Leviticus. Thusit seems that at the end of the monarchy the number ofgerfm in Judah hadincreased, and provision had to be made for them. There had probably beenan influx of refugees from the former northern kingdom.

The assimilation of theseger!m, akin in race and of the same faith, was easy,and must have helped to hasten the assimilation ofgeriwl of foreign birth. Thispaved the way for the status ofproselytes, and it was by this Greek word thatthe Septuagint translated the Hebrew word ger.

Sometimes the term r&hub OCCUIS alongside that ofger (Gn 23: 4; Lv 25:23, 25; I Ch 29: IS; Ps 39: 13). The r&hab appears also with the wage-earn-ing workmen in Ex 12: 45; Lv 22: IO; 25: 40, with the slaves, the workmenand ‘all those who dwell with you’ in Lv 25 : 6. From these texts it seems thatthestatusofthe rdrhab was like that of thegcr, though not exactly the same. He

76 n: cmn lNlnTunoNs

seems less assimilated, socially and religiously (Ex *z: 45; cf. LV 22: IO), lessfirmly rooted in the land and also less independent: he has no house of hisown, but is some nun’s drhab (Lv 22: IO; 25: 6). It is a later word, appearingmostly in texts edited after the Exile.

Besides the sl.wes, who will be the subject of the next chapter, there werePaid workers, free men who hired themselves for a dcfmite job, for P certaintime, at an agreed wage. Resident or travelling foreigners also hired out theirservices in this way (Ex 12: 45; Lv 22: IO; Dt 24: 141, as Jacob had done withLaban (Gn 29: 15; 30: 28; 31: 7). As time went on, some families grewpoorer and lost their lands, and so an increasing number of Israelites wereobliged to work for wages (cf Dt 24: 14). In early days it was mostly agri-cultural labourers who were hired in this way. They worked as herdsmen(Am 3: IZ.). as harvesters or grapepickers (perhaps Rt 2: 3f.; 2 K 4: 18; cf.Mt 20: If.). They could he hired by the day, like modem ‘day-labourers’(Lv19:13;Dt24:1~;dMt2o:8),orbytheyear(Lv~3:~o,53;1~16:t4;21: 16; Si 37: II).

The Old Testament gives no direct information on the amount of theirwages. In Mesopotamia, workmen were paid either in money or in kind.According to the Code of Hammurabi they were paid one shekel of silver amonth during the season of hard work, and rather less for the rest of the year;but some contracts fixed much smaller sums. The same code presumes thatthe yearly wage will amount to ten shekels or thereabouts, and perhaps thismay explain Jg 17: to and the difficult text ofDt ‘5: 18. Its meaning wouldthen be that a slave who has served for six years has repaid his master doublehis own worth, at the rate of a paid man, since the value of a slave was thirtyshekels (Ex 21: jz). The labourers in the Gospel (Mt 20: z) earn a denarius,which represents much more, but it would be pointless to compare valuesbetween two such distant periods.

The fact remains that the condition of the wage-labourers war far fromenviable (Jb 7: I-Z; 14: 6), and unjust masters did not even give them theirdue(Jr 22: 3; Si 34: a). Yet the law did make some effort to protect them.Lv 19: 13 and Dt 24: 14-15 lay down that workmen must be paid everyevening (ct Mt 20: 8), and the prophets were their champions againstoppression (Jr 22: 13; Ml 3: 5; Si 7: XI).

Apart from lnbourcrs, economic progress and the development of urbanlife multiplied the number of independent craftsmen, Many trades are men-tioned in the Old Testament: millers, bakers, weavers, barbers, potters,

3: THE FREE POPULATION: ITS DlvISlONS 77fullers, locksmiths, jewellers. etc. A more general term, harash, &notes aworker in wood or stone, and especially in metals. i.e. a smith, founder orcarver. They worked on the system of the family workshop, where thefathcr handed on the craft to his son, sometimes assisted by a handful ofworkmen, slaves or paid men.

The craftsmen ofone trade lived and worked together in a certain quarteror street, as they do inEastern towns to-day; again, a village would specializein one industry. Geographical and economic circumstances accounted forthese concentrations, e.g. the presence of the raw material. ore, clay or wool,or ofthe means ofproduction. such as supplies of water or fuel, or good sitesfor ventilating the furnaces, etc. These groupings were also founded ontradition, for the crafts were, as a general rule, hereditary. Thus we learn thattextiles were made at Beth-Ashbea in the south ofJudaea (I Ch 4: x), andthat the Benjaminites worked in wood and metal in the rggions of Lod andOno (Ne I I : 35). Excavations indicate that weaving and dyeing were Aourish-ing industries at Debit, the modern Tell Bcit-Mirsim. At Jerusalem there wasa ‘Bakers’ Street’ (Ne 3: 31-jz), a ‘Fuller’s Field’ (Is 7: 3). a ‘Gate of thePotsherds’ near which the potters worked (~1 19: If.), and a ‘Goldsmiths’Quarter’ (Jr 37: 21). This specialization was carried still further in theGracco-Roman and Rabbinical periods.

These crafumen who worked side by side gradually organized themselvesinto guilds. There is clear evidence of this aiier the Exile, when the craftguilds, following the model of the family system from which they hadsprung, called themselves families or clans, mirhpahorh.1 At Beth-Ashbeathere are mirhpahoth of lien-makers (I Ch 4: 21). The head of the guild iscalled a ‘father’, e.g. Yoab, ‘father’ of the Valley of the Smiths, I Ch 4: 14,and the journeymen are called ‘sons’. Uzziel is a ‘son’ of the goldsmiths (Ne3: s), that is, a journeyman goldsmith, like Malkiyyah of the same corpora-tion (NC 3 : 31). and Hananyah, a perfumer by trade (Ne 3 : 8). In Judaismthese guilds were to be given legal status, and to make rules for the protec-tion of their members. Sometimes they would even have their own places ofworship: there was a weavers’ synagogue in Jerusalem. The influence of theprofessional organizations in the Graeco-Roman world must have hastenedthis development, but the passages quoted, and the older parallels from Meso-potamia, show that these guilds originated long before. Perhaps they maydate back to the monarchical period, if we admit that certain signs oftenengraved on the pottery, arc, if not the owner’s name, trade-marks of acorporation, not of a family workshop. It is difficult to drcidr, but iu anycase, during this pre-exilic period, all important enterprises were in the handsof the king. The foundry at Esyon Gebcr under Solomon, excavated someyears ago, was a state factory. According to I Ch 4: 23, the potters ofNetayim and Gcdarah worked in the royal workshop. It was from these

78 1,: ClYIt. *NETlrtlllONS

workshops that those jars with an o&al stamp came; the stamp waspresumably meant as a guarantee of their capacity.1

The Israelites did not take to cmnmetce until late in their history. Foreigntrade, ot big business, was a royal monopoly. With the help of Hiram ofTyre, Solomon equipped a fleet on the Red Sea (I K 9: x%8; IO: II, a),which was m batter the products of the Esyon Gcber foundry against thegold and wealth of Arabia. A similar enterprise war planned under Josapharbut did not succeed (I K 22: 4~90). Solomon also traded with desert cara-vans (I K to: IS), and tan a forwarding agency; his agems bought horses inCilicia and chariots in Egypt and then x-sold them both (I K IO: d.-zg)-but this interpretation of the text is not certain.

Achab signed a commercial agreement with Benhadad, by which he couldset up bazaars in Damascus, as the Sytian king could in Samatia (I K 20: 34);this is yet another royal concern. This kind of business went on all wet theNear East in ancient times, Solomon’s counterparts were the king of Tyre(I K 5: r3-26; 9: 27; to: x1-14), and the queen of Sheba ( I K I O: 1-13). Andthe tradition was of great antiquity In the third millennium B.C. and againunder ffammurabi, the kings of Mesopotamia owned camvans; in theAmarna period the kings of Babylon, Cyprus and other lands had merchantsin their service; in the eleventh century B .C . the Egyptian story of Wen-Amon tells us that the prince of Tmis had a merchant navy and that the kingof Byblos kept a register of the business he did with the pharaoh.

Private citizens in Israel did business only in their own locality. In thetown or village square, where the market was held (2 K ,: I), craftsmen soldtheir wares, and peasants the produce of their fields and herds. This businesswas on a very small scale and the producer sold ditcct to the consumer with-om any middleman; hence there was no merchant class. Real commerce wasin the hands of foreigners, especially the Phoenicians, who WCIC the universalagents of the East (cf. Is 23 : 2, 8; Ez 27), and (according to Na 3: 16) theAssyrians also. Even after the Exile the Jews brought agricultural products toJerusalem, but the Tyrians sold imported goods thcrc (NC 13: 15-16). Pet-haps the tirsr Israelite merchants we know of in Palcstinc itself ate those whoworked under Nchemias when he was restoring the ramparts (Ne 3: 32); onthe other hand, these too may have been Tyrians, for, according to Ne 13:16. some of them lived in the city.

This state of affairs is reflected in vocabulary; a ‘Canaanite’ meam a‘merchant’inJb4o: 30; Pr 3t: a,; Za 14: 21. Other words describe themer-chant as ‘one who travels around’, or by a root connected with the verb ‘mwalk’. They were foreignus, caravan drivers like the Midianitcs of

1. Cf pp. 116 2nd >a->o,.

G n 37: 28, OE merchants on foot who touted the country, sell ing theitimported rubbish and buying the local products for export.

It was in the Diaspora and by force ofnecessity that the Jews became mer_chants. In Babylonia the descendants of those exiles who did not uke part inthe Return are found as clients or agents of big commercial firms. In Egypt,in the Hellenistic period, we know from the papyri that some were tradersbankers ot broken. The Palestinian Jews gradually followed suit, but th;wise men, and later the Rabbis, were fat from approving of it. Though Ben-Sirach says that the profits of commerce are legitimate (Si 42; 5). he alsoobserves that a merchant cannot live without sin (Si 26: 29; 27: 2).

SLAVES

1. The existence of slavery in Israel

CERTAIN writers. and especially Jewish scholars, have denied thatreal slavery ever existed in Israel: at least, they maintain, Israeliteswere never reduced to slavery. There is a semblance ofjustification

for this view if we compare ~sracl with classical antiquity; in lsrael and theneighbowing countries, there nevc~ existed those enormous gangs of slaveswhich in Greece and ~otne continually threatened the balance ofsocial order.Nor was the Position of the slave ever so low in lsrael and the ancient East asin republican Rome, where Varro could defme a slave as ‘a son of talking

’tool , ‘inshu~rigenur vorak’. The flexibility of the vocabulary may also bedeceptive. Strictly speaking ‘rbed means a slave, a man who is not his ownmaster and is in the power of another. The king, however, had absolutepower, and consequently the word ‘ebed also means the king’s subjects,especially hit mercenaries, offtcen and ministers; by joining his service theyhad broken off their other social bonds. my a fresh extension of meaning, theword became a term of courtesy. We may compare it with the developtnent of its equivalents ‘servant’ in English or ‘setiteur’ in French, bothderived Gom xwus, a slave. Moreover, because a man’s rektions with Godare often conceived on the model of his relations with his earthly sovereign,‘t-bed became a title for pious men, and was applied to Abraham, Moses,Josue or David, and ftnally to the mysterious Servant of Yahweh.

By ‘slave’ in the strict sense we mean a man who is deprived of his free-dom, at least for a time, who is bought and sold, who is the property of amaster, who makes UEC of him as he likes; in this sense there were slaves inIsrael, and some were Israelites. The fact is proved by some eady tern whichspeak of slave in contrast with free men, wage-earners and residentforeigners, or which speak of their purchase for a sum of money; and theexistence of slavery is presupposed also by the laws about emancipation.

2. Slaver offoreign origin

Throughout antiquity, war was one of the chief sources of supply for theslave-market, for captured prisoners were generally sold as slaves. The ctts-tom obtained in Palestine, too. In the days of the Judges, S&a’s army, had it

j:sravEs 81

been victorious, would have shared out the spoil: ‘a damsel, two damsels, toevery warrior’ (Jg 5: JO). After the sack of Siqlag, the Amalekites car&doff all the inhabitants into captivity (I S 30: z-3). Yahweh till judge thenations who ‘have drawn lots for my people; they have traded boys againstharlots; for wine they have sold the maidens’ (J14: 3). In the Hellenistic age,slave-traders followed the armies of Antiochus Epiphates in order to buy theJews whom they would take prisoner (I M 3: 41; 2 M 8: IO-II). Later,Hndrian sold the prisoners taken in the Second Revolt.

AU these are examples of Israelites enslaved by foreign enemies. But theChronicler records that Peqah, king of Israel, in his war against Judah, took~oo,oca prisoners, women, boys and girls, who were set free at the protest ofa prophet (2 Ch 28: S-15). It is uncertain what credence should be given tothis story, which has no parallel in the Books of Kings; the Gsuspect. But it does show that the enslavement ofprisoners ot

we, at least, iswar who were

brothers by race was not unheard of. though the custon, was abhorred byright-thinking men. On the other hand, the presence in Israel of foreignprisoners as slaves is presumed by two laws of Deuteronomy. Dt ZI : IO-I~considers the else of a female prisoner whom her captor t&s as wife: he maylater divorce her, but he may never sell her. This implies that he could havesold her, if he had not married her. The story of Nb 3 I : 26-47, which relatesthe sharing of the spoil after the war with Midian, is a parallel example: thevirgins were shared among the combatants and the whole community, allthe rest having been put to death to carry out the anathema (Nb 31: IS-IS).

The law of Dt M: m-18 deals with the conquest of towns. If a townstands on the land assigned by God to Israel, it is to be totally destroyed andno living thing may be left in it. When P town outside the Holy Land isattacked, it must be given the chance to surrender. If it agrees, the wholepopulation is condemned to forced labour; ifit refuses and is captured, all themen are put to death and the women and children are reckoned as booty. 1”its present form, this law breathes the spirit of Deuteronomy (cf. the parallelin 7: x-6). but it is unreal: the age of territorial conquest and foreign wars waslong past. It reflects the memory of the ancient curses (Jos 6: 17-z; 8: 26;IO: 28f., etc.; I S 15: 3; cf. Dt 2: 34; ,: 6). of the obstacles to total conquest(Jos 17: u-13; Jg I: 28. 30, 33, 35). and ofDavid’s wars (2 S 8: 2; IZ: 31),which provided the State with its first slaves.r

The slave traffic was general throughout the ancient East. In Am I : 6 and9. C&a and Tyre arc condemned for dealing in prisoners. According to Ez27: 13. Tyre bought men in Asia Minor, and J14: 6 says she sold Judaeansthere. These Phoeniciatu, who were the chief traders in Israel, must also havebeen slave-dealers. The law allowed Israelites to buy slaves, men and women,of foreign birth, or born of resident aliens (Lv 25: 44-45: cf. Ex 12: 44; Lv22: II; Qo 3: 7).

I. cc pp. lill-9

82 II: CI”” lNSTlTUTI”NS

Slaves who had bea bought for money arc distinguished from thoseborn in the house (G” 17: IZ,Z~, 27; Lv 22: II; cf. Jr 2: 14): y’lid bayyrh. It ispossible, however, that the expression does not refer only t” those born in thehouse; it may include all those who are attached t” P house as slaves, and whohave cerain obligations t” the master of the house when it is necessary t” takeup arms. This would explain the 3x8 y’lidt bayh, who were the ‘partisans’ ofAbraham (G” 14: r4), md the use ofyolld when referring t” war (Nb 13 : 28;2 S 21: 16,18). A master could buy married slaves, or mamy off those he had;the children belonged t” the master (cf. Ex ZI : 4, and were a cheap additiont” his domestic staff. If they had been brought up in the family, they wouldbe more attached t” it and would be better treated, but they had the samesocial status as those who had bee” bought.

We know for certain that there were slaver of foreign origin; but wereIsraelites ever reduced to slavery? We have just mentioned the text of z Ch28: 8-15, which condemns this practice, and it is forbidden by Lv 25: 46wbicb. after speaking of foreigners, adds: ‘You may have them as slaves, but“one of you shall ever exercise such absolute power “vet your brethren, thechildren of Israel.’ Yet Lv 25: 39-43 speaks of a” Israelite who is ‘sold’ t”vlothet Israelite; he must be treated as a paid worker or a visitor, and not as aslave. On the other hand, Lv 25 : 47-53 deals with the case of an Israelite whohas ‘sold’ himself t” a resident alien: he can be redeemed by his kin a can re-deem himsex, uld must be treated with consideration. Whether their marter isIsraelite or foreign. these slaves are t” be set& in thejubilee year(Lv 25 : 40).

The Israelites, the& could not become slaves permanently ; but thelaw doesallow them to be ‘sold’ as real slaves, though only for a limited time, andunder certain safeguards. It is difficult t” say whether this law was everapplied. I” Nehetis’ time the Jews bewailed the fact that they had had tosell their sons and daughters as slaves, and Nehetis implored the people tocmcel their debts and to free persons who had give” themselves as security(NC 5 : r-13). There is no allusion to the law ofLv 25.

It seems, the”, that this law is later than the time of Nehanias, and eve” ifthis argument Gem silence is not pressed, the law must be late, since it is asubstitute for earlier laws. In Dt 15: 12-18, if a ‘Hebrew’, man “I woman, issold t” one of his brethren, he must serve him for six years and be set free inthe seventh year. If he declines t” be freed, he becomes a slave for life, This isthe law referred t” in Jr 34: 14. concerning the liberation of ‘Hebrew’slavves under Sedccias.

The law ofEx 21: Z-II is much older. A ‘Hebrew’ slave who has bee”‘bought’ is to E.FX sii years and t” be freed in the seventh yea; ifhe refuseshis freedom he becomes a slave fcr life. These provisions arc identical with

, : Sr.A”ES 83those ofDt 15: 12-18, but they apply only t” male slaves. Girls sold as slave,t” become concubines “f their tnzter “t his son, XC not f r e e d , uld theirstatus is similar t” that of female prisonrn of war (Dt 21: 10-14, cf. above).

It is interesting that in the texts quoted from Ex, Dt and Jr, these s&es atecalled ‘Hebrews’, a term which, except in one late text (cf. Jon I: 9), isapplied t” Israelites only in certain conditions. It has been suggested that theword means those Israelites who forfeited their freedom by a semi-voluntaryslavery. The theory can be supported from I S 14: 21, where the Israeliteswho entered the service of the Phihstines are called ‘Hebrews’, and by theanalogy of documents from Nuzu, in which the &iru sell themselves asslaves. The biblical texts would preserve traces of a” archaic usage, but theycertainly refer f” Israelites.

The only ream”” why a” Israelite was ever reduced to slavery was his own,“I his relatives’, poverty. Usually, if not always, they were deh‘ulting debtors.“I persons given as security for the repay”ient of a debt.1 This is presumed inthe laws of Lv 25 and Dt 15: z-3, and confirmed by the other passages.Eliseus performs a miracle to help a wonxm whose tw” children are about tobe taken as slaves by a money-lender (2 K 4: 1-7). In Is 5”: I, Yahweh asksthe Israelites: ‘To which of my creditors have I sold you!’ Nehemins’ contem-poraries sell their sons and daughters into slavery as securities for the paymentof debts (Ne 5: I-S). This explains why such slavery was not permulent;it ended ““ce the debt was paid or cancelled (Lv 25: 48; 2 K 4: 7; Ne 5:8 and II). The Laws of Ex 21 and Dt IS fixed a maximum duration of sixyears. (According to the Code of Hammurabi, certain slaverfordebt couldnot be kept for more than three years.) But these laws were not obeyed, asJr 34 shows. It is because of this dificulty that the ideal law of Lv 25 allowsfor a” extension which may am”unt t” fifty years, but purs the master underthe obligation of treating his slave like a wage+amer or a guest.

There were, then, Israelite slaves under Israelite masters. In addition tothose who had been reduced t” this state by poverty “I debt, there werethieves who could not clear themselves and were sold to repay the cat oftheir theft (Ex 22: 2). 0” the other hand, the laws ofEx 21: 16 and Dt 24: 7prescribe the death penalty for abducting a” Israelite in order to exploit “I

sell him PI a slave. Possibly the prohibition in the Decalogue (Ex 20: 15; Dt5 : IS), which is clearly distinguished from the very detailed commandmentabout crimes against justice (Ex 2”: 17; Dt 5 : 21). condemns this particularlyhateful seizure of a free person.

4. The number and value of s!mer

We have very little information about the number of domestic slaves inIsrael. Gideon took ten ofhis servants to demolish the sanctuary ofBaa (Jg 6:

I. cc p. I?&

84 n: CF.lL INSTI~“TtONS

27). Abigail, wife of the wealthy Nabal, had an unstated number of slaves,and when she went to marry David, she took five maidservants with her(I S 25: 19. 42). After Saul’s death, the property of the royal family wasvalued by Siba, a steward, who had fifteen sons and twenty shves of his own(2 S 9: IO). some large landowners in the days of the monarchy may havebad a comparatively large household, but they were exceptions. The censusof the community on its return from the Exile (Esd z.: 64; Ne 7: 66), records7,337 slaves of both sexes as compared with 42,360 free persons. The situa-tion is therefore utterly different from that in Greece cn Rome, but has itspamllel in Mesopotamia, where a family of substance had one or two slavesin the earliest periods, and from two to fwe in the Net-Babylonian era: inAssyria the figures were a little higher.

Evidence about the value of slaves is equally scanty. Joseph wu sold by hisbrethren for twenty pieces of silver (Gn 37: 28). and that was also the averageprice of a slave in ancient Babylon. It was the same a! the price of an ox.Prices doubled in the Neo-Babylonian age and rose even higher under thePersians. In the middle of the second millennium B.C. the market price of aslave was thirty shekels of silver at Nuzu, forty at Ugarit (Ras Shamra). InIsrael a slave cost thirty shekels according to Ex 21: 12, and this is the sumgiven to Judas to betray Jesus (Mr ~6: 15). But by the Greek period, prices hadrisen: when Nicmor promiwd the traders ninety captives for a talent, that is,about thirty-three shekels a head (2 M 8: II), he was asking an absurdly lowprice, compared with those indicated in contemporary papyri, for he hopedto attract the traders by the prospect of an enormous profit.

-5. T/I~ position ojslaves

Strictly speaking, the slave is a chattel, belonging to his master by tight ofconquest, purchase OI inheritance; the matter makes use of him as he willsand can sell bim again. The ancient laws of Mesopotamia presume that he isbranded, like cattle, with tattoo marks or a brand made with hot iron or bysome kind of label attached to his body. In practice, not all slaves bore thesemarks of identity, but they were commonly applied to runaway slaves whohad been recaptured and to those who might be tempted to run away. TheRabbis allowed P slave to be marked in order to discourage him from run-ning away, but the practice is not clearly attested in the Old Testament. Aslave who declined to be freedhad his ears pierced (Ex 21: 6; Dt 15: 17). butthis was not a brand in&ted on him; it WM a symbol ofhis attachment to thefamily. The nearest analogy to this is the name of Yahweh written on thehands of the faithful in Is 44: 5 to signify that they belong to God. likethe name of the Beast marked on his followers in Ap 13: 16-17, or thetattoo marks of the Hellenistic cults.

Yet in the ancient East no one ever quite forgot that the slave was a human

*j: , : SLAVES 85b&g: slaves had their rights. True, the Code ofHammurabi punished crueltyonly against another man’s slave, because the slave WPE his master’s property;similarly, Ex 31: p states that if a slave is gored by a ncighbour’s bull, theowner of the bull owes compensation to the slave’s master. Still, even inMesopotamia slaves had legal remedy against unjust violence, and in Israel thelaws protected them even more explicitly. A man who blinded his slave orbroke his tooth was bound to set him free in compensation (Ex a: ZLZ~). Ifa man should beat his slave to death, he was to be punished (Ex 21: XI), butif the slave survived for one or two days the master was exonerated, for ‘itwas his money’ (Ex 21: ax). Obviously, they thought that the master hadbeen suff&ntly punished by the loss he had incurred. but this clause showsthat even in Israel the slave was thought ofas his master’s chattel.

In Mesopotamia and in Rome the slave could save mopey of his own.carry on business and have his own slaves. We cannot be sure that this was soin Israel. Lv 25: 49 certainly allows a slave to redeem himself if be has thetneans, but the text does not give any more derail. Other cases are sometimesquoted: the servant who went with Saul had a quarter of a shekel in hispocket (I S 9: 8). Gehazi, servant of El&us, persuaded Naaman to give himtwo talents of silver, with which, Eliscus says, he would be able ‘to buygardens, oliveyards and vineyards, flocks and herds, menserwnts and maid-servants’ (2 K 5: 20-26). Siba, steward to Saul’s family, had twenty slnves(2 S 9: IO). But the master retained supreme control over his slave’s property:2 S 9: IZ states clearly that ‘all who lived with Siba were in the service ofMcribbaal’. But these cases do not afford conclusive proof, for here theHebrew word is not ‘e&e-d, ‘slave’, but na‘ar, ‘young man’. and so‘servant’, ‘assistant’, probably always a free man, attached to a master’sservice.

In everyday life the lot of a slave depended largely on the character of hismaster, but it was usually tolerable. In a community which attached suchimportance to the family, in which work was scarcely conceivable outsidethe framework of the family, a man on his own was without protection ormeans ofsupport. The slave was at least assured of the necessities of life. Morethan that, he really formed part of the family, he was a ‘domestic’ in theoriginal sense of the word. (That was why he had to be circumcised, Gn 17:12-13.) He joined in the family worship, rested on the sabbath (Ex 20: IO;23: IZ), shared in the sacrificial meals (Dt 12: 12, IS), and in the celebrationof religious feasts (Dt 16: II, 14). including the Passover (Ex 12: 44). fromwhich the visitor and the wagesarner were excluded. A priest’s slave couldat the holy offerings (Lv 22: I I), which visitors and wag-mers could not(Lv a.: IO). Abraham’s relations with his servant (Gn 24). show how intim-ate master and slave could be. Pr I,: 2 s.xys: ‘Better a shrewd servant than adegenerate son’ (cf Si IO: 25). He could share in his master’s inheritance (Pr17: z.), and even succeed to it in the absence ofheirs (Gn 15: 3). We know of

86 n: ClvIL INST1TlnKJNS

one slave who married his master’s daughter (I Ch 2: 34-35). In these last twocases, obvionsly, the slave was @sofato emancipated.

The slave had of course to obey and to work, and the wise men ndvisedmasters to meat them harshly (Pr 29: 1% 21). Firmness there had to be,but it was to the master’s interest to combine with it justice and humanity(Si 33: 25-33). Devout men added a religious motive: Job protests that he hasnot neglected the rights of his servant and his handmaid, for, like him, theyare God’s creatnres(Jb 31: 33-v).

Leviticus prescribes that a slave of Israelite birth is to be treated favourably:he is to be like a visitor or a wage-tamer and is nor to be made to do the workof a slave (Lv 25: 39-40). Commenting on this text, the Rabbis laid down lhathe should not be given tasks which wers too exacting or too degrading, liketurning the mill (cf. Jg 16: ZI), or taking offhis master’s shoes or washing hisfeet (cf. 1 S 25: 41). Hence in the New Testament, when John the Baptistprotests that he is not worthy to untie the sandals of the one he announces(Mt 3 : II and parallels), he means he is less than a slave. Peter recoils whenJesus wants to wash his feet (Jn 13 : 6-7), because that is a task only for a slave.

We have already had occasion to note that female slaves formed a specialcategory. They attended to the personal needs of the mistress of the house(Gn 16: I; 30: 3,9; I S 25: 42; Jdt IO: 5. etc.), or nursed the children (Gn 25:59; z S 4: 4; 2 K II: 2). The master arranged their marriages at his discretion(Ex 21: 4). He might take a slave-woman as his concubine, and her lot wasthen improved. Abraham and Jacob, for example, took slaves as concubines,at the request of their childless wives. But they kept their status as slaves(cf. Gn 16: 6) unless their master freed them (cf. Lv 19: 20). The ancientlaw ofEx 21: 7-11 allows an Israelite father who is poor or in debt to sell hisdaughter to be the slave-zoncubine of a master or his son. She is not freed inthe seventh year like the male slaves. If her muter is not satisfied, he may re-sell her to her family, but may not sell her to a stranger. If he takes anotherwife. he must leave intact all the rights of the first. If he intends her to be hisson’s wife, he must treat her as P daughter of the family.

The Denteronomic law makes similar provisions for female prisoners ofwar who are married by their captors (Dt 21: 1*14). But unlike Ex 21, Dtmakes no distinction between men and women in the treatment of Israeliteslaves: the wanan is freed in the seventh year like the man, and like him shecan refw her freedom (Dr IJ: IZ and 17). Similarly Jr 34 makes no distinc-tion between male and female slaves. This seems to mean that by this periodthere were no slave-concubines. The later law of Lv 25 makes no mention ofthem, and NC 3 : 5 spelks of the violation ofIsraelite girls by their master, butdoes not mention their being taken as concubines.

3 : sL*vvEs 87

7. Rsnaway daver

As a rule, the slave’s only way of escaping from his master’s cruelty wasfight (Si 33: 33), and even if he were well treated he might be tempted torun away, if only to enjoy that freedom to which every man has a right.Nabal was a man of wealth and selffihness and must have known somethingabout this: ‘There are too many slaves running away from their mastersnowadays’, he tells David’s messengers (I S 25: IO). Two of Shimei’s slavesfled to Gath (I K 2: 39). It was the same everywhere. The Code of Hammur-nbi prescribes the death penalty for aiding and abetting a runaway slave,refusing to give him up, or merely hiding him. Other Mesopotamian lawswere less strict; at Nuzu anyone who harboured a fugitive slave paid a fme.

To deal with slaves who took refuge abroad, some treaties between statesprovided extradition clauses. Thus Shimei was able to recovtt his two slaveswhofledtorhekingofGarh(~K~:4o,cf.also~S3n:1~).

Israelite law contains only one article on runaway slaves. Dr 23: 16-17 for-bids anyone to hand river a slave who has escaped from his master and soughtrefuge; he is to be welcomed and well treated, in the town he has chosen.This provision has no parallel in ancient law and is difficult to interpret. Itdoes not seem to apply to an Israelite slave deserting an Israelite master. forhe would naturally return to bis family or clan. For the same reason it doesnot apply to an Israelite slave fleeing from a foreign mater. It seems then thatthe law must deal with a foreigner coming from abroad and admitted tohrael as ager or a hkab. Extradition would be refused and all the Holy Landwould be considered a place of refuge, in the spirit of Is 16: 3-4.

The master obviously had the right to free his slave if he so willed, andfurther, certain cares are provided for by law. If a man took a female prisonerofwar as his wife, she ceased to bea slave(Dt 21: IC-14). Liberationcould alsooccur as compensation for a bodily injury (Ex 21: 26-27); note that the un-conditional wording of this text does not allow us to restrict it to Israeliteslaves. But, generally speaking, foreign slaves were bound to slavery for life.and were bequeathed with the rest of the inheritance (Lv 25 : 46).

The enslavement of Israelites, however, was in theory temporary. Maleslaves (according to Ex 21: z-6) and female slaves as well (according toDt 15: 1x7), had to be set free after six years of service. They could refusethis freedom, and no doubt often did so. for fear of falling into poverty oncemore: this, after all, was precisely what had led them to sell themselves. Thepresent which they received from their master (Dt 15: 14) was only a meagreinsurance for the future. They had still more cause to remain if their masterhad given them a wife, for the wife and children remained his property (Ex

88 tt: CIV” niST,T”TIONS

21: 4). ~nsuch acase &slave had his carpierccdagainst thedoorpostar lintel,as a symbol of his final attachment to the house, and he became a slave for life.These laws do not seem to have been strictly observed. According to Jr 34:8-22, which is explicitly based on Deuteronomy, the people of Jerusalem hadliberated their ‘Hebrew’ slaves. during the siege under Nabuchodonosor; butwhen the siege was raised for a while, they seized them again. The prophet de-nounces this as felony against their brethren and transgression of a law of God.

The provisions already quoted from Lv zs ccmcem the liberation ofIsraelite slaves. in connection with the jubilee year.’ In this year both they andtheir children are to go free (Lv z.5: 41. 54). Before this period they can beredeemed or an redeem themselves, counting the years left before thejubileeat the price of P hired man for each year (Lv 1.5 : 48-53). These provisionsseem somewhat Utopian: a shvc who began his term ofservice soon after thebcgimting of a jubilee period might well die before seeing the end of it, orbecome too old to earn his living as a free man. The price of his freedom,unless the jubilee year was very near, would have cost him very dear, forthree ycus’ wage was enough to cover the price of P slave. We saw that aslave was valued at thirty shekels (according to Ex 21: 32). and that a work-man earned about ten shekels a year, according to the Code of Hammurabi,and perhaps Dt 15: 18.zThere is, however, no evidence that the law was’everapplied, either before or after Nehemias, who makes no reference to it whenhe orders P remission of debts, involving the liberation of persons held assewrity(Ne 5: 1-13).

A freed slwe is called hcfihi in the laws ofEx zt and Dt 11. and in Jr 34 (dalso Lv 19: 20; Is 58: 6;Jb 3: 19). The word is never used in any context butthat of the liberation of slaves, except, figuratively, in Jb 39: 5, and in 1 S 17:21 (where it means exemption from taxes and forced labour). The onlypossible translation is, therefore, ‘freed’. But there is nothing in the OldTestament to suggest that these freed persons formed a special class ofsociety.This conclusion could only be derived from non-Biblical analogies: atAU and Nuzu, in the Amama letters and the Ras Slumra texts, in theAssyrian laws and the ktcr Assyrian documents, huprhu denotes a class of thepopulation, midway between the slaves and the landowners. They seem tohave been serfs, farmers and sometimes craftsmen. tn these d&rent socialbackgrounds the same word has many different connotations, and it isunreasonable to apply one or other of these meanings to Israel. where therewere no welldefmed social classes. On his liberation the slave belonged oncemore to the ‘people of the land’.

Prisoners of wax provided the states of the ancient East with the servilemanpower they needed for the sanctuaries and the palace, for public works

I. CT p. ‘75. 1. CF. pp. ‘16 uld %I.

3: SLAVBS0 89

and the big commercial or industrial enterprises which were the monopolyof the king. Though the Old Testament laws deal only with dome?& slaves,it xems that in Israel there were also State slaves.

After the capture of Rabbah, David ‘set the population handling the saw,picks and iron axes, and employed it on the making of bricks, and so he didfor all the towns of the Ammo&es’ (?. S 12: 31). For a long time it wasthought that &is text described a strange massacre of the inhabitants, carriedout with workmen’s tools; but the translation just given makes perfect sense,and there is no need to assume any such massacre. The only question iswhether it mans reduction to slavery for the service of the State, or simplysubjection to forced labour. Under Solomon, the work in the mints of theArabab and the foundry at Esyon Geber, in remote regions and under appal-ling conditions, must have caused fearful mortality, and it required a slavepopulation in the king’s service. It is unthinkable that f&e Israelites couldhave been conscripted for it, at least in any number. The Ophir fleet, whichexpatcd the half-finished products of the factory at Esyon Geber. had‘Solomon’s slaves’ for crews, working alongside the slaves of Hiram of Tyre(I K 9: 27; cf. 2 Ch 8: 18; 9: IO). It is possible that these State slaves offoreignbirth worked also on Solomon’s large buildings (I K 9: IS-~). The text usesthe term mar ‘abed, ‘servile levy’, to signify these labourers, who wererecruited‘from the descendants of the camunites; the addition of ‘servile’may be to distmguish this levy from that to which the lsraelites were sub-jected.l We may question this distinction, by which the redactor tries toexempt the Israelites from a burden (d v. 22) to which they had in fact beensubjected. according to the early documents of I K 5: 27; II : 28. But theimportant point is that he adds (I K 9: 21) that the Canaanites remainedslaves ‘until this day’. In his time, therefore, at the end of the monarchy, therewere State slaves, whose institution was ascribed to Solomon.

Now after the Exile we fmd ‘descendants of the slaves of Solomon’ whohad returned from Babylon and lived in Jerusalem and its suburbs (Esd 2:55-58; NC 7: 57+X0; II: 3). But their connections had changed. They arementioned along with the n’rhfnfm, the ‘given’, and counted with them (Esd2: 43-54; Ne 7: 4656). These ‘given’ lived on mount Ophcl, near theTemple (Ne 3 : 3 I ; I I : 21). They formed the less important personnel of thesaxtuary and were at the service of the Levites (Esd 8: 20). To some extenttheir names betray P foreign origin. Though the term does not appear in pre-exilic texts, there ~1s a similar institution in existence, at least at the end ofthe monarchy: Ez 44: 7-9 reproaches the Israelites for introducing foreignersinto the sanctuary and entrusting part oftheir duties to them. 1t is even likelythat slaves of foreign origin were attached to Israelite sanctuaries from thebeginning, as was the practice in all the temples of the ancient East, of Greeceand of Rome. The editor of the book of Josue was already acquainted with

90 II: CIVK EiSTITUTmNS

Gibeonites who cut wood and carried water in the Temple (Jos 9: 27), sayingthat their fathcrs had been condemned to this task by Josue, for deceivingIsrael (Jos 9: 23). It is such foreigners who are alluded to in Dt 39: 10. Esd 8:20 ascribes the institution ofthe n?hlnlm to David, but. in reaction against thisemployment of foreignen, Nb 3: 9; 8: 19 emphvizes that it is the Leviteswho were ‘given’ to the priests for the service of the sanctuary.

Under the monarchy, then, ar in neighbowing countries, there were twoclasses of State slaves, the king’s slaves and the Temple slaves, both of foreignorigin, and usually prisoners of war or their descendants. After the Exile,with the disappearance of royal institutions, the ‘slaves of Solomon’ weremerged with the ‘given’, and all wece attached to the service of the Temple.

CHAPTER Foul8

T H E I S R A E L I T E C O N C E P T O F T H E S T A T E

I. Imel and Be various Earrem notionr of rhe Sfare

W H E N the Israelites conquered Canaan, the land was dividedinto a host of principalities. Jos 12: 9-24 recwds the defeat ofthirty-one kings by Josue, and this list is not a complete inven-

tory of the towns on the political map of Palestine. Two centuries earlier theAmama letters reflect the same state of affairs and show that Syria too wasdivided into principalities. It was the form the Hyksor domination took inthese regions, but it dates back still further: Egyptian decrees of banishmentwitness to it at the beginning of the second millennium B.C. These politicalunits are confmed to a fortied city with a small surrounding territory. Eachwas ruled bya king, who at the time ofthe Hyksos and in the Amamapcriod,was often of foreign birth, relying on an army drawn from his own peopleand reinforced by mercenaries. Succession to the throne was normally on thedynatic priiciple. The same idea of the State is found in the five Philistineprincipalities on the coast. It is true that these formed a federation (Jos 13 : 3 ;Jg 3: 3; I S 5: 8), but this war true of the four Gibeonite towns also (JOE 9:17). without coundng the apparently ad hoc alliances between the Canaanitekings (Jos 10: 3t; II: I-2).

In conttxt with these pygmy states, there weren’t emoires: the Emtisan~which for centuries counted the petty kings of Palestine and Syria as iu vxs-sals, then d~As!ytia_n, thsNw-Babylonian and the Persian Thesewe&+lyorganizcd~ sfa&Luniting h&&geneous populations across vastterritories won by conquest. National feeling was hardly developed at all.and the army which defended the territory and made the conquests was Pprofessional army embodying mercenary formations. The authority wasmpnarchical and the succession1 in theoty, hereditary.

At the end of the second millennium B.C. some national states made the(rappexance. They bore the names of peoples-Edom, Moab. Amman andAram. They were confined to the territory where the nation lived, and atfirst made no attempt to spread by conquest. The country was defended, notby a professional army, but by the nation in artns. by calling to arms all themenfolk ix time of danger. The government was monarchical. though notnecessatily hereditary. From the list of the first kings ofEdom(Gn 36: 31-39).

92 1,: CNIL MSmLmONS

it appears that the kings owed their power to the fact that they had been eitherchosen or accepted by the nation. If, later on, the dynastic principle wasestablished, the change was no doubt due to a natural evolution or to theinfluence of the great neighbouring states.

According to one Biblical tradition, the Israelites asked for a king in orderto be ‘like the other nations’ ( I S 8: J). But they did not imitate the Canaan-ite principalities whom they had dislodged. Such a conception of the Statenever held sway in Israel.

Attempts were made, but they came to nothing: it was this type of royalrank, with hereditary succession, which Gideon refused (Jg 8 : z.tfY), and theshort-lived kingdom of Abimclek at Shechem was based on non-Israeliteelemenu(Jg 8: 3 I ; 9: tf.). It has recently been maintained that both Jerusalem(2 Jebusite town conquered by David) and Samaria (a new town founded byOmri on land bought by him) had the status of city-states of the Canaanitetype inside the kingdoms ofJudah and Israel, but this condusion seems to gobeyond the texts on which its claims arc based.

Nor were the original Israelites inclined to adopt their ideas on the Statefrom the great Empires witb which they had been in contact, particularlyinEgypt. It was only at the end of David’s reign and under Solomon that anattempt was made to realirc the idea of empire. But its success was short-lived and all that remained were some features of administrative organizationcopied from Egypt.

The notion of the State in Israel is in fact closer to that of the Aramaeankingdoms of Syria and Transjordania. First Israel, then Israel and Judah, were,like them. national kingdoms; like them they bore the names of peoples, andlike them they did not at once accept the dynastic principle. The parallelcould no doubt be pursued further if we knew more about the early historyand organization of these kingdoms. 1t is certainly noteworthy that thesenational states were formed about the same time as Israel, after a semi-nomadic existence. These states emerged as the result of the solidarity of thettibes which eventually settled dawn in a limited territory.

In the first stage of its settlement in Canaan, Israel consisted of a federationof twelve tribes. Parallels to this system are known, and precisely in thoserelated peoples who bad passed through the same stage of social evolution.According to Gn 22 : x-24, Nahor had twelve SON, who gave their names tothe Aramaean tribes. Similarly the sons of Isbmael are ‘twelve chiefs of asmany tribes’ (Gn 25: n-16). Again, there were twelve tribes of Es&sdewendmts established in Tramjordan (Gn 36: 10-14, to which v. IZ addsAmalek).

At Shechcm the twelve Israelite tribes joined in a pact which sealed their

4: THE ISBAPUrP CcNcaPT OP THB STAT.? 93religious unity and establizhed a certain form of national unity between them(JOS 24). This organization has been compared to the amphictyonies in whichGreek cities were grouped around a sanctuary: there they joined in cot,+man worship and their representatives took counsel together. The compari_son is helpful, provided we do not press it too far and tty to find all &features of the Greek amphictyonies in the Israelite federation. The twelvetribes were conscious of the bonds which united them, they shared the samename, and together they formed ‘all Israel’.

They acknowledged one and the same God, Yahweh (Jos 2.4: a,.~, 24).and celebrated his feasts at the same sanctuary, around the Ark, the symbol ofYahweh’s presence in their midst. They shared a cotmnon statute and a com-mon law (Jos 24: 2s) and they assembled to condemnviolations of&is custom-ary ot written law (Jos 14: 26), the ‘infamies’, the ‘thiigs which are not donein Israel’ (Jg 19: 30; 20: 6, IO; cf. 2 S 13: 12). I.

The punishment of the ouuage of Gibeah (Jg 19-20) shows us the tribesacting in concert to chastise a particularly odious crime. Apart fromsuch an extreme case, perhaps they settled disputes and points of law byappealing to a judge whose authority was gencrllly recognized: the listof ‘lesser’ judges (Jg I O: r-5 and 12: 8-15) would be evidence of thisinstitution.’

This may well be true, but the theory that there was a council of tribalrepresentatives is far less probable. The narratives in the Book of Judgespresent the federation of tribes as a body without any organized governmentand lacking real political cohesion. The members formed one people andshared one worship, but they bad no commcm head, and the oldest traditionnever mentions any personality comparable to Moses or Josue. The editorof Judges has divided out the period between chiefs who are supposed tohave reigned successively over all Israel, after liberating it from foreignoppression, but it has long been recognized that this is an artificial present.+don. Their activity did sometimes involve a group of tribes (e.g. Gideon,and especially Deborah and Baraq), but this was quite unuwal. Nothing issaid about their actual functioning as rulers; only their military achievementsare recorded and Gideon expressly refused a permanent authority (Jg 8:22-23). The reign of Abimelck(Jg 9) was an isolated episode which a&ted onlythe Canaanite town of She&m and a few IsracIitc clans.

However much these ‘judges’ differed from each other. they had one traitin common: they were chosen by God for a mission of salvation (Jg 3 : 9. I 5 ;4: 7; 6: 14; 13: 5). and they were endowed with the spirit of Yahweh(Jg 3: 10; 6: 34; II: 29; 13: 25; 14: 6, 19). The 04 authority manifest inIsrael at that time was charismatic. This Is an aspect which it is important tonote, for it wiU reappear Inter.

t. %cbclor,p.LsL

% n: CIWL KwTrrLmONS

1srac1 (2 S 5 : 3). z S 5 : 4-s states clearly that David bad reigned seven yearsand six months over Judah and thirty-three years ‘over all Israel rmd overJudah’. When David named Solomon as his successor. he appointed himchief ‘over Israel and over Judah’ (I K I : 35). Tbc kingdom of David andSolomon had, of comx. a real unity, in the ~nsc that the authority of thesame sovereign was acknowledged everywhere. but it comprised two distinctelements. The list of Solomon’s prefectures, 1 K 4: 7-191, omits the territoryofJudah, which had a separate administration; it is the ‘land’ ofv. 1pb.I Thesame distinction held goad in military matters. when David ordered hiscensus of the people for the general levy, two lists were compiled, one forIsrael, the other for Judah (2 S 24: 1-9). At the siege of Rabbah, 1srae1 andJudah were encamped (2 S I 1: I I). The unity of the regime proceeded fromthe fact that the two states had one and the same sovereign: it wa a UnitedKingdom like England and Scotland before the Act of Union, a DualMonarchy l&e the old Austria-Hungary or, to t&e an example less remotein time and place, a double state like the kingdom of Hamath and La’ash,which is known to us from a Syrian inscription of the eighth century B.C.

Furthermore, the kingdom ofDavid and Solomon wa no longer merely anational kingdom. Though some authors have perhaps exaggerated thepolitical tiuence of those canaanite enclaves which were subjugated byDavid and Solomon, David’s wars of aggression did bring into his kingdomnon-Israelite populations, Philistines. Edomitcs. Ammonites, Moabites andAramacam (2 S 8: r-14) ; sometimes their kings were left to rule as vassals(2 S 8: 2; IO: 19; I K 2: 39). at other times governors were set over them(2 S 8: 6, 14).

The notion ofa national sta.tc gave way to that of an empire, which aspiredto fill the place left vacant by the decline of Egyptian power. Its success washort-lived and its conquests were partly lost by David’s successor (I K p:mf.; II: 14-as), but the idea of empire persisted, at least as an ideal, underSolomon (I K 5: I; 9: IS), who gave it practical expression by large com-mercial enterprises and by the external splendour of Israel’s culture (I K p:~&IO: 29). This evolution involved an administrative development whichwas begunby David (2 S 20: 23-26), and completed by Solomon (I K 4: 1-6and 7-19); it was modelled, it seems, on the Egyptian administntion.~

5. The kingdoms of Israel and Judah

This Dual Monarchy and this attempt at empire lasted only two genera-tions. On Solomon’s death, Israel and Judah parted company, and formedtwo national states, with their cxremal provinces ever diminishing. Butthe notion of the State was rather d&rent in the two kingdoms. IX 1srac1the charismatic aspect of Saul’s period was revived. The throne was promised

4: THE ISI(A=‘I~~ CONCEPI OP THB si-ILTE 97

to the first king, Jeroboam, by a prophet speaking in the name of Yahweh(I K II: 31. 37); later. Jeroboam was acknowledged by the people (I K IZ:20). In the same way Jchu was named as king by Yahweh (I K 19: 16),anointed by a disciple of Elisem (2 K p: If.), and acclaimed by the army(2 K p: 13). God himself made and unmade the kings of Israel ( I K rq: 7f.:r6:1t;21:2of.;2K9:7f.;cf.O~13:11).B~tOsee~oaccusesthepeopleof having made kings without God’s sanction (0s 8: 4). The principleof hereditary succession was never recognized in Israel before Omri,and the dynastic principle was never taken for granted. Omri’s dynastylasted some forty years, Jehu’r a century. thanks to the long reign ofJerobonm II, after which six kings, four of whom were assassinated,succeeded each other in twenty years; and then the kingdom wxs conqueredby Assyrii.

The kingdom of Judah presents a striking contrasts Then the dynasticprinciple was admit;ed from the outset. and sanctioned by divine intcrven-tion: the prophecy of Nathan promised David a house and kingdom whichwould endure for ever (2 S 7: 8-16). God’s choice, which in the days of theJudges, and at intervals in Israel, picked out an individual, here lights cm aparticular family; and once the choice was made, the succession followedhuman rules. There is no dispute round David’s deathbed about the dynasticprinciple, but only of to which of David’s sons is to succeed him, and it isDavid himself, not Yahweh, who names Solomon (I K I: 28-35). Later on,Judah, in ccmtrast to 1srac1, accepts Roboam, Solomon’s son, without dispute(I K 12: I-X). There were palace revolutions in plenty in Judah, but theDavidic line was always maintained, thanks to the loyalty of the ‘people oftheland’. thenation(2 K 11: 13-w; 14: 21; a: 24; 23: 30).

It is probable that if our information about the two kingdoms was fullerand more balanced, other institutional differences would come to light. Onefact at any rate is very clear: Israel and Judah are sometimes allies, sometimesenemies, but they ue always independent of each other, and other nationstreat them as distinct entities. This political dualism, however, does not pre-vent the inhabitants feeling themselves to be one people; they ale brethren(I K 12: 24; cf. 2 Ch ~8: II), they have national traditions in common, andthe Books of Kings, by their synchronized presentation of the history ofJudah and Israel. claim to tell the story of one people. This people is unitedby its religion. Lie a man of God before him, who came from Judah (I K 13 :.of.) Amos the man ofJudah preached at Bethel, in spite of the opposition ofAmasiis, who wanted to send him back to Judah (Am 7: x-13). In theTemple of Jerusalem, worship was offered to ‘Yahweh, the God of Israel’.Political conditions may frequently lead writers to ccmtrast ‘Israel’, i.e. thenorthern kingdom with ‘Judah’; but ‘Israel’ always retained its widerconnotation and Is 8: 14 speaks ofthe ‘two houses ofIsrael’. Thus, all throughthe politica separation of the monarchy, there survived the religious ida of

--

98 I,: CWIL MSlTr”TIONS

the federation of the Twclvc Tribes, and the Prophets looked forward to itsreunion in the future.

6. The post-w&c communify

The fall of Jerusalem marked the end of Israel’s politica institutions.Henceforth Judaea was an integral pat of the successive empires, Neo-Babylonian, Persian and Seleucid. which subjected it to the customary law ofthdr provinces: even when the Hasmonaeans laid claim to the title ofking, they were still vusals. Old customs were maintained, no doubt, at amunicipal level, by the clans, misbpa~odz, and their elders, iqenlm, whorepresented the people before the authorities (Esd 5: g; 6: 7), but there wasno longer any idea of a State. Within the limits of what cultural and religiousautonomy was lefi to them, the Jews formed a religious community, ruled byits own religious law under the government of their priests. It was a thee-cmtic regime, and here again an ancient idea was reaKumed and restated:IsraelhadGodforking(ExIS:IB;Nb23:2I;Jg8:23;1S8:7;Iz:Iz;1Kzz:Ig; Is 6: 5). The idea was often expressed during and after the Exile, in thesecond par? ofIs& (Is 41: zt; 43: ‘5; 44: 6) and in the P&u about theseign of Yahweh (Ps 47; g3 ; q6-w). The kings who had governed Israel wereonly his viceroys (I Ch I,: 14; 28 : 5 ; 2 Ch g: 8). The Chronicler, reviewingthe history of his people, saw in the reign of David the realization of thiskingdom of God on earth (I Ch II-zg), and believed that the Jewish com-munity of the ~etum. that of Zorobabel and Nehemias, approximated tothat ideal (Ne IX 44-47).

Clearly we cannot speak of one Israelite idea of the State. The federation oftbe Twelve Tribes, the kingship of Saul, that of David and Solomon, thekingdoms of Israel and Judah, the post-exilic community, all these are somany different regimes. We may even go further and say that there neverwas any Israelite idea of the State. Neither the federation of the Tribes nor thepost-exilic community were states. Between the two, the monarchy, in itsvarying forms, held its ground for three centuries over the tribes of theNorth, for four and a half over Judah, but it is hard to say how far it pax-tratcd 01 modified the people’s mentality. The post-a&c communityreturned to the pre-monarchical type of life with remarkable ease; thissuggests some continuity of institutions at the level of clan and town. Thismunicipal life is also the only aspect of public life considered by the legisla-tivetexts. Thereis indeedthe ‘law ofthe king’(Dt 17: t4-zo), and the ‘rightsofthe king’in I S 8: 11-18 (cf. IO: zs), but thesein no way resemble politicalcharters. These texts accept the fact of kingship as something tolerated byYahweh (I S 8: 7-9) or ar subordinate to his choice (Dt 17: IS); they warn

4: TIHE ISRAELII% C0NCF.P~ OP THB sr*m 99

against imitating alieu (I S 8: 5: Dt 17: 14). and the evil which kingshipentails(r S 8: I*-18; Dt 17: 16-17). Andtbatisnll.Tostudyroyalinsdtwionswe must glean what occasional information we can from the historicalbooks.

One current of opinion was hostile to the monzrchy. It can be seen in oneof the traditions about the institution of the kingdom (I S 8: I-X; IO: 18-zs), in the omissions in Dt 17: 14-20, in the denunciations of Osee (OS 7:3-7; 8: 4. IO; IO: IS; 13: g-II), and Ezcchiel (Ez 34: I-IO; 43: 7-9). whoallots only a very obscure rirle to the ‘prince’ (he avoids the word ‘king’) inhis programme of future restoration (Ez 45: 76. 17, zzf.). The Deuterono-mic editor of the Books of Kings condemns all the kings of Israel and nearlyall those ofJudah.

On the other hand there is a stream of thought which is favourable to it; itfinds expression in the other tradition on the institution o’f the kingdom(I S g: t-m: 16; II: I-I I, 15) in all the passages glorifying David and hisdynasty, from Nathan’s prophecy onwards (2 S 7: S-16), in the royal psalms(Ps 2; 18; 20; 21, etc.), and in all the texts on the royal Mess&h, which pro-claim that the future Saviour will be a descendant of David, a king after theimage, idealized, of the great king ofIsrael (Is 7: 14; 9: s-6; II: I-S; Jr 23 : 5;Mi 5 : I ; cf. the Messianic adaptation of the royal psalms).

But these two opposite convictions are inspired by the same conception ofpower, one which is fimdamental to Israelite thought, the conception oftheocracy. Israel is Yahweh’s people and has no other master but him. Thatis why from the beginning to the end of its history 1~1x1 remained a religiouscommunity.

It was religion which federated the tribes when they settled in Canaan, asit was to gather the exiles on their return from Babylon. 1t was religionwhich preserved the unity of the nation under the monarchy, in spite of thedivision of the kingdoms. The human rulers of this people are chosen,accepted or tolerated by God, but they remain subordinate to him and theyarejudged by the degree oftbeir fidelity to the indissoluble covenant betweenYahweh and his people. In this view of things the State, which in practicemeans the monarchy, is merely an accessory element; in actual fact 1srae1lived without it for the greater part of its history. All this should warn usagainst the tendency of a certain modem school of thought to attach toomuch importance, in the study of Israel’s religion, to what is called ‘theideology of kingship’.

T H E P E R S O N O F T H E K I N G

THE fact remains that, for a period of several centuries, 1srac1 livedunder a monarchy, ad this is precisely the period when its politicalorganization is best known. Moreover, royal institutions had an

um&iable inauence on some of ~srael’s religious conceptions, though thisinflwncc may have been exaggerated by a recent school of exegesis. Wem”st therefore devote some attention to them. Unfortunately our informa-tion is one-sided; it is m&y about Judah, from which most of ““I docu-mcntr have come, and we have just seen that Israel held another view of theroyal power. Moreover. it is incomplete. because the Biblical writers werenot specially interested in studying imtitutiau. We can of cause make goodthis deficiency by examining the org;mization of the ncighbouring countries,which is sometimes better known; this can be very helpful, but then we runthe risk of attributig to Israel ideas or custooms which were foreign to it.

We have seen that while the dynastic principle was “ever really accepted inthe northern kingdom, it was always observed in J&h. Even in Judah, how-ever, accession to the throne implies a divine choice: a ma” is ‘king by thegrace of God’, not only because God made a c”vc”ant with the dynasty ofDavid, but because his choice was exercised at each accession. Ifthc kingdomdescended to Solomon uld not to his elder brother Ad&as, it was ‘becauseit umc to bim from Yahweh’ (I K 2: 15; d I Ch 28: s), and, as we shallYC, every enthronement meant a renewll of the Davidic covenant and anadoption of the new sovereign by Yahweh. This idea of divine choice isuniversal in the ulde”tEast. It is affirmed in Mesopotamia, eve” when a kingruccecdr his father, as was the ordinary rule, and at all periods, from Gudea,who is ‘the shepherd designed by Ningirsu in his heart’, down to Nabonidus,whom ‘Sin and Ncrgal chore to reign when he was yet in his mother’swomb’, uld Cyrus, of whom a Babylonian document says, ‘Marduk chosehis name for the kingdom over the world.’ With this we nztuIally compareIs 44: 28, ‘1t is I (Yahweh) who say to Cyrus: My shepherd’, and Is 45: I,‘Thus says Yahweh to Cyrus his anointed.’ The idea is carried to cxtremc~ inEgypt. where every king is held to be a so” of Ra. the run-god. I” the

5 : THE PBRScx-4 OP THE KING 101

Aramacan kingdoms of Syria, Z&r, king of Hamath and La’ash, says:‘Ba’al Shamai” called me and stood by me, and Ba’al Shamain has made meking.’ This Z&r was a usurper, but Bar-Rekub, king of Senjirli. was alegitimate heir. yet he said: ‘My master Rekub-el has made me sit on thethrone of my father.’

Thde ynvtic principle does not neccswily involve primogeniture, but thiswas probably the mle among the Hittiter, though not, apparently, in theAramaean kingdoms of Syria. In Egypt and Assyria the father was uswally.thoughnot always, succeeded by his eldest son. The king appointed the hcir-apparent and took him as a partner in the government during his lifetime.Similarly, at Ugarit the king appointed the heir from among his ~011s. I”Israel too, primageniture was a title to the succession, but appointment bythe king was also required (2 ch 21: 3)s for the king was not \.opund to choosehis eldest so”. Though Adonis, the eldest surviving son of David, hoped tobe king (I K 2: 15 and a), and was supported by a whole party (I K I: 5-9;2: n), a rival party supported Solomon (I K I: I O). It lay with David tochoose his s”ccessor (I K I: m,27), uld he chose the younger so”, Solomon(I K I: 17. 30). Joachaz succeeded Josias, although he had an elder brother,who was later placed on the throne by the Pharaoh and given the nameJoiaqim (z K 23: 31 and 36). It is possible that this choice between the somtook place only if the first-born, the normal heir, was dead: with Solomonthis would be Amno”, and with Joachaz it was the Yohanan mentioned inI Ch 3 : 15, of whom nothing is said at the time of the succession. This seemsto have been the astom also in Assyria. But the situation was compliwcdwhen a king had several wives: Roboam preferred Maakah, although shewas not his first wife (compare David and Bathshcba) and he gave Abiyyah,Ma&ah’s eldest son, precedence over his brothers, in the hope that he wouldbe king (2 Ch I I: 21-a).

Solomon was anointed king duri”g the lifetime of his father ( I K I : 32-40).who did not die until some time later (I K 2: I-I O). Similarly Y&amassumed power when his fither O&s became a leper (2 K 13: 5). but WC arenot told that he was at once anointed. These arc the only two cc-regenciesexpressly mentioned in the Bible. though there may have been others notmentioned. Some modern historims list a whole series of them: Josaphat,Ozias and Manassch in Judah, and Jeroboam II in Israel, are all said to havereigned at the same time as their fathers. But these are only hypotheses whosemain purpose is to harmonize the discordant data ofBiblical chronology. Inthe two certain cases, Solomon and Yotham assumed power bcca”se theirfathers were too old or ma ill to rule; the term co-regency is therefore some-what inaccurate, and the situation is not quite the same ar in Egypt orASS@.

Women were excluded from the succession. I” the kingdom of Israel,Jonm succeeded his brother Ochoziar because the latter died without male

,__

IO?. n: cNu. “wrnvTTO?iS

descendants (2 K I : 17; CC 3: I). In Judah, Athaliah seized power on thedeath of her son and reigned for seven years, but her reign was regarded asunlawful and was terminated by a revolution (2 K II).

We possess two iiirly detailed accounts of an enthronement, concerningSolomon (I K I: 32-48) and Joas (2 K II: IZ-20). Both situations are exceptional: Solomon’s accession was the last event in a long intrigue and tookplace in his father’s hfetime, while the accession ofJoas brought to an end theusurpation of A&&h. Though a century and a half passed between thetwo coronations, the two rites are so similar that they must represent thegeneral custotn. at least in Judah. There were two parts to the ceremony, thefirst of which was performed in the sanctuary, and the second in the royalpalace. It included the following: investiture with the insignia (not mentionedfor Solomon), anointing, acclamation, enthronement, homage of the highofficials (not mentioned for Joas). We shall consider these points in order.

(a) The setting: the sanctuary. ~&non was consecrated at Gihon, the springof Jerusalem. Is it because water played a put in the ceremonies, as in therites of purification before the coronation of the Pharaoh? Some authors,inrerpredng PE IIO as a coronation psalm, point to the allusion in v. 7: ‘Hedrinks of the brook by the wayside’, but it is a most flimsy theory. It is muchmore likely that Solomon was consecrated at Gihon because the sanctuary ofthe Ark was there. We are in fact told that when Sadoq came to Gion hetook the horn of oil ‘in the tent’ and anointed Solomon ( I K I: 39): this,then, would be the tent which David had erected for the Ark (2 S 6: 17). andthe ‘tent of Yahweh’ where Joab sought refuge (I K t: 28), and near itwould be the altar at which Ado&s (who was quite near by, at the Fuller’sspring, I K I : g) took refuge on hearing that Solomon had been enthroned inthe palace (I K I: 49-50). Joas was consecrated in the Temple, where, wepresume, the consecration of the other kings of Judah after Solomon took@CC.

According to .z K II: 14. during the ceremony Joas remained ‘standingnear the pillar, as the custom was’. We may compare this with 2 K 23: 3.which shows us Jo&as ‘standing near the pillar’ during the reading of thelaw: the pamllel passage 2 Ch 34: 31 merely says ‘in his place’. Writing ofJw, z Ch 23 : 13 adds the detail that this place was ‘near the entrance’. So wemay connect it with the ‘king’s dais’ (in Greek) and the ‘entrance for theking’, which Achaz took out of the Temple to gratify the king of Assyria(t K 16: 18). This dais is perhaps the one which Solomon erected in themiddle of the court, according to 2 Ch 6 : I 3. This detail is illustrated by twos&e. one from Ras Shamra and one of Egyptian origin, which show the

5: THE PERSON OF THE KING 103

king ( or a worshipper?) standing on a pedestal before an image of the God.We may then ask ourselves whether, in 2 K II: 14; 23: 3 and z. Ch 23: 13.we should not translate ‘on the dais’ instead of ‘near the pillar’. One fact iscertain, that a special place was reserved for the king in the Temple, just asthere was a place for the Pharaoh in the Egyptian temples; the new kingstood in this place during the ceremonies of consecration.

(b) The invesrifure with the insignia. According to 2 K II: 12, the priestYehoyada gave Joas the near and the ‘edttrh. The meaning of nerer is certain:it is the diadem or crown, which is the royal emblem par excellence (2 S I :IO; Jr 13: 18; Ez 21: 30-31; Ps 89: 40; 132: 18). The word ‘edtkh is mored&cult: it means ‘testimony’ or ‘solemn law’, and is usually corrected to&ad&h, ‘bracelets’. And in fact, in 2 S 1: IO, Saul’s diadem and bracelets,which would have been royal insignia, are brought to David. But perhaps inthe sacring rite we ought to keep ‘edtith. We fmd that Ps 89: 20 gives ‘dia-dem’ as a parallel to the ‘covenant’, b’rPh; now b’rfth is sometimes synony-mous with ‘edL;th. Another synonym is h6q, ‘decree’; Ps 2: 6-7 speaks of thesacring of the king and the ‘decree’ of Yahweh. We may compare it withthe ‘protocol’ mentioned by Egyptian enthronement tires, which wassupposed to have been written by the hand of the god: e.g. Thutmoses IIIsays: ‘He has put my diadem on me and established my protocol’, whichwould be a good parallel to 2 K I I : 12. This protocol contained the Pharaoh’scoronation names, the affirmation of his divine sonship and power; it was anact of legitimation. It may be that the new king ofJudah was given a similartestimony affirming his adoption by God and promising him victory overhis enemies, in the manner ofyahweh’s ‘decree’ in Ps 2: 7-9, or recalling thecovenant between Yahweh and the house of David (2 S 7: 8-16; Ps 89: x-38; 132: 1x-12, where the word ‘edl;r/i occurs).

In Egypt it was the bestowal of the cmwns and sceptres of Upper andLower Egypt which made a man Pharaoh. In Assyria, the crown and sceptrewere placed on cushions in front of the god; the priest crowned the kiig andhanded him the sceptre. The Israelite accounts of enthronement do not men-tion a sceptre: it is not an exclusively royal emblem, there is no special namefor it, and when it is carried by the king it seems to signify his executivepower (Ps z: g: IIO: z.) and his functions as judge (Ps 45: 7).

(c) The atminting. The coronation or imposition of the diadem does notappear in Solomon’s wring. as it does in that ofJoas, but the two accountsagree on the essential rite of anointing (I K 1: 39; 2 K 11: 12). It is men-tioned from the beginning of the monarchy, for Saul (I S g: 16; IO: I), forDavid 1s king ofJudah (2 S 2: 4), then as king of Israel (2 S 5: 3), in additionto the special tradition in I S 16: 13. Apart from Solomon and Joas, it recursin the story of Abralom’s usurpation (z S 19: I I); it is recorded of Joachazin the kingdom ofJudah (2 K 23: 30). and ofJehu in Israel (z Kg: 3, 6). Butit is certain that all the kings ofJudah were anointed, and it is probably true

p

*w n: CIVIL MSIrIuIIONS

of all the kings of Israel. The Prophet Samuel anointed Saul (I S IO: I) andDavid (according to the tradition of I S 16: 13). Jehu was anointed by adisciple ofEliscur. A priest anointed Solomon, according to I K I : 39 (thoughv. 34 speaks of Sadoq and Nathan, a print and a prophet) and Joar (2 K I I :12). In the other instmur the texts use a plural verb. but the rite was ob-viously performed by a single officiult, who was a religious pcrsoruge. Therecm be no doubt that alI the kings ofJudah were consecrated in the Templeand anointed by a priest.

Anointing is a religious rite. It is accompanied by a coming of the Spirit:WC would say that it confers a grace. Thus the spirit of God took hold of Saulafter he was anointed (I S IO: IO), uld in the story of David the link betweenthe two is eve” more direct accordiig to I S 16: 13. The king is the AnointedofYahweh(IS~4:7,11;~6:9.~~.16,~3;~S1:~4,16(Saul);zSr9:~~(David); Lm 4: 20 (S&&s); cf. I S 2: IO; 12: 3. 5; 2 S z.2: 51; Ps 18: 51;20: 7; 84: IO; 89: 39, 52; 132: IO). The king, a’consecratcd person, thusshares in the holiness of God; he is inviolable. David refuses to raise a fingeragainst Saul because he is Yahweh’s Anointed (I S 24: 7. II; 26: 9. II, 23),and he executes the man who had dared to lift his hand against the king(2 S I : 14, 16).

The vlointi”g of a king is not, however, a rite peculiar to 1srae1. Y&am’s6ble about the kingship of Abimelek (Jg 9: 8, IS), shows that the rite existedin Cmaan before the establishment of the Israelite monarchy, utd thecomrmnd toElias to eo and anoint Hazael as king ofAram (I K 19: IS), mayindicate that the rite was practised at Damazas, though th& is not borne outeither by the account ofHazael’s accession (2 K 8: 9-13) or by the non-biblicaldocuments. Concerning Canaan, extra-biblical documents do exist, thoughthey arc not all equally convincing. There is a text from Ras Shama whichmay contain a” allusion to the anoindng of Baal as king, but the text ismutilated and its mevling uncertain. One of the Amama letters telh us thatthe kings of Syria and ~&tine were anointed as vassals of the Phxaoh, andul Egyptian b&an vase found in one ofthe royal tombs at Byblos may haveserved for such a” investiture. These facts suggest a” Egyptian practice ratherthm a native cwtmn: we know from other sauces that the high o&ials inEgypt were anointed on appointment to c&e. but the Pharaohs were not.The kin@ in Mesopotamia do not seem to have been anointed: the only textwhich might be quoted is of doubtful value: it is a mutilated passage of theAssyrian royal ritual, which may refer to a”ointi”g. Hittite kings, on theother hand, were anointed with ‘the holy oil of kingship’. and in theirtitles these sovereigns are styled, ‘Tabama, the Anointed, the Great King,etc.’

Was a”cd”ti”g, in Israel, a strictly royal rite? I” I K 19: 15-16 God com-“v&s Elia to go and anoint Hazael, Jehu and El&cur. Hamel was to beking of Syria, Jehu would bc anointed king of Israel by a disciple ofEliseus,

~:l?mpauoNOFmBxING 105

but we hear nothing of the anointing of Eliseus or of any other prophet. Herethe word was demanded by the context and is used metaphorically. I” Is 61:1, ‘anointed’ is used figuratively and signifier the prophet’s consecration toYahweh(cf.Jr. I: S).Thesame figurative are is found inPs 105: 15= 1 Ch 16: 22,where the Pat&& are called ‘anointed’ and ‘prophets’.

Many passages, however, say that priests were aminted, and according toEx 40: IZ-IS, it was this anointing which conferred on them the priesthoodin perpetuity, from generation to generation. These passages all belong to thePriestly tradition. and in them we cm distinguish two parallel series of texts:in one, anointing is reserved tothehighptiest alone (Exw: 4-9; Lv4: 3.5.16:6:13(retliningthesingular),15;8:1z;16:3~),whileinrheotheritisrcccivedby all priests (Ex 28: 41; 30: 30; 40: IZ-15; Lv 7: 35-36; I O: 7; Nb 3: 3).

Everyone admits that all thex texts were edircd after the E&e. Before thisthe historical atld prophetical books “ever mention the a”oi&g of priests,not eve” of the high priest. 1r is therefore possible that, after the disappear-ance of the monarchy, the royal anointing was transferred to the high priestas head of the people, and later extended to all the priests. One shouldnote, however, that, apart from these texts from the Pentateuch, there is nocenain evidence for the anointing of priau before the Hellenistic period.Zz 4: 14, it is tme, speaks of the ‘two IOM of the oil’, who are probablyJosue uld Zorobabd, the spirinul uld temporal heads of the community;but even ifwe grant that this unusual expression refers to a” anointing (whichis a moot point), it is certain that Zorobabel was “ever anointed, uld conse-quently we canma conclude that the high priest Josue was ever anointedeither. There remains the uncertain text of I Ch 29: 22, which mentions a”aminting of Sadoq as priest, along with that of Solomon as king. This textonly tells us how the practice of former times was then pictured (cf. the textsjust quoted from the Pentateuch referring to Aaron), but it is no evidence ofco”temporary practice. On the contrary, the ‘anointed prince’ of Dn 9: 25is probably the high priest Onias III, and the ‘race of anointed priests’ in2 M I : IO is apparently that of the high priests. But the custom of anointingpriests had ceased by the Roman en, uld the Rabbis even thought that ithad “ever been practised throughout the period of the Second Temple.Hence it is hard to say at what period the high priest or the priests in generalwere anointed, thcmgh it is dear that it was not under the monarchy. 1 In thosedays the king was the only Anointed One.

We have stressed somewhat this problem of anointing, because of itsreligious implications. Anointing, 1~ we shall see, made the king a sacredperson and empowered him to pcrform certain religious acts. Further,‘Anointed’ and ‘Messiah’ are synonyms, being respectively the translationand the transliteration ofthe sane Hebrew word, marhiah. The reigning kingis therefore P Messiah, and we shall see that he is also a saviour.

These clemenu were to combine in the expectation ofa future saviour whoI. cc PP. ,5%-,m.

106 n: CIVIL MSTIT”TIONS

would be the Messiah King. But it was only in the last century before Christ,in the apocryphal P&s of Solomon, that this combination became explicitand that the long-promised, long-expected saviour was called the Anointed,the M&ah.

(d) The a&m&n. After the anointing, the new sovereign was acclaimed.The horn or the trumpet was sounded, the people clapped their hands andshouted: ‘Longlivetheking!‘(, K ,: 34, 39:2K I,: 12, ,4;cf.~K9: 13).It is the unx shout which the rebeb must have raised at the banquet ofAdonins (I K I: zj), and which greeted the appointment of Saul at Mispah(I S I O: 24). This was the cry of Hushai when he pretended to go over toAbsalom (2 S 16: 16).

This ac&mation does not mean that the people chose the king, but thatthe people accepted the choice made by Yahweh and made effective by theanointing: the shout of ‘Lang live the king!’ is not P wish, it is an acquies-cence (& ‘Jehu is king’ after the anointing and the sounding of the horn in2 K 9: 13). Men recognize the king’s authority and submit to it. The samemeaning must be given to similar expressions such as the greeting: ‘May thekingliveforever!‘(,K1:3,),orrheoarhsbythelifeoftheking(,S,7:~5; 2 S 14: 19). This oath is sometimes coupled with one by the life ofYahweh (z S I,: I,; 15: 2x), and this double formula makes the king’sauthority parallel to that of God.

(e) The mthrotmmr. After the acdamation all left the sanctuary andentered the palace, where the new king took his seat on the throne (I K I : 46,Solomon; 2 K II: 19, Joas). This action marks the assumption ofpower, and‘to sit on the throne’ becomes a synonym for ‘to begin to reign’ (I K 16: 11;2 K 13 : 13). The same expressions recur in other Eastern cultures and in ourmodem languages. Thus the throne becomes the symbol of royal power(Gn 4,: 40; Ps 45: 7). and is sometimes almost ycrsonified (2 S 14: 9). It issrill called the throne of David, when speaking of his successors the kings ofJudah(,K~:~4,45;Is9:6;Jr,3:,3;,7:~s),romarkthepermanenceoftheDavidic dynasty promised by Nathan’s prophecy, ‘Your throne shall beestablished for ever’ (2 S 7: 16; cf. Ps 89: 3; 132: II-12).

Solomon’s throne of gold and ivory is described in I K IO: 18-20 as oneof the wonders of the world; its back was surmounted by bulls’ heads, twostanding lions served as arm-rests and it war approached by six steps flankedby figurer of lions. The thrones of gods or kings which archaeologists haveunearthed provide analogies which illustrate this description, and there is noneed to look for a cosmic symbolism, as some have done.

As Yahweh was held to be the tme king of Israel,1 the royal throne is called‘the throne of Yahweh’ (I Ch 29: 23), and more explicitly, ‘the throne of thekingship of Yahweh over Israel’ (I Ch 28: 5). This throne of Yahweh hadJustice and Right for its supports (Ps 89: 15; 97: 2). The king’s throne, too,

I. cf. p. 98.

was firmly established onjustice (Pr 16: 12; 25: 5; 29: 14; cf. Ps 72: I-Z), oron right and justice (Is 9: 6).

(f) The homqe. When the king had taken posse&m of his throne, the high&i&Is came to do him homage (I K I: 47). This homage is mentioned onlyin the account of Solomon, b;t ii must have taken pkce at every accession:the ministers made acts of obedience and the new sovereign confirmed themin their offices. Here the Assyrian royal ritual had P picturesque ceremony:the oI&ds laid their insignia before the king, and then ranged themselvesround in any order, without regard for precedence. The king then said: ‘Letevery man rewme his o&e’, and every one resumed his insignia and hisplace in the hierarchy.

3. The coronation name

At the coronation of the Pharaoh his fidl set of titles was prd;laimcd, com-prising five names, of which the last two were the names of accession and ofb&h, each inscribed on a cartouche. In ancient Mesopotamia an old corona-tion text of Umk says that the goddess Ishtar takes away the king’s ‘name oflowliness’ and calls him by his ‘name of lordship’. But the Assyrian royalritual says nothing of a change ofname, and one must not draw too sweepinga conclusion from expressions like those of Asrurbanipal in his inscriptions:‘Assu and Sin have pronounced my name for power.’ This is probably nomore than a way of signifying predestination by God; we may compare aBabylonian text about Cyrus: ‘Marduk has pronounced his name, Cyrus ofAnshan, and has appointed bis name for kingship over the world.’ Conse-quently, it is not proved that the kings of Assyria took a new name at theircoronation. Asarhaddon certainly received a new name when he becameheir-apparent, but this name was hardly ever used in his reign. There remainthree instances which are clearer: Tiglath-Pileser III took the name of Puluwhen he became king of Babylon (cf. the Pul in the Bible, a K 13 : 19; I C h5: 26), Salmanasar v reigned at Babylon under the name of Ululai, andAssurbanipal called himself Kandalanu at Babylon; perhaps they were con-forming to a custom of Lower Mesopotamia. Several Hirtite kings wereknown by two names, but as both names are used in official texts datingfrom their reigns, they cannot be birth and coronation names.

1” Israel, the Messianic titles given to the child, probably the Emmanuel,whose birth is forctold in IS 9: 5. have been compared with the five names ofthe Egyptian protocol: there are in fact four double names, and perhaps thetrace of a fifth. This is very probably a literary imitation of an Egyptian cus-tom, but it does not justify the conclusion that the kings of Israel were given asimilar set of titles at their accession.

On the other hand there are two certain instances of a change of name.Whenthe Pharaoh made Elyaqim king, he gave him the name ofJoiaqim (2 K 23: 34).and Mattmyah, placed on the throne by the king of Babylon, was named

I!

/

108 II: - lrcrmnmm

Sedecias (2 K 24: 17). The two cases are similar in that each time a foreignsuzerain intervenes, whcrcar J&kin came to the throne between these two kingwithout bis suzerain intervening and with no mention of a change of name. Thechange might then be a mark of the bond of varsalage, except that one wouldexpect the Pharaoh to give his vassal an Egyptian name (cf. Gn 41: 45), and theking of Babylon a Babylonian name (cf. Dn 1: 7), whereas the new n.unez ofthese two kings are just as Hebrew and even Yahwist as those they had before.It is therefore possible that the change was an Israelite custom accepted by theforeign master.

If this is so, the kings of Judah-we find nothing similar in Israel-mayhave been given a coronation name or a reigning name, and this conclusionseems to be confirmed by other texts. Besides general expressions like 2 S 7:9; I Ch 17: 8 (literally, ‘I will make you a [great] name’), which have theirequivalents in Egypt, certain facts are sign&ant. To begin with the mostcogent, the son and successor ofJosias is called Joachaz in t K 23: ~O,JI. 34,but Sballum in Jr 22: II, and the list ofJosias’ sons in I Ch 3: IS contains noJoachaz but doa contain a Shallmn. May this not be the bii name, andJoachaz the reigning name? We know that the successor of Am&s is sometimes called Otis and sometimes Azarias in the accounts of I K 14: X--IS :34,buttheprophe~~w~yrullhimO~~(Is~:~;6:~;7:1;0~1:1;AmI : I ; Za 14 : 5). and so does 2 Ch 26, every time, in the accamt of bis reign.Yet he is called Avrias in the genealogy of I Ch 3 : 12. We may thereforeconclude that Azarias was his birth name and Ozias his coronation name.According m 2 S 12: 24-25 the child of David and Bnthsbeba xc&cd thename of Solomon from his mother, but the prophet Nathan called himYedidyah. It is curious that this latter name never appears again: could ithave Lxa his birth name, displaced by his reigning name? A still morehwrdom conjecture is to consider David as the coronation name, in fact aroyal title, of the Iirst king of Israel, whose birth name was Elhanan: thesame Elhanan who slew Goliath according to a S 21: 19. and the same asthat Baalhanau, who, according to Gn 36: 38-39, reigned over Edom aftera certain Saul.

If we have no more or no dearer examples, the reason may bc that thereigning name. the only official one, almost always completdy displacedthe name given at bi, so that it was no longer even remembered. But inevery instance we ue still in the realm ofhypothesis: the most one can say isthat it is probable, though not certain, that the kings of Judah took a newname when they succeeded m the throne.

,. Thz mrhronemcnr psalms

The crowning of the king was accompanied by popular demomtrxiom.Besides the cry of ‘Long live the king!’ there was cheering, and playing on

~:Tm?PensoNoP~ph(G Iog

the Bute and trumpet (I K I: 40; 2 K I I: 13-14). This music and cheeringevidently provided an accompaliment to songs praising the new ruler. a9 insuch demonstrations in the East to-day. some of tl2 ‘royal’ p&Is may havebeen composed and sung in this most solemn of settings, as Ps 45 was corn-posed for a royal wedding. The question concems chiegy Ps 2 and I IO, whichseem to allude to the rites of enthronement.

III Pr 2, in reply to the princes of the earth who have conspired againstYahweh and his Anointed (v. z), Yahweh declares that it is he who has estab-lished his king in Sian (v. 6). The king (or the cantor) then proclaims thedecree, the @q, of Yahweh: on this day of sacring he adopts him as his sonand promixs him dominion over all the land (xv. 7-9). Then the !xings payhomage to him (v. 12). In t&s psalm, then, we find the anointing. the‘decree’ (which is the equivalent of the ‘testimony’ delivered to Joas, + K II :12. and of the ‘covenant’ with the how of David, 2 S 7: S-169. and finallythe homage. The supposed revolt of the vassal kings is understandable at thetime of a change of reign, and has P parallel in the sham fight which was per-formed in Egypt at coronation feasts. The question of adoption will beconsidered 1ater.a

In Ps I IO, Yahweh scab the king on his right hand (v. I). promises him thexeptre of power (v. a). declares that he has begotten him (v. 3. according tothe Greek, the text being corrupt and disputed), and declares bim a priestafter the order of Melchisedech (v. 4); the king slays his enemies, he is‘arbiter of the nations’ (w. g-6). Here again we see the enthronement. theinvestiture, the promises and probably the adoption. The allusion m thepriesthood of Melcbiscdech will be discussed later.3

These two psalms are therefore close akin and would be appropriate m asacring feast. Against &is it may be objected that the New Testament usesthem as Messianic p&u, and that part of the Jewish tradition and allChristian tradition interpret them as such. Some writers point out that thepsalmist could not promise universal empire m the human king of the littlekingdom ofJudah, and that he certainly could not address him a, Yahweh’sson. Yet there is nothing here which goes beyond the expressions of courtedquette, or the ideas the Israelites held about their king. On the firstpoint, there are numerous parallels from other Eastern sources, but we needonlyrec?Uthc’PsalmofDavid’(zS22=PsIB),inwhidlthekingsingsofhis victories over all his enemies in terms very like those of Ps a and I 10, orthe expressions of the royal wedding song in PS 4s. which also allude to thesacring, or the good w&s expressed at the accession of Solomon (I K I : 37and 47). The title of ‘son’ is found in Nathan’s prophecy (2 S 7: 14). wherethe primary reference is to the human king descended from David, as thenext words (w. 14b-15) show. Moreover, the terms of this prophecy areapplied explicitly to Solomon by I Ch 17: 13; 22: IO; 28: 6. The two aspects

1x0 It: CIV”. INSTITuTmNS

of universal dominion and divine adoption are combined in the comtnentatyon this prophecy given in Ps 89: zw8.

other ps&ns, to). may have been sung on this occasion, even though theydid not contain express references to the ceremonies of the day. Ps 72. forexample, ptays that the king may reign in juctice and foretells that he willrule to the ends of the eatth, and PS IOI draws a pomait of the righteousprince.

1t has been maintained that Ps Z,~Z and IIO were at first royal psalms, andwere mod&d after the Exile in a Messianic sense; but it is very hard to saywhat the revisions were. It is mote reasonable m suppose that these psalms,like Natban’s prophecy and other texts referring m royal Messianism, had atwofold meaning from the manent of their composition: every king of theDa&c line is a figure and a shadow of the ideal king of the future. In fact,none of these kings attained tbis ideal, but at the manent of enthronement,at each renewal of the Davidic covenant, the same hope was expressed, in thebelief that one day it would be fulfilled. All these texts, then, are Messianic,for they contain 2 prophecy and a hope of salvation, which an individualchosen by God will bring to fulfdment.

5. The king ax raviour

The king is ipso facro a saviour. It is a common idea among primitivepeoples that the king embodies the good estate of his subjects: the country’sprosperity depends on him, and he ensures the welfare of his people. The ideais camn~n in Eastern countries, ma In Egypt, to cite only two examples,there is a hymn about Senusrer III which reads: ‘He has come m us, he hasbrought the people ofEgypt m life, he has done away with their aElictions.*Another hymn describes the reign of Raises IV in these words:

Those who had fled returned to their twvns, those who had hidden showedthemsd”es again;

&how who had been hungry were fed, those who had been thirsty were givendrink;

those who bad been naked were clad, those who had been ragged were clothedin fine garments;

those who were in prison were set free, those who were in bon& were filledwith joy .

In Mesopotamia, Assurbanipal says: ‘From the mmnent that Assur, Sin.etc., placed me on the throne, Adad made bis rain fall, Ea opened hersprings, the corn grew five cubits high, the harvest of the land has beenabundant.’ Adad-shum-usnr. a priest. wmte to the same king: ‘Shamash andAdad have destined for my lord the king good government, days ofjustice, years of righteousness, abundant rains, powerful floods, good com-

,.

2: THE PERSON OF THE KING III

“lerce ; those who have been ill for many days are cured. The hungry aresatisfied, the starved grow far. .Wamen give birth, and in their joy tell theirchildren: our lord the king has given you life.’

It is not surptisiig, then. to find sit&t developments of thought inIsrael. So we read in Ps 72:

He wiIl judge the lowly unong the people with justice,he will Prove himself a saviour to the cbildrcn of dx Poor,and will crush their oppressors.

He will come down like gentle rain upon grass,like the showers which soften the cattb.

In his days justice shall blarsom forth,and widespread peace, until the moon be no more.

He will set free the poor who call for help.and the lowly, who stand helpless, alone;

he will show mercy to the weak and &e poor.and will save the life of the poor.

Abundance of wheat on the cat&C”cn en the tops of the has!

Abundance l&e Lebanon’s, when its fruit is awaking.and ia tlowcting. like grass wet the earth!

Just as in former times the Judges had been ‘saviows’ (Jg 3: 9, IS), sounder the monatchy the king delivered the nation from its enemies (2 S 19:IO); he was a ‘savior’ (2 K 13 : 5). whom men called to their aid (2 K 6: 26).

6. Divine adoption

Some recent writers go further, and speak of the king’s divine character. ofa divine kingship, ot of a diviniation of the king, in Israel. Here too theyappeal to Eastern parallels, but not all of them ate equally convincing. It iscleat enough that the Pharaoh was considered a god: he is called. withoutqnalification, ‘the god’, or ‘the good god’: he is the son of Ra the creatorgod; during his life he is an incarnation of Homs and after his death he isassimilated to Osiris. This divine character is expressed in the royal titles, inreligious literature, in the rites of coronation and in att, which represents thePharaoh with divine attributes and more than human stature.

In Mesopotamia, it was from time to time acknowledged, in very earlydays, that the king had a divine character. Among the Babylonians andAssytims, however, this is far less appuent. Despite the fiction of divine son-ship and the f&t that a cettain supematutal power was ascribed to him, theking still remained 1 man ammlg men. It was quite a different concept from

114 n: Clvrl lNSnTlmONs

of ccame, be taken in a fact&e sense, that the king ‘had sacrifice offered’,but not all UC capable of this meaning. And other texts in fict exclude it: in2 K 16: IZ-15. A&z goes up to the new altar he has had made, offers the firstsacrifice, and then comman ds the priest to continue the liturgy there; in I K12: 33 it is said thatJeroboam ‘went up to the altar to offer sacrifice’ (cf. 13:rf.). Again, David and Solomon bless the people in the sanctuary (2 S 6: 18;I K 8 : 1.4, which is a rite reserved to the priests by Nb 6: ~~-27 and I Ch 23 :13. Solomon cauecrate~ the middle of the court (I K 8: 64). David wears theloincloth which is the vestment of officiating priests (2 S 6: 14). Neither theprophets nor the hisroric~ books before tlx exile make any protest againstthese intrusions by the king into liturgical worship. It is only after the end ofthe monvchy that they become a stumbling-blcck, and 2 Ch 26: 1620 saysthat Ozias was sack with leprosy because he had dared to bum incense atthe altar, thus usurping a privilege of the sons of Aaron (z Ch 26: 18, cf. Nb1,: 5; 1 Ch 23: 13).

All this evidence callr for a carefully balanced solution. The part played bythe king in the regulation and supervision of worship OI the nomination ofthe clergy does not mean that he ~2s himselfa priest; it docl not exceed theprerogatives which the head of State may have over the State religion. If isquite another thing when he performs actions which are properly sacerdotal.But we must note that the instances where the king’s personal action isbeyond question are all very special or exceptional: the transference of theArk. the dedication of an altar or a sanctuary. the great annual festivals.Ordinarily, the conduct ofworship was left to the priest (2 K 16: I.+ Anoint-ing did not confer on the king a priestly character, since, as we have seen,’priests were not anointed in the days of the monarchy; but it did make hima sacred person, with a special relationship to Yahweh, and in solemn circum-stances he could act as the religious head of the people. But he was not apriest in the strict sense.

But, it may be objected, Ps IIO is a royal psalm, and it calls the king a‘priest’. It has recently been suggested that this verse (Ps I IO: 4) was addressed,nor to the king, but to the priest whom the newly enthroned king (vv. 1-3)was confirming in his functions, and that these words were originallyaddressed to Sadoq, the psalm being composed in David’s reign. It is aninteresting hypothesis, but without foundation. The text can be explaiiedotherwise: it could mean that the king was a priest, but in the only way inwhich an lsraelite king could be: that is, in the way we have described. Hewas a priest in the saame way as Melchisedech, who, it was thought, had beenking and priest in that same Jerusalem where the new king was beiig en-throned. It was the starting-point of the Messianic interpretation to be givento the verse in He 5 : 6.

THE ROYAL HOUSEHOLD

I. The harem

IN a society which tolerated polygamy, the possession of a large haremwas a mark of wealth and power. It was also a luxury which few couldafford, and it became the privilege ofkings. Saul had at leastone concubine

(2 S 3 : 7), and elsewhere there is mention of hi? ‘ wives’ (2 S &: 8). Even whenDavid was reigning only in Hebron, he already had six wives (z S 3: z-s),and in Jerusalem he took more concubiies and wives (2 S 5 : 13 ; cf. 2 S 19: 6),including Bathsheba (2 S II: 27). When he fled from Absalom he left tenconcubines in Jerusalem (z S IS: 16; 16: 21-22; 20: 3). According to 2 Ch 11:21, Roboam had eighteen wives and sixty concubiies. Abiyyah had fourteenwives according to 2 Ch 13 : 21. According to 2 Ch 34: 3 Joxs had at least twowives and so had Josias (cf. 2 K 23 : 3 I, 34.36). Ben&dad called on A&b tosurrender his wives (I K 20: 3-7). and Nabuchodonosor deported Jo&in andhis wives (z K ~4: IS). The same fate befell the wives ofJoram (2 Ch 21:14. 17) and of Sedecias (JC 38: 23). Sennacherib. according to his Annals.accepted the women ofEzechias’ harem as tribute. The ‘king’ in the Song ofSongs lus sixty queens and eighty concubiies (Ct 6: 8). But all these areeclipsed by the fabulous harem of Solomon, who had, according to I K II : 3.seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines. Whatever we may thinkof these la figures, Dt 17: 17 had good cause to warn the king againstpossessing too large a harem.

Things were probably much the same in the small states bordering onIsrael, though we are poorly informed about them. In the Amarna periodwe learn, incidentally, that the king ofByblos had at least two wives, and theking of AIasia (Cyprus) speaks of his ‘wives’. In the eighth and seventhcenturies B.C., however, the Assyrian Annals attribute to the kings of Ascalon,Sidon and Ashdod only one wife each, who may have been the queen con-sort; this would still leave room for other wives and concubines.

We are better informed about the great empires. Among the Hit&es therewas only one queen conscxt, but the king had a harem ofwives (free women)and of slave concubiies also. Similarly, in Assyti, the king had other wivesbesides the queen, the ‘Lady of the Palace’; often they were princesses fromvassal countries. In Egypt the pharaoh had only one ‘great royal spouse’.five persons, no doubt in succession, held this tide in the very long reign of

116 II: CNn. MSmo~S

~amses II. but his one hundred and sixty-two children prove that he did notrestrict himself to his offuial spouses. According to the Amama letten. aPharaoh’s batem was the nearest approach to that attributed to Solomon: theprincess from Mitatmi whom Amenopbis III married arrived with 317 youngmaidens, and the ume Pharaoh ordered from the king of Gezcr forty ‘ bcauri-ful women’ at forty shekels of silver each. The Phvaoh received thirty younggirlo as a present from the king of Mitmni, twenty-one from the king ofJerusalem and twenty or thirty from a Syrian prince.

Foreign women were often introduced into these barems to serve not onlythe king’s pleasures but alro bis policy. Such marriages set the seal on allian-ces, maintained good relations and guaranteed the loyalty of subject cam-tries. We saw that Amenophis III matried a princess of Mitanni: he alsomarried a sister of the king of Babylon. Thutmoses IV before bim hadmarried a daughter of the king of Mitatmi, and after bim Ramses II marrieda daughter of the Hittite king. Another Hittite king gave his daughter toh%vziwza of Miami; Asarbaddon of Assyria gave his to a Scytbian king.A daughter of the king of Amurru bcume queen at Ugarit, and such uses. .could be multiplied.

In the same way, David married Ma&h, daughter of the Aramaean kingof Geshur (2 S 3: 3). Solomon became the Pharaoh’s son-in-law (I K 3: I).and ifhc took wives from among the Moabites, the Ammonim, the Edom-ita, the Sidonims and the Hittiter (I K 11: I, cf. 14: 21). bis motive was tostrengthen the bonds with bis allies and tributaries. The marriage of Achabwith Jnabel, daughter of the king ofTyre (I K 16: 31). was arranged by hisfather otnri. in order to strengthen his alliance with the Phomiciam.

From some passages it appears that the king’s harem. at least in the earlydays of the monarchy, used m par m his successor. In 2 S 12: 8, Nathan saysthat it was Yahweh himself who, by establishing David as king of Israel, hadgiven him the wives of his master Saul. Absalom publicly approached theconcubines whom David had left in Jerusalem: it was a way of arrertinpthat he was now king (2 S 16: ZI-2.2). for possession of the harem was a titleto the tbmne. Ishbaal’s anger against Abner, who bad taken one of Saul’sconcubiia (2 S 3 : 7-8), is easy to explain if she had passed by inheritance toIshbaal, for Abner’s action would imply that he was disputing the power withhim. Adonias desired to have Abiiag, who had belonged to David’s harem(althcugh, according to I K I : 4. he bad not had carnal knowledge ofher) andbad entered Solomon’s harem. But when Ad&as persuaded Solomon’snether to present his request m the king, Solomon answered: ‘Ask me Mgive bim the kingdom, tea! ’ (I K 2: 13-u). No evidence has yet been foundof any such custmn among ~srael’s immediate neighbours, but we may notethat it existed among the Persians: Hercdotus (III, 68) records that the f&eSmerdis had usurped both Cambysn’ throne and all his wives. Among theancient Arabs, wives formed part of the inbetitancc. a$ the cwtan was not

6: TRB POYA‘ HOUSBHOLD II?

abolished at one stroke by the Koran’s prohibition. In lsrael, too, the voice ofreligion was raised in protest against tbio incestuous practice: Reuben lost hispm-eminence beaux he had taken his father’s concubine (Gn 35: 22; 49:3-4). and the laws of Lv 18: 8; Dt 23: I; 27: w were meant for the kingas well as the rest of the people; only he did not always observe them (cf.Ezzz: IO).

Among the ladies of the harem, one held the king’s preference. This wasevidently the privilege of Bathsbeba under David, of Jezebel under A&b,of A&&b under Joram, and it is explicitly stated of Maakh that Robonm‘loved her mite than all his other wives and concubines’ (2 Ch II: 21). Butthe king’s favvour was not enough to give this wife official title and rank. It isremarkable &at the Old Testament only once uses the word ‘queen’, thefeminine of m&k, ‘King’. in connection with Israel, and th+,t is in a poeticalpassage and in the plural, to describe the ‘qucem’ of the ‘King’ in the Songof Songs, as distinct from bir concubines (Ct 6: 8). Elsewhere the singular isused of foreign queens: the queen of Sheba (I K IO), the queen of Persia (Estp&m, especially Est 2: 17: the king preferred Esther before all tbc otherwomen-cf. 2 Ch II: x--land chose her as queen’-nothing similar in2 Ch II) .

On the other band, at the court of Judah, official rank was accorded m thegbfrah. In ordinary speech the word means ‘misness’ as opposed to setvant,and corresponds to ‘a&n, ‘lord’, the fe minine ofwbich is not used in Hebrew(a K 3: 3; Is 24: 2; Ps 123: 2; Pr 30: 33). In I K II: 19 it is applied to thePharaoh’~ wife and consort, but it is never used of the wife of a king ofJudah; under Asa, the gbfmh is his grandmother Maakh (I K 15: 13;2 Ch 15: 16). The g’bfrohm carried into captivity in Jr 29: 2 is the king’smother, according to the parallel in 2 K 24: 13. The sons of thegbirah men-tioned in 2 K 10: 13 along with the sons of the king must be distinct fromthem: they are the mm of the queen-mother (and therefore the king’sbrothers). In Jr 13: 18 the king and the g’birah are Jo&i and bis mother.Etymology and usage suggest that the title should ‘be rendered as GreatLady.

This title implied a certain dignity and special powers. Bathshebn was ccr-tainly gbtrah under Solomon; he recciva her with great honour and scabher on his right hand (I K 2: 19). The paver of the Great Lady did not prc-teed merely from the influence of a motbcr over her son. as with Bnthsbeba;it war much mme extensive, and for abusing it, Ma&ah was deprived by Auof her dignity of Great Lady (I K 15: 13). Tbb authority of the queen-mother explains how Ad-&ah could so easily seize power on the death ofOchozias (2 K II : If.) ; the queen-mother had an official position in the king-dom, and hence the Books of Kings always mention the name of the king’s

118 11: CIvn MnTnJTIONS

mother in the introduction to each reign in Jnti-except in the cases ofJoram and Achaz, where no woman is named, and of Asa, where his grand-mother’s name takes the place of his mother’s. If is possible that the GreatLady was accorded her rank on the accession of her son, which wouldexplain the career of Ha&al, wife of J&as, who was queen-mother underJoachaz, was set aside under Joiaqim and J&kin, and returned underSedecias, the brother ofJoachv (2 K 23: 31. 36; 24: 8, 18). It is also possiblethat the mother becatneg’biroh 1s soon a her son was designated heir to thethrone, as ir suggested by 2 Ch I I : ~I-~~. The story of Bathsheba does notenable us to decide this point, since Solomon’s sacring took place immediatelyafter his nomination; but it does at least prove that before this nominationSolomon’s mother had not the dignity which she subsequently enjoyed (cf.I K I: 15-16, 31 and 2: 13-19). Bathsheba was the first Great Lady in Israel.On the other hand it seems that the Great Lady could keep her position afterher son’s death: Maakah, wife ofRoboam, was stillfbbah under her grand-son Asa, after the short reign of her son Abiyyam (I K 15: 13). From thesame passage we see drat thegbbah could be dismissed by the king: Ma&hhad favouted the cult of Ashetah.

Hittite parallels may help to elucidate this rather complicated question. Thetovannana was the lawful queen, the mother of the heir-apparent, and playedan important part in policy and religion. If she survived the king she retainedthe same position during the reign of her son (or sons, if two brotherssucceeded to the throne): and only on her death did the dignity pass to herdaughter-in-law, the wife of the reigning king. Lie Ma&ah, she could bedismissed for a serious offence against the king ot the state; but, as in Judah,this seems to have been exceptional. The queen-mother must have held asimilar position in Ugarit, where several off&l letters are addressed to theking’s mother, also called the ‘odath, which is the feminine of’addn, and there-fore the equivalent of g’bbah. The Akkadian texts of Ras Shamra indicatethat this queen-mother intervened in political &its, and they also mentiona Great Lady ofAmurtu. For Assyria the evidence is less clear, but we shouldremember the part played by the queens Sammuramat and Naqi’a duringthe reigns of their husbands and then of their sons. This tradition is preservedin the Greek legends of Semiramis and Nitokris. One may also point to theinfluence of Adad-guppi’, the mother of Nabonidns.

There is no direct evidence of the existence of a Great Lady in the northernkingdom. In the introductions to the reigns of Israel, the name of the king’smother is never given. 2 K IO: 13 mentions agbirah who can only be Jezebel.but the word is put in the mouth of the ptiices of Judah. The institution,moreover, presupposes a dynastic stability which was not usually found in thekingdom of Israel. But we must draw attention to a tare term, which is pet-haps the Israelitic equivalent of the gblrah ofJudah. In Ps 45: IO, the shegal ismentioned as standing on the tight hand of the king; she is not classed with

6: TIIB R0Y.u. HO”SEHOL” 119the other women of the harem, for she is the queen consort. Now Ps 45 hasbeen interpreted as a wedding-hymn composed for a king of Israel: it is alsovery tempting to restore the word shegal at the end ofJg 5: 30 in the Hymnof Deborah, in place of the impoaiblc rlurlal, ‘booty’. The word is parallelto Sisera, and would denote the queen ot queen-mother, cf. v. 28. Onceagain. the Hymn of Deborah is a composition of northern ~sracl. The onlyother examples of the term in the Old Testament, Ne 2: 6 (the queen ofPersia) and Dn 5: 2, 3.23 (the Aratnaic plural form: the wives of Bahhazar)do not prove that the word was an ofiicial term in Judah before the Exile.

Our only information cm the position of the king’s daug$ers comes fromthe story of Tamar, the daughter of David. From this we may conclude thatthe ptincesses lived’ in the palace until their marriage, under the care ofwomen (2 S 13: 7). They wore a distinctive dress (2 S 13: IS-19), probably along-sleeved robe like that given by Jacob to his favoutite son Joseph (Gn 37:3, 23, 32). Their father would give them in marriage to his senior o&err(I K 4: II, IS) ot to friendly kings (2 K 8: 18).

The king’s sons were brought up in the palace by nurses (2 K II : z), thenentrusted to tutors chosen from the leading men of the city (2 K IO: I, 6f.;cf. I Ch 27: 32). We are told that Achab had seventy sons. The figure is nodoubt symbolic of a large family (cf. Jg 8 : 30; 9: 2, 5). but this parallel showsthat we must take ‘sons’ in the literal sense and not interpret it as descendantsin general ot as more distant relatives. We know besides that Achab had aharem (I K 20: 2, 5.7), which may have been a large one. In the same way,in the story of Absalom and Amnon, the ‘king’s sons’ are certainly the sons ofDavid (2 S 13 : 23-38). Again, .x K IO: I 3 speaks of&e sons of the king and thesons of the Great Lady; there is no good reason to interpret these terms 2shonorific titles instead of takiig them in the sttict sense. When they hadgrown up and, no doubt, married young. the king’s sons led an independentlife and were provided for by their father (2 Ch 21: 3 ; d Ez 46: 16). Atnnonresided outside the palace (2 S I 3 : 5), and Absalom had his own house (2 S I 3 :20; 14: 24) herds and lands (z S 13: 23; 14: 30). But even when they wereadults these sons were still subject to the authority of their father the king(2 s *3: 27).

Apart from the heir-apparent, who had special prerogatives (2 Ch II : a),the king’s sons could perform certain duties at the coutt (2 S 8: 18; I Ch 18:17). The expression hen hammelek, ‘son of the king’, is, however, used severaltimes in contexts which seem to imply that it does not mean a son in theproper sense. In I K 22: z&27=2 Ch 18: 25-26, the ‘king’s son’ Yoash isnamed after the governor of the city, and both are ordered to put theprophet Michcas in prison. In Jr 36: 26, the ‘king’s son’ Yerahmeel, and two

I20 n: CIVIC lNS?lNnONS

other men are commanded to s&c Ban& and Jeremias. In Jr 38: 6, Jcremivis thrown into the cistern of the ‘king’s son’ Malkiyyahu. In 2 ch 28: 7 the‘king’s son’ Maaseyabu is killed along with two of the king’s o@icers. Noneof these men appear elsewhere as a member of the royal family. It seemstherefore that in these four instances the title ‘king’s son’ denotes an office.This conclusion is perhaps confirmed by two discoveries in Palestine, one ofa seal, the other of a stamp from a signet-ring: both have a proper name,followed by ‘king’s son’ in the place where other seals mention theirowner’s oflice. These o@i&ls were not of very high rank; Yoarh is namedafter the governor of the city and in three instances out of four their inter-vention is connected with prisoners. Probably, therefore, the hen hnmmekkwas a police o&r. The explanation may be that this o&z was perhapschosen originally from among the king’s sons.

A parallel from Egypt may be noted: ‘royal son of Kush’ is the title of theviceroy of Ethiopia, who was never 1 descendant of the Pharaoh, except per-haps for the first holder of that title, who would have been a grandson of thefounder of the Eighteenth Dynasty.

The royal family was surrounded by a court of ofIicials and household ser-vantc (I K 10: 4-5). All, whatever their offioe, were called the king’s ‘ser-vanh’,fromthesoldicrroftheguard(~Kt:33;~S~~:9,13;~o:6),tothehighest oficials (I K 11: 26; 2 K 19: 5: 22: 12; 2 Ch 34: 20; and for foreigncoortscf,zK5:6;zj:8;zCh32:9).

The question has been raised whether the expression ‘king’s servant’. ‘ebedhmmelek, when used in the singular. may not sometimes denote a specialoEice. For example the ‘rbed hamdek Asayah is named together with thesecretary Shnphan (2 K 22: IZ= 2 ch 34: 20). Further. we possess a number ofxals bearing a proper mme followed by ‘ebed hammchk or by ‘ebed with thename of a king. Seals of the same type, but of Phoenician, Ammonite, Edom-ire and perhaps Philistine origin, have also been discovered. Now it is truethat the title stands in the place where an o&e is usually mentioned, but thisdoes not prove that it denotes a particular o&e. As a matter of fact the titleis given to Nebozaradan (z K 25: 8) who at the same time is called the com-mander of Nabuchodonoror’s guard. Finally, the number of seals whichhave survived would be surprisingly large. ifall their wearers had occupiedthe same office. We should rather conclude that it was a general title, borneby several o&ials who used their seals to stamp offGal documents. Thecorresponding Assyrian expression also covered different functions.

At the time of the capture of Jerusalem in 587 B.C., the Chaldaeans tookprisoner five men ‘who saw the king’s face’ (z K 25: 19; in the parallel of

‘;.

,:,

‘,L’,

6: TAB 110ya ROOSB~OLD I21

Jr 32: ZJ there are seven). This is sometimea amslated as ‘coomellon’, andin fact in Est I: 14. the same words denote the seven members of the royalcouncil of Persia. In itself, however, the expression has a general sense: itmeans chose who ?.re admitted to the king’s presence (15 2 S 14: 24,28,32),just as the expression ‘to go to see the face ofYahweh’, means ‘to go to theTemple’ (Dt 31: II; Ps 42: 3). The term then includes the king’s personalservants, and also his friends and courtiers, all who ‘stand before the king’(I S 16: xf.; Jr jz: n; d the angels in Mt 18: IO). The expression is foundin Assyrian with the same vague meaning. The king would natorally seekadvice from his courtiers (I K 12: 6; cf. the heavenly court in I K 22: xgf.;Jb I: 6f; 2: of.). The formal d&of ‘coumellor’, yB’erwas given toAhitophe1under David (t S 13: 12; d 1~: 31 and its sequel) and to David’s uncle inI Ch 27: 32-33. The title is found under Am&as also (2 Ch 23: 16).

I S 8: r~ m&ions, along with the king’s servants, the i&m. They arenamed among the men of rank in Jr 34: 19, and among the men of war, thewomen uld the children in Jr 41: 16. A srm^r is sent by A&b to the prophetMicheas hem Yimlah (I K 22: 9= 2 Ch 18: 8) ; another is charged with restor-ing her goods to the Shununite (2 K 8: 6). Two or three rarfslm join in throw-ing Jezebel down from the window (2 K g: 32). The a&m of Joiakin arcsent into captivity (2 K 24: 12, 15: Jr zg: 2). The sa& Nathan-Melck had aroom in the Temple (2 K 23: II). At the capture ofJerusalem a sar& was incommand of the men ofwar (2 K z.5: rg; Jr 52: 2s). It is wally translated by‘eunuch’, and it certainly has this sense in other passages (Is 56: 3-s; Si 30: 20,uldpcrhapsin~K~o:~X=Is39:7,probablyinErt~uld~,parrim,uldDn~,passim). But it is more than doubtful whether this sense holds good in thetexts quoted earlier, where the sar?sEm figure simply as officials or courtiers.Outside Israel, the Bible uses this word to denote the captain of the guard,the chief cupbearer and the chief baker of the Pharaoh (Gn 37: 36; 39: I;40: 2); it mentions the chiefsaf?rEm of Sennacherib (2 K 18: 17 omitted in theparallel of Is 36: z), and of Nabuchodonosor (Jr 39: 3, 13). both of whomtook part in military expeditions.

The word itself is borrowed from Auyrian: it is transcribed sha-rrshi, ‘heat the head’, simply a dignitary, a courtier, who goes before the king, one ofhis confidential advisers. For certain tasks, such as the supervision of theharem or the royal children, eunuchs were chosen, and the word acquiredthis meaning, as several cuneiform inscriptions show. This evolution inmeaning also cxphins all the Bibliul uses. The word passed into Egyptian ata late date, in the form nr, to signi@ Persian 05icials.

The king maintained male and female singers to entertain himself and thecourt. David, who was called to play the harp before Saul, is rather an exceptional figure anyway (I S 16: 14-23; 18: IO: 19: 9), but Bare&i says he is tooold to accept David’s invitation to cotnc and listen to the male and femalesingers at the palace (2 S 19: 36). The memory of Solomon’s musicians k

,,,...

preserved in Qo 2: 8. Sennachcrib mentions in his Annals the singers, maleand female, ofEzechias, who wete givco to him in tribute.

Thcsc singers, men and wotneo, used co enliven banquets. It was a signalmark of favoor to be admitted to the royal table ‘as one of the king’s sons’(2 S 9: 7. 13: 19: 19. 34; cf. Lk 22: 30). Solomon’s table was renowned for itslavish service and the high quality of its menu (I K 10: 5), though the abun-dant victuals which [cached it (I K 5: z-3,7) supplied not only the king’s owntable but all the inmntcs of the palace and the king’s pcnsioncrs, like thedescendants of Barzillai (I K 2: 7), and (later) the hundreds of prophets who‘ate at Jczabel’s table’ (I K 18: 1% cf. Daniel and his companions, Dn I : 5-15.and the table of Nehemias, Nc 5: 17-18). The great monarchies of the Easthad o&i& in charge of the king’s table, cupbearers, bakers and carvers, justas the French monarchy had its q&err de bosrke. The old Testament speaksof the Pharaoh’s chief cupbearer and chief baker (Gn 40: of.) and Senna-chcrib’s chief cupbearer (2 K 18: 171.; Is 36: af. where the context shows thatsuch titles could be honorary and associated with other duties, as is abun-dantlyconftrmcd by Assyrian documents). Nchemias, on the other hand, whowas cupbearer to the king of Persia, did serve at the king’s table (NC I : I I :2: I). The small courts of Israel and Judah may have had similar o&es, butthey arc not mentioned in the Bible; in I K to: 5=2 Ch 9: 4, the wordusually translated ‘cupbearers’ really means a ‘drinking service’.

The king, who had military duties and often went to war himself, had asquire. At first, hc was called the king’s ‘armour-heater’: this WOE David’stitle when he was attached to Saul (I S 16: zt), and another of Saul’s squirestook part in the battle of Gilboa (I S 3r : 4-6). Abimclek, king of Shechcm,had his squire (Jg 9: 54). and the senior offtcers of coutsc had theirs (I S 14:6f; 2 S 23: 37). When Solomon began to use chariots, the squire was calledthe s/&/r, literally the ‘third man’. The Hittitc, ~sraclitc and Assyrianchariots wctc in fact mounted by three men, the driver, the fighting man andthe d&h, who carried the buckler and the weapons. (He was called inAssyrian the shnlrh~r.) In Ex 14: 7; 15: 4> the word is cxtcndcd to the Egyptianarmy, whose chariots carried only two mtn. Every Irraclitc chatiorecr hadhis slrnllsh, but the king’s squire was an important personage, his orderlyofficer or aide-de-camp; he was the man ‘on whose arm the king leaned’(2 K 7: z.. 17. 19; cf. 2 K 5: 18). WC hear ofJehu’s squire (2 K 9: 25), andPcqahyah’s, that Peqah who assassinated his master and reigned in his stead(2 K 15: 2s). The word is twice employed in the plural, and in both texts theking’s guards are mentioned too (I K 9: 22; 2 K IO: 25). The name and theo&e disappeared when there were no more chariots, i.e., at the fall ofSamaria in the northern kingdom, and after Scnnacherib’s invasion in thekingdom of Judah.

Under David, Hushai is called the king’s ‘friend’ (2 S 15: 37, also in v. 31,according to the Greek; 16: 16). The name has bca taken as the name of

6: THE ROYAL Ho”sBHoLD 123

an o&x by I Ch 27: 33. which includes Hushai among David’s principaloff&ls, and in fact the list of Solomon’s officials also includes a ‘friend’ ( I K4: 5). This word re‘eh is generally explained as a different form of r/a, ‘com-panion’, which is the word used in I Ch. 27: 33. But the two words may beunconnected, and re’eh may be a word borrowed from abroad. In theAmama letters the king of Jerusalem proclaims himself the rubi of thePharaoh. Now there is an Egyptian title rb nw.f, the man ‘known by theking’, a title ofnobility given to men whom the Pharaoh wished to honow.The Hebrew word may be a transcription ofthis, via the Canaanite language.If so, a S 16: 16 is making a play on the words: Hushai is the re‘eh, the mm‘known by’ David, and Absalom asks him why he has not departed with hisre‘a his ‘friend’. The title carried with it no special function and it is notfound after Solomon. Possibly it was replaced by a translation of thisEgyptian expression; this would explain the ‘known’ or familiar men ofAchab’s court, the m’yudda’im (2 K 10: II). The equivalent nltldrl is by thenfound at Ugarit.

David had a corps of foreign mercenaries, the Kcrethites and the Pelc-t&es, recruited in Phil&a and the neighbowing regions. They were undera separate command Gem the army raised in ~sracl (2 S 8: 18= I Ch 18: x7;2 S 20: 23). The part played by these mercenary troops in war (cf. 2 S 20: 7)will be examined in connection with military institutions, but they alsoformed the king’s bodyguard. They accompanied David on his Aight fromAbsalom (2 S 15: IS), and formed the escort to Solomon on the day of hissacring (I K 1: 38, 44). They are those Lscwants ofMy Lord’ (2 S zo: 6; I KI : 33). who lodged at the palace gate (2 S I I : 9, 13). They are never againmentioned after Solomon’s accession, but other foreign mercenaries, the&rites, were in the service of the Palace at the time of the revolt againstAthaliah (2 K I I: 4, 19).

On this occasion the &rites ate mentioned along with the n&r, the‘runners’. The latter furnished the exortplatoon which ran before the king’schariot. Absalom, and later Ado&s, in their attempts to seize the throne,provided thcmsclvcs with a chariot-team and fifty runners (z S 15 : I ; I K I :5), for this was part of royal ceremonial. The runners appear in the reign ofSaul (I S 22: 17). where the context implies that they wcrc recruited fromthe Israelites. We learn from I K 14: 27-28=2 Ch 12: IO-II, that theirguardroom stood at the entrance to the Palace, and that they kept there thebronze bucklers worn when they accompanied the king to the Temple.There were six hundred of these: they had replaced the golden bucklerswhich Solomon made and which he had stored in the Gallery of the ForestofLebanon (I K IO: 16-17). This suggests that this gallery was the guardroom

12.5 11: Q”lL LNsI*uTIoNs

name of Eli&m, na‘ar of the king. As the title does not appear in the textswhich mention the highest o&ials of the realm, it may perhaps have beenreserved for the steward of the estate.

This information may perhps be completed by reference to somearchaeological discoveries. Some seventy inscribed potshcrds have been un-earthed in the ruins of the royal palace at Emaria: they are delivery notes forwine or oil. with the name of the receiver and the deliverer, and ofvn anindication of the place of origin. They are administrative receipts datingfrom the reign ofJeroboam II. It is very likely that they concern the admini-stration of the royal estates near the capital: similar documents have beenfound in Egypt. It is much less likely that the Judaean jars which are stampedon the handles with lammelek, ‘to the king’, arc connected with the mmage-ment of the ertate: obviously they could have been used for the d&cry ofrevenue, but it is simpler and less hazardous to explain the stamp on them as ahall-mark of the royal workshop. 1

T H E P R I N C I P A L O F F I C I A L S O F T H E K I N G

THE king was assisted in the administration of the kingdom by a num-ber of high-ranking o&c& who lived close by and formed his govcm-ment; they were his ministers. They are called the king’s ‘servants’,

but in relation to the people they are ‘chiefs’, iariml (I K 4: I); they arereferred to by their office, or by the title ‘set over’ such and such a charge. Aswith other Eastern courts, their functions are sometimes d&cult to define,and the Bible does not give a complete picture of this central administration.

I. The ministers of David and Solomon

We possess two lists of David’s senior o&als and one of %&nods. Theyare certainly derived from documents preserved in archives, but they havebeen m-edited and their text has suffered to some extent.

The fusr list (z S 8: 1618=1 Ch 18: 14-17) is given after Nathan’sprophecy and the oummary of David’s victories, and before the long storyabout the succession to the throne. Consequently, it represents the final anddefinitive arrangement after the foundation of the kingdom. The militarycommand was shared between Joab. commander of the army, and Benayahu,commander ofthe guard. Yehoshaphatwu herald, Serayab(or Shawshain Ch)was secretary. Sadoq andEbyathar were the priests, but at the end of the listis added: ‘the sons of David were priests’. The order as we have it seemshaphazard: commander of the army, heralds, priests, commander of theguard and fmally the sons of David. Joab and Benayahu. Sadoq and Ebyathar,all figure in the same &ices in the history of the reign. Neither Yehoshaphatthe herald nor the sons of David play any part in it.

The mention of the latter is strange: their names, which one would thinkessential in a document of this kind, are not given, and their status as ‘priests’is enigmatic. The most we can presume is that they assisted or did duty fortheir father in those sacerdotal functions which were occasionally performedby t&king.* The parallel in I Ch 18: 17 has: ‘and the sons ofDavid held thefirst rank next to the king’, which is proof of a Levite’s scruple, but it doesnot clarify matters. The text about the two legitimate priests is doubtful. TheHebrew reading is ‘Sadoq son of Ahitub and Ahimclek son ‘of Ebyathar’;this must be corrected at least to ‘and Ebyathat son of Ahimelek’, according

128 u: cnu LNSnItrrtONs

to the Syriw (I S 22: M and z S 20: 23). Perhaps we should even restore‘S&q and Ebyathat son of Ahimelek son of Ahitub’, according to 2 S .zt:20; this would make Sadoq a newcomer, without Israelite ancestry. Thesequadons will be dealt with in connection with the history of the priesthood.~Hue it is enough to note that the religious leaders are included among theroyal 05ca.

The rccond Davidic list (2 S M: 234). which has no parallel in Cbron-ides, is given at the very end of David’s reign. The same names are herevrangcd in a more logical order: commander of the army, commander ofthe guard, herald, sccrctaty (here c&d Shcya or Shcwa). and the prints. Butbefore the herald it adds Adoram, the officer in charge of forced I&our; andat the very end, instead of the SON of David who were ‘priests’, it gives Irathe Yairitc, ‘priest ofDavid’. This repetition of a list of high officiab is easilyexplained after the rcmm of Joab to the post from which he had been diimissed (z S 19: ‘4; aa: zz), and after the suppression of the revolt of Sheba(a S 20: t-a); but it is not so easy to account for its new features. It is doubt-ful whether Adoram, who was still in 05cc after Solomon’s death (I K 12:18). could already have been in charge of forced labour under David, for thisport dots not seem to have been instituted until tbc reign of Solomon (I K 5 :27; 9: IS). The mention ofa ‘priat ofDavid’&ngwith Sadoq andEbyatharir puzzling. According to one reading of the Greek. this In the Yairitc mightbe a doublet ofIn the Yattitite, who is one ofDavid’i warriors, according to2 S 23 : 38. It is not impossible &at this list prcscntz a ttuc account oftbc stateof administration at the end of David’s reign; it is also possible that thepassage is a subrcqucnt compilation.

The list for Solomon’s reign (I K 4: t-6) raises some d&cult problems ofliterary and textual criticism, to which no satisfactory solution has yet beenfound. Examin ation of cxtemal witnuscs and the weight of internal evidencewould suggest suppressing v. 4 on Benay&, Sadcq and Ebyathar, and add-ing to v. 6 the mention of l&b, non ofJab. as army commander. It wouldthen read as follows (with the proper names often uncertain): the priestAzaryahu, son of S&q; the secretaries Elihoreph or Elihaph and Ahiyyab,who are sons of Sbisba, cvidcntly David’s sccrctary; Yehoshaphat the herald;the chief prefect Avryahu or Adoniyahu, son of Nathan; the king’s friend,Zabud or Zakkur. another ran of Nathan (to whom a gloss has added thetitle of ‘pticst’); the master of the palace, Ahishar or Abhiyah (or ‘hisbrother’?), with no mention of his f&her’s nunc; the army commander.Eliab, son of Joab; the chief over the levy, Ado&am or Adoram, son ofA&.

The continuity with the Davidic administration is evident. Solomoncmploys the sane herald as his father, the son of one of his priests, both thesom of his secretary, the son of his army commander and at last two sons of

’ a PP. 172-171.

,: T’AE PRMClDdL OFmCL4LS OF mm KING 129

the prophet Nathan, who had been an adviser of David and bad favoured theaccession of Solomon. On the whole, it rcprcscnts a new generation comingto power; this proves that the list does not date from the beginning of Solo-mon’s reign. This is confirmed by the appearance of new posts: there is achief prefect, a fact which presumes the existence of the organization dcs-cribed in I K 4: 7-19. and an officer in charge of forced labour, the inttoduc-tion of which is recorded in I K J : 27 (with the reservation noted above aboutthe second Davidic list).

It is noteworthy, too, that some of these high officials. or their fathers,have non-Israelite names, names which have puzzled the copyists or thetranslators: Adoram has a Phoenician name. like his father Abda. The namesof Shisha or Shawsa (I Ch 18: 16) and his son Eliiorcph or Elihaph may beEgyptian or Hurrite. In f&t it was to be expected that thf, young Israelitekingdom should recruit some ofia 05cialr from the neighbowing countries,which had an administrative tradition. Even for its organization it had to copymodels abroad. Study of some officer suggesu the tiuence of Egyptianinstitutions, but it does not cnable us to decide whether this intluence wudirect, or whether it came indirectly to 1srac1 from the Canaanite states whichIsrael displaced. Direct inAucncc seems the more likely, for the kingdom ofDavid and Solomon was far bigger than any of the little city-states of Canaan.

The king’s ‘friend’ is rather an honorary title, probably Egyptian inorigin’; he is perhaps an intruder in this list of officials. The r&s of armycommander and commander of the guard will be studied under militaryinstitutions~. The offtcer in charge of the prefects, and the officer in charge offorced labour will be discussed in connection with the setvices they dirccteds;in any case they do not appear after Solomon. There remain three ministerswhose functions continued until the end of the monarchy and who arc againmentioned together in an important crisis, Sennachctib’s invasion in 701 (cf.2 K 18: 18): they are the master of the p&e, the secretary and the herald.There three deserve to be studied on their own.

2. The mmter of rhe palace

In Solomon’s list, Abisbar is ‘a& ‘al habbayrh, the mxster ofthe palace. Thesame tide is given to Arra, who had a house at Tirsah under El& king ofIsrael (I K 16: 9); to Obadyahu, who was minister under A&b (I K 18: 3);to Yotham, when he succeeded his sick father, the king Ozins (2 K I 5 : 5) ; andto Shebna, who was master of the palace under Ezechias (Is 2.z: IS), and latersucceeded by Elyaqim (Is a: 19-m); it was this Elyaqim who held the dis-cussion with Sennacherib’s envoy under the walls ofJerusalem (a K 18: t8=Is 36: 3). Outside the Bible. the title appears in the inxription of a tomb inSiloam (the name is incomplete: could it be the tomb of Shebna? ct Is 22:

I. cf. pp. 111-11,. 2. CT pp. 1x-~X. 1, cf. pp. 11, 4 ,+a.

130 n: Crvll. ,Nwrr”TmNS

x6), and on a seal-impression in the name of Godolias, doubtless the manwhom Nabuchodonosor installed as governor of Judah after the capture ofJerwalem (2 K 25: 22; Jr 40: 7). He would formerly have been master of thepalace under Sededas, the last king of Judah. It has recently been suggestedthat the post was hereditary, and that Godohas was a descend&t ofElyaqim,who was master of the palace under Ezechias; but there is no su&ientevidence for this suggestion in the texts. In the vocabulary of Chronicles,the equivalent is perhaps the n’gtd kabbayfk. the chief of the palace, a title givenby A&z to a certain Azriqam (z Ch 28: 7).

The exact semantic equivalent in Assyrian and Babylonian is rka pdn 8kolliand in Egyp!ian mr pr. They were high officials, but their authority seems tohave been restricted to the administration of the royal palace: rhey were theking’s stewards or majordomos. In lsrael the powen oE the master of thepalace were far more extensive and the similarity between his functions andthose of the Egyptian vizier is even more important than the verbal resem-blances. This vizier used to report every morning to the Pharaoh and receivebis instructions. He saw to the opening of the ‘gates of the royal house’, thatis, of the various offices of the palace, and then the official day began. All theaffairs of the land passed through his hands, all important documents re-ceived his seal, all the o&&Is were under his orders. He really governed inthe Pharaoh’s name and acted for him in his absence. This is obviously thedignity which Joseph exercised, according to Genesis. He had no one abovehim except the pharaoh, and he was appointed over the whole land ofEgypt;he held the royal seal (Gn 41: 4~4, and to describe his dignity the Biblesays that the Pharaoh ‘put him in charge ofhis house’: he made him, in fact,his master ofthe palace (Gn 41: 40; 45: 8).

The master of the palace had similar functions at the court of Judah.Announcing the promotion ofElyaqim, Is 22: 22 says

I lay the key of the how of Davidupon his shoulder;

If he opens, none will shut;If he shuts, none will open.

The Egyptian vizier’s instructions are described in a very similar fashion.Every morning ‘the vi&r will send someone to open the gates of the king’shouse, to admit those who have to enter, and to send out those who have togo out’. One is reminded of our Lord’s words to Peter, the Vi&r of theKingdom of Heaven (Mt 16: 19). Like the Egyptian vizier, the master of thepalace was the highest official in the state: his name comes first in the list of1 K 18: 18; he alone appears with the kingin I Kr8: 3; and Yothambears thistitle when he acts as regent of the kingdom (2 K I 5 : 5). as the vi& did in theabsence of the Pharaoh.

It seems, however. that the master of the palace only gradually came to be

7: THE PmcI**L ORICIALS 05 THE KlNG 131the first minister, and perhaps in the early days of the monarchy he was onlythe steward ofthe palace and of the royal estate.1 This would account for histitle and for the fact that he is not named among David’s senior o~%al.s, anddoes not head the list ofsolomon’s civil servants. Under David and Solomonthe secretary and the king’s herald were the immediate teprew~tativa ofthe king: there was no place for a vi&r.

In Is 22: IS Shebna, the master of the palace, ia called the soken. This wordis found in the form zrrkinu in two Canaanite glows of the Amarna letters, todenote the Pharaoh’s commissary. In Akkadian, rhaknu denotes first the pre-fect of Assur (sknkh n&i), then the governors of the conquered countries; andthe term was adopted by the Pharaohs in their Akkadian correspondence. AtRar Shamra, however, the rkn (in alphabetical script) or the slwkln m&i (inAkkadian) was an o&id at Ugarit, apparently the highest in the land; thiscorresponds to the position held in Judah by Shebna, soken a!id master of thepalace.

We have seen that the list of David’s high officials included a secretary,whose two sons held the same o&e under Solomon. An edict ofJoar, kingofJudah, entrusted to the royal secretary the duty ofcollecting the contribu-tions given for the repair of the Temple (2 K 12: I I ; cf. 2 Ch 2.4: II). and itwas while performing this duty a century later thar Shaphan the secretarylearned of the discovery of the Book of the Law (z. K 22: 3. S-IO, 12; 2 Ch34: 15. 18,zo). Shebna the secretary was one ofthe three ministers who heldthe discussion with Sennacherib’s envoy (2 K 18: 18, 37; 19: 2; Is 36: 3. II,22). We know the names of the last secretaries under the monarchy: we havejust said that Shaphan held the post in 622; he was succeeded by Elishama in604 (Jr 36: 12, zo), and in 588 the secretary was Yehonathan (Jr 37: 15.20).

This official, an indispensable link in the chain of power from the time ofDavid, was both the king’s private secretary and secretary of state. He wasres omible for all correspondence, internal and external, and for the Templeco1pechons (2 K IZ : I I) ; he played a considerable part in public n&s. Heranked below the master of the palace (Shebna, who held the latter port,Is 22: 15. was demoted to that of secretary, Is 36: 3. etc.), but he comesLnmediatelyahcrthemasterofthepalaceinzK18:18f;Is36:3E.andthefate of the kingdom hung on the mission they performed together. Shaphanthe secretary brought to the king the Book of the Law discovered in theTemple, read it to him and went to consult Huldah the prophetess for him;this was the beginning of the religious reformation (2 K 23). The senioro&i& held a conference in the house of Elishama the secretary, and thereprophecies of Jeremias were read to them (Jr 36: 11-20). The ‘secretary’sroom’ where they met (Jr 36: 12, 20, 21) was evidently his o&e. the state

132 1,: CIVIL INSllTuTIONO

chancery. During the siege of Jaw&m the home of Yehonathm. thesecretary, became a public prison (Jr 37: IS).

In Egypt, under the New Empire, the title ‘royal scribe’ occurs frequently,bath cm its own and in combination with other functions. There were in-numerable clerks, but above them certain royal scribes bad functions of thehighest importance and were involved in all affairs of state. The ‘scribe of theroyal documents’ was one of the four holders of the seal during the XIIIthDynasty; the ‘royal scribe’, together with the vizierandtheherald, conductedthe enquiry into the pillage of the tombs in the time of Ramxs IX. The saneofficial transcribed the great edict of Horemhcb at the dictation of thePharaoh hi-If. There can hardly be any doubt that the Israelite post was acopy, on a reduced scale, of that which existed at the Egyptian court.

During the reigns of David and Solomon, Yehoshaphat was ma&r and thepost continued until the end of the monarchy, since we know of Yeah, the,,wzkbofEzechias, zK 18: 18,37;Is36: 3,tI,zz; andofanotherYo& maz-kir to Josias. according to 2 Ch 34: 8. He was not the king’s annalist or archi-vist, ar it is often translated. From the meaning of the root, and its causative(Hiphil) form, the mnrkk is the mm who calls, names, reminds, reports. Theexact equivalent is found in the Egyptian scheme of titles: the whm.w is ‘hewho repeats, calls, announces’, i.e., the Pharaoh’s herald. He was in charge ofthe palace ceremonies and introduced people to audiences, but his duties farsurp.wed those of a modern Lord Chamberlain. He reported to the king onwhat concerned the people and the country, but also passed on to the peoplethe commands of their sovereign. He was the Pharaoh’s o&iaI spokesman.When the Pharaoh went abroad, he accompanied him, watched over hisperson. and prepared quarters for each sage of the journey.

In Israel too the herald was a very high o&al. The mission which receivedSennacherib’s envoy, himself a high raking oficial, consisted only of themaster of the palace, the secretary and the king’s herald (2 K 18: 18). It isremarkable that in the very serious matter of the violation of the royal tombsunder Ranues IX, the three corresponding Egyptian officials, the tier, theroyal scribe and the herald, are named in the same order as alone presidingover the enquiry. This parallelism confmns the connections we have noted,and underlines the Egyptian b&exe in the organization of the kingdom ofJudah.

__

cnmn3P. Emn

T H E A D M I N I S T R A T I O N O F T H E K I N G D O M

I. The kingdom ojDavid

E know nothing about the administration of the kingdom underDavid apart from the fact already noted,’ that Jsmel and Judahremained distinct entities. It is true that I Ch 26: w-32 names

some Levires engaged in secular affairs under David, as civil servants orjudges, and attributes to this king the establishment of a police force, alsocomposed of Levites, who supervised all the affairs of Yahweh and the kingon both sides of the Jordan; but what these statements mean, or from whatperiod they date, cannot be decided.

It is alro true that I Ch 27: 1622 names the chiefs who commanded thetribes under David, but this list is obviously artificial. It follows the order ofthe sons ofJacob as given in I Ch 2: I-Z, it retains Simeon and Levi (not tomention Reuben) which under David were no longer ~ntonomo~s tribes; itthen divides Joseph into three (Ephraim and the two halves of Manasseh) andomits the last two names on the list, Gad and Aser, so as not to exceed thenumber of twelve. It is still probable, however, that in the strictly ~sraelitcterritory David retained the tribal organization as he found it established, andas we fmd it described, with only slight variations, in Gn 49 and Dt 33.Beyond these frontiers the subject lands were laid under tribute and adminis-tered by governors (1 S 8: 6, 14). or else left under their vassal kings (2 S 8: 3;10: 19).

Y,. The administration under Solomon

h contrast to this, a most important document has survived from thereign of Solomon. It is a list of twelve prefects,nis?abEm, with the descriptionof the lands they governed (I K 4: 7-19). Five of them are named only bytheir patronymic. ‘son of X’, and it has been suggested that the redactor hadbefore him an old document from the archives, the edge of which watdamaged: this would account for the absence of certain personal names. Onth th h d, the administrative lists of Ugarit show that this designationb~p~tr~y~c alone was the rule for certain families, which served the kingfrom father to son. The twelve prefectures are given in the folkving order:

134 II: CIVIL INSnTUTlONS

1. The h&-country of Ephrim, probably including part of the territory ofMuurseh.

II. The farmer countrv of the Dutitcs. auemented bv the districts annexedfrom the Cvlaaniter and Philbtina.

III. The plain of Sharon, from Philistia in the south to the next district on thenorth.

IV. The prefecture of Dor, continuing from the plain of Sharon and boundedon the east by the ridge of Cannel.

V. The fortnet Canaanite territories in the plain of Erdraelon and the regionof Be&n.

VI. On the other ride of the Jordan, with &moth-G&ad as its capital, whatwas formerly Euarn Manusch, and what remained of David’s AramaeanW”qUestL

VII. In Tramjordan, the prefecture of Mahanaim. lying to the south of the lnrt-named territory.

VIII, The territory of Nephthali, to the north of the Lake of Tiberias.IX. The territory of Arer. lying between Nephthali and the Phoenician

pouersians along the coast.X. The territory of lssachar, to the south of the Aser and Nrphthali prcfcc-

tureS.

XI. The tertitoryofBmjamin.XII. The territcw of Gad if&wine the Gtcek text. instead of Gilcad) on the”

other side of the Jordan.

This list dates f&m the second half of Solomon’s reign, as two of the prc-fects are the king’s sons-in-law. The order followed is not always geogtaphi-Cal, but follows a logical arrangement: the house ofjoseph (I), to which arcattached the former Canaanite territories (II, III, IV, V), then the conquest*in Tramjordan (VI, VII), the Northern tribes (VIII, IX, X), and finallyBenjamin (XI) and Gad, facing it on the other side of the Jordan (XII),According to 1 K 4: 7; 5: 7-9, each of the twelve districts supplied on amonthly rota the provisions needed by the Palace (by which is meant tbcwhole staff in the king’s service) and the forage for the horses and draughtanin& The whole system was under the central control of an c&et whoheld nutbotity over the prefects, Azatyabu son of Nathan, who was a mem-ber of Solomon’s ministerial cabinet (I K 4: 5). Mesopotamian documentsprovide evidence of a vaguely similar organization in the Net-Babylonianperiod, and Herodotus (I, 192) states that under Cyrus the victualling of thecoutt and the army was allotted to the provinces according to the month ofzieay four months being imposed on Babylonia because of its exceptional

The avowed object of the Israelite system was to ensure the raising of therevenue. The r& of the prefects was of course wider than that: they werethe governors of their districts, which represented the administrative divi-sions of the kingdom. But one must remember that in Eastern monarchies,

8: THE ADMINISmRATKJN OF THE KINGDOM 13.5

both ancient and modem, the essential task of the adtninisttaton, apart fromthe maintenance of otdet, is the collection of the taxes and tither. It will benoticed that six of the prefectura ate described by the names of tribes.Evidently Solomon did not try to destroy the administrative units whichexisted before him; in fact he preserved them when he could, but he had tointegrate the Canaanite enclaves conquered by David into the old tribalterritories, or group them with each other. He also had to ensure a mea~teof equality between the districts, since they bad to take funs in providing theneeds of the state for a month at a time. 1n point of fact WC do not know howthe system worked in practice, and it is doubtful whether the small district ofBenjamin, for example, was obliged to provide as much as the whole ofEphtaim.

It is still mote surprising that Judah does not figure in this st. Some exe-getes, in fact, have been so surprised that theyhavemodified ie textinotderto bring Judah in. None the less, Judah is implicitly mentioned: it is ‘the land’which, according to I K 4: rgb, had a governor of its own (in the same way,in Assyrian, nzatw, ‘the land’, meam the central province of the empire). Butthis mention comes after the end of the list of the twelve prefectures; Judah,then, was not incorporated in this system. It would be rash to conclude that itwas exempted from all taxation, but one must at least admit that it had anadministration of its own. Perhaps the reason why the organization ofJudahis not described is that Solomon did not modify it, because he had no newterritories to integrate in this region. But this difference of tteattnenl empha-sizer the dualist nature of Solomon’s monarchy.1

We do not know how Solomon administered his external possessions. Theallusions to the tribute of the vassal kingdoms (I K 5 : I), and to what was paidin by the ‘pa&s ofthe land’ (I K IO: Ijb), occur in glosser added to the text,and in any case give us no details. As fat as he could, Solomon must havepreserved the organizations created by his father, in the regions which hesucceeded in retaining (I K a: IC-14; II: 14-25).

we have just said that nothing is known about the organization of Judahunder Solomon, but we are perhaps better informed on the situation after theschism. In Jos 15 : 21-6~ (excepting vv. 45-47. which arc later insertions) thetcis a list of the towns of Judah, farming eleven groups introduced by geegraphical titles.

A list ofthe towns ofBenjamin (Jos 18: 21-28) maker a twelfth group; thislist ha been separated from the previous list to furnish nanes of towns in theterritory of Benjamin, whose boundaries, like those of the other tribes, aredescribed in accordance with a ptemonarchicaI document. It is less certain

1. Cf p. 54

136 II: CIVIL MSnnnlONs

that WC should include in tbb list the groups of towns of Simeon (Jos 19:z-s), and of Dan (Jos 19: 4x-46), which have been inserted here accidmtzlly.and are of composite origin. WC thus obtain a picture of twelve districts,covering the whole kingdom of Judah. The administrative centres arc notindicated; from the towns mentioned we have chosen whichever seems tobe the most important. or which gives the best indication of the geographicalp&ion of the district.

In the Negcb:I. Bce&eba(Jos 15: x-32).

IothcPLin:II. Azeqah(Jor r3: 33-36).

lII. Lakish(Jos 15: 37-41).IV. Mu&ab(Jos rj: 42-44).

In the H&country:V. Dcbir(Jos IS: 48-51).

VI. Hebran(Jos IS: 52-54).VII. Maon(Jos 15: 55-57).

VIII. Beth-.Sur(Jos IJ: ss-sga).IX. Bethlchem@~ 15: 3gb Greek; missing in Hcbrcw).X. Qiryath-Ycarim(Jos IS: 60).

Xl. Gibeon (to be aken from Jos 18: ~5-28).

IndUd%It:XI,. Engaddi(Jos 15: 61-62).

This table reveals an organization similar to that of Solomon’s twelve pre-fectures, and no doubt designed, like the former, to ensure the collection ofthe taxes. III this connection we may recall the governors and the cdlecringcentrcs established by Josaphat (2 Ch 17: 2, 12). An organization of this kindmay have existed even under David and Solomon, but if so, we have noknowledge of it, and according to I K 4: wb, the ‘Land’, i.e. Judah, wasadministered by a single governor (the word is different from that used forSolomon’s prefects. and the same as that in 2 Ch 17: 2). in any case. theorganization we have reconstructed from the lists in Josue is certainlylater than the schism, since it includes a part of tsrael’s two most southerlyprefectures under Solomon. But it is impossible to decide how late we shoulddate the list. One authoritative opinion has it that these lists represent thestate of the kingdom under Josias, but good arguments have recently beenbrought forward in favour of an earlier date, viz. the reign ofJosaphat, in theninth century. It is hard to decide, because the document was revised eitherbefore, or when, it was inserted into the book of Josue. It is enough forour purpose that it gives us the scheme of an administrative division of thekingdom of Judah

8: THE h”huNISm*nON OP THE KMGDOM 137

4. T/w districts o/de kingdom o/Zmel

For the kingdom of Israel we have nothing like this. One is tempted toapply the same mctbod to the lists of towns given by the book of Josue forthe no&m tribes. but thew lists UC a medley of points vaguely marking thetribal frontiers and filled with names of towns borrowed from other Biblicallists. WC can only presume that the northern kingdom preserved the systemof Solomon’s prefectures in so hr as it retained control over their territory.There is usual mention in I K 20: 14-22 of the chiefs of districts. here calledm’&nSth, the word used in the Book ofEsther for the satrapics of the Persianempire.

The ostraka from Samtia, which have already been quoted in connectionwith the royal ware, provide some details about the central region of thekingdom. Certain geographical names appear as those ofdirticts, each com-prising seven1 villages: Abincr, Helq. Shcchcm, Shemida. Noah, Hoglah,Soreq. Except for the last, these dirt&~ are given as the clans of Manasseh inJos 17: z-3, along with several other names which probably correspond toadministrative divisions. This is certainly true of Tirsah, the ancient capital,for the exuvations at Tell cl-Farab have proved that it retained ia impor-tance until the eighth century B.C. Naturally these ostrakn do not provide acomplete picture. for it is sheer chance that has preserved them, and it scansthat they all refer to the management of the royal estate. AU thcsc districtswere dependent on Snmaria, where these ostraka were found: Sam& wasboth the capital of the kingdom and the administrative centrc of a province.It has been suggested, with lcss probability, that they cover all the territotyleft to Joachaz of Israel after the incursions of the Aramaeans and the men ofJudah.

Mesopotamian dcamumts. cspnially for the time of Hammurabi, provideample information about their intemal administration of the provinces, andabout the numcmus duties of their governors and the staff which assistedthem; but very little of the kind survives about Israel.

We learn incidentally that the two capitals, Jerusalem and Samaria, eachhad a govcmor. He bore the title of iar ha%, ‘chief of the town’, or (once)‘aher ‘al ha%, ‘he who is over the town’. The ‘town’ su&es to describe thecapir~,asin~K~~:~~;Is66:6;Er7:~j.ItisAmon,govemorofSamaria,who is ordered by Achab to put the prophet Michaeas bcn Yimlah in prison(I K 22: 26). An unnamed governor of Samaria appears, together with themaster of the p&e and the Elders, in Ihe time of Jehu (2 K IO: 5). UnderJ&as there was at Jcrusaem a ‘gate ofJoshua, governor of the town’ (2 K23 : a), but one of his successors was by then in charge, called Maascyahu,

._

138 II: CMI. nisllm”NE

according to 2 Ch 34: 8, where he is mentioned with the royal secretary andthe herald. He was evidently an important person, nominated by the king.Much earlier, in the abortive attempt at monarchy at She&em, a governor ofthe town is mentioned (Jg 9: 30); be had been appointed by AbimelekfJg 9 : 28). We have no proof that there was a similar post in town* other thanthe capitals. There may perhaps be an indication to the contrary: in 2 K IO:5. the governor of Samaria, with the master of the palace and the Elders,replier to a message addressed to them by Jehu: but when Jezebel plots thedeath of Nab& she writes only to the Elders and notables of Yizreel, and nogovernor ofthe town appears in the story, though as an official appointed bythe king he would have bad a major part to play in it (I K 21: 8-11). InAssyria and Babylonia we know there was a head of the town (rab di), andthat there were mayors (&Snu) in the small towm; there is also evidence forthex in the kingdoms of Mari on the Euphrates. But at Ugarir the burgo-master (&zzanu 01 baza?n dli) seems to have been the governor of the capital,where he had authority over all the inhabitants except those who had beenennobled by the king. This is certainly the nearest parallel with the br ha%of the Bible.

Outside the two capitals, local affairs were, it seems, left in the hands of theElders, the r’qenlm.l They formed a sort of municipal council. They are themen who take action under thelaws ofDr 19: 21: 19. 18-21; 22: 13-21; 25:5-m. At the end of Saul’s reign. David sent messages and gifts to the Eldersof the different towns ofJudah (I S 30: 2631). Jezabel wrote to the Elders ofYiieel (I K 21: 8) and Jehu addressed himself to the Elders of Samariaand to the royal othcials (2 K 10: 1, 5). The Elders ofJudah and Jerusalemwere convened by Jo& to hear the reading of the Law (2 K 23: I). InMesopoamia. from the archives of Mari in the eighteenth century B .C .down to the royal correspondence of the Svgon dynasty in the eighth, theElders appear as the people’s representatives and the defenders of their inrer-csts, but without any administrative functions. In the Hittite empire, how-ever, municipal affairs teem to have been left to the council of the Elders,which also settled local disputes in cc-operation with the commander of thegartion. The Phoenician town also had thti assemblies of Elders, attested,for Byblos and Tyre, by non-Biblical documents, and cf. Ez 27: 9. In Israelthe Elders had 2 sin&r rble; under the monarchy they continued to regulatethe life of the clans, thereafter identified with the towns and villages.1 Theysurvived the collapse of the royal institutions: we meet them again during&Exile (Ez 8: I; 14: I; 20: I, 3), and afier the Return (Esd I O: 8, 14).

Cnama. NINE

F I N A N C E A N D P U B L I C W O R K S

ITTLE is known about the fiscal system of Israel or the resouxes atL the disposal of the State. First of all, it must be a&ted that therewas no distinction between the king’s revenues and those of the king-

dom. A sovereign’s wealth wa the expression of his own power and of thatof the kingdom he ruled (cf. I K IO: 23; 2 Ch 17: 3: 26: 8). The king boreall the expenses (the upkeep of the administration and the army, nationaldefencz and public works), but he also enjoyed absolute control of the entirerevenue. Similarly. there was only a theoretical distinction between thenational and religious treasuries (cf. I K 14: 26). The kingmightdepositinthesanctmry booty taken from the enemy (cf. Jos 6: rg) and his personal gifts(aS8:11;1K7:51;1~:13;2K1~:1g);hisoffid~~toowereindurgeoftheofferings made by the people (2 K 12: mf.; 22: 3-4); but to meet urgentdemands he would draw on both the Temple and Palace trevuries(I K 13: 18; 2 K 12: rg; 16: 8; 18: 13; cf. even Jg g: 4).

The king had at his disposal the produce of the royal estate,’ the profits ofhis commercial and industrial enterprises.9 the import or transit taxes paid bythe caravan merchants (I K IO: IS). and the tribute of the vassal states. Thislast source was an abundant one under David (2 S 8: 2, 6) and under Solo-mon (according to I K 5 : I), but shrank as the external possessions were lost.Mesha king of Moab, before he shook off the yoke of Israel, paid a tribute inkind for which 2 K 3 : 4 gives home fantastic iigures: 100,ooo lambs and thewool of ~oo,ooo ratns. According to 2 Ch 17: II, the Philirtins paid tributeto Josaphat, and the Arabs brought him in tribute or gifts 7,700 rams and7.700 goats. The Ammonites paid tribute to Ozia, according to 2 Ch 26: 8.

2. ’ Voluntary’ or exceptional contributions

In addition there were the presents brought by foreign embassies. AU thekings of the earth, it was said, wished to be received by Solomon, and eachbrought his gift (I K I O: 24-25), but none surpassed the queen of Saba in

I_ Cf. pp. *a-115. 1. CI. p. 78.

Ilo n: CNII mwITmTclNS

lavishnns (I K 1”: 2, IO). Before this the king of Hanxath had se”t gold,silver and bronze to David (2 S 8: IO), and Merodak-Baladan sent z presentto Fzchias (2 K 2”: ~z=Is 39: I). But these transactions were scarcelyprofitable, since the king of Israel had to ret”m these courtesies with anq”ally lavish gest”re (I K I”: 13). The cust”m was in fact general among thekings of the East.

The sovereign made a clearer profit from the presents which had to beoffered by all who prscnred themselves at court. When David was admittedto Saul’s prance he brought only a modest offering ( I S 16: 20). but whenNaanxan was sent by his master t” the king of Israel, his present was a princelyone (2 K 3: 5). On the occasion of the king’s coronation, CUSL”~ obligedmen to make presents to the king when they sw”re him fidelity (I S I”: 27).such more or less voluntary contributions are also mentioned in ugtiticdocuments.

I” grwe circumstances the king would decree a” exceptional tax. Mena-hem, for example, l&cd a thouund talents of silver on all the me” of rank inIsrael. at the rate off& shekels a head, in order to buy the favour ofTi&th-Pi&r III (2 K I 5 : Ipzo). Joinqim raised the hundred talents of silver &d tentalents of gold demanded by the Pharaoh by taxing the people of Judah,according t” their wealth (2 K 23: 33-33).

3. Tithes

Some exegetes have argued that, apart from these occasional contribu-tions, the Israelites were not subject to regular taxation, but this is contra-dicted by several facts. Solomon’s prefecruresl presuppose a system ofrevenues in kind which did not derive solely from the royal estates, and when2 Ch 17: 3 says that all Judah brought its tribute to Josaphat, this is bestunderstood as a” annual tax, like the tribute of the vassal states. Though Gn47: 13-26 describes the land system ofEgypt as something strange, owing itsorigin to Joseph, what surprises the redactor is not that revenues are paid tothe Pharaoh but that all the lands, except those of the temples, belong t” himuld that all the Egyptians are serfs of the crown, in c”“trast with the systemof private property prevailing in Israel.

I” particular, I S 8: 15. 17 predicts that the king will levy the tithe on thefields, the vineyards and the herds. This is what went on in the neighbouringkingdoms, as is clearly proved by the Ugarit texts. The Bible states that theking may leave this rev&e t” his officers; this custom is attested by Ugnriticdocuments also, and there is perhaps a” allusion t” this practice in Am 5 : I I,where the prophet rebukes the me” of rank for crushing the poor ma” byextorting tribute from his corn.

The king seems t” have had a right over the first mowing of the meadowsI. CT. pp. x11-115.

9: FINhNCE AN” PuB”C WOllRS 141

(Am 7: I), similar, perhaps, to the right of pastwage exercised by thesovereign of Quit. Both there and in Israel a” individull “I his family couldbe exempted. by the king’s favour, from tithes uld forced labour (I S 17: 23).

It b on the model of this institution ofthe monarchical period that Ezecbiel.over and above the estate he rcserva for the prince of Israel, fixes the revenuewhich all the people of the land will “we him, in what, barley, oil and live-stock (Ez 43: 13-16); in warn for this, and in accordance with the ideals oftheocracy envisaged by Ezechiel, the prince will be responsible for all thepublic sacrifices and oblations (Ez 43: 17).

A M stage vas reached when the thecaacy was actually set up after theremrn from the Exile; the people solenmly undertook t” pay into the Templea third of a shekel annually, the first fruia of the earth and the flocks, a titheon the soil and certain offerings of wood (Ne I”: 33-40). Tr~$.tworthy me”were charged with collecdng, storing and distributing these reve”“es (Ne 12:44-47; 13: 10-13). These meamres can no doubt be interpreted as the ftid-ment of the Priestly laws about the tithe due t” the sanctuary and its ministers,but whatever be the date of these regtdations, it can scarcely be doubted thatthis religious legishti”” is the parallel t”, or the memory of, a sinxilar civili”stit”ti0”.

4, Forced labour

Forced Lbour was universal in the ancient East. There is evidence of it inLower Mesopotamia from the earliest times down t” the Net-Babylonianperiod. The Assyria” laws condemn ccrtai” criminals t” a period of forcedlabour for the king. The Israelites preserved a harrowing memory of thetasks imposed on their ancest”n in Egypt (Ex I : I 1-14; 3 : 4-w; cf. Dt 26: 6).though their lot had been no worse than that of all the Pharaoh’s subjecu.Forced labour is also mentioned in the documents of Syria and Palestinebefore the Israelite settlement.

In 1sne1 it was not organized till after the instioltion of the monarchy; itwas one of the disadvantages foretold by I S 8: 12, 1617. David imposed iton the Amnmniter (2 S 12: 31). unless this means that they were reduced t”utter slavery.1 A def&red enemy, if he survived, became liable t” this levy(I~31:8;Lm1:1).Attheendofhisreign,Da~idissaid tohavehadadter set over the levy (2 s 2”: 24), but this statement is not certain.’ I” a”y caseit is under Solomon that the institution appears in its ftdl development. Thegreat works undertaken by the king, the building of the Temple and thePalace, the fortication ofJerusalem and the garriscm towns (I K 9: 15-19).required a considerable labour force. Solomon ofcourse had state slaves at hisdisposal. whom he uwd on the Red Sea fleet and in his factory at Esyon-Gebcr.3 and they probably worked also on the great buildings of his reign.The text of I K 9: zo-?a implies that all the me” employed on them were

142 1,: CIVIL ,NSTlNl¶ONS

descendants of those Canaanites who had escaped extermination and that theIsraelites furnished only soldiers and otficers for the king. Tbia information,however, does not come from an early document; the text is in the style ofDeuteronomy and reflects an opinion from the end of the monarchicalperiod. The-e opinion recurs in Chronicles (2 Ch 2: 1617; 8: 7_9), whereit is explicitly stated that only resident aliens had been employed on thesebuildings.

But the earlier texts ate equally explicit in stating that Israelites wereinvolved. 1t was in ‘all rsrael’ (I K J : 27) that Solomon raised the men for thelevy, mar, and he had 30.000 workmen, of whom IO,OOO went in their turnto the Lebanon to cart the wood cut by the king ofTyre’s woodcutters (I K5: to, 23, 2.7-28). Further, it is said, he had 70,00o porters and 80,aoo quatry-men employed at Jet&em with Hiram’s masons and atpenterr (I K 5 : ?+32). The ‘levy of the how of Joseph’ over which Jeroboatn was placed(I K I I : 28) was made up of Israelites. 1t was in fact this burden laid on theLwaelites which incited Jeroboam to revolt (I X II: 26f.). and a&r Solomon’sdeath it is given as the main cause of the political schism (I K 12: 4-16).

The levy was staffed by supervisors and o&err (I K 5: 30; 9: 23; II: 28).under the orders of the chief of the levy, Adoram. son of Abda, apparently aPhoenician, who war one of Solomon’s ministets (I K 4: 6; 5: 28). It WYthis Adoram, whom Roboam, through stupidity or for provocation, sent tosubdue the rebeb ofBmel, and who was stoned to death by them ( I K 12: 18).

eater history contains no mention of any other chief of the levy. and itwould appear that this ceased to be a regular institution after Solomon’sreign. Yet from dmc to time the kings of Israel and Judah must have resortedto it for the building programmer attributed to them; there is explicitevidence for this in the reign of Asa, who called up every single man in Judahto forti+ Gebn and Mispah (I K 15: 22). But popular sentiment regarded thisforced labour a~ an exaction, and Jeremias denounces Joiaqim for building hispalace with no respect for justice, making men work without pay (Jr a: 13).Thin explains the reluctance of the redactors of the Books of Kings andChronicles to admit that Solomon had used free ~sraelits in the levy. UnderNehemias the walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt by teams of volunteers; thewriter merely observes that the leading men from Teqoa refused to takepart in it (Ne 3 : 5).

CHAPTER TEN

LAW A N D J U S T I C E

I. Lqislntive coder

THE iaw, T&ah, means in the first place a teaching, a doctrine, adecision given for a particulat case. Collectively, the word means thewhole body of rules governing men’s relations v&God and with

each other. Finally the word comes to mean the first five books of the Bible,the Pentateuch, containing God’s insttuctions to his people, the ptescripdons which his people had to observe in their moral. social uld religious life.All the legislative codes of the Old Testament are found in the Pentateuch.

(a) The Decaloguc contains the ‘Ten Words’ of Yahweh, the essential prc-cepts of morality and religion. It is set out twice (Ex 20: 2-17 and Dt 5 : 6-x)with some sign&cant vxiams, but the two texts stem from a shorter ptimi-tive form which may justifiably be assigned to the Mosaic Age.

(b) The Code of the Covmnnf (Ex 20: 22-23: 33) is a composite collection,in which one can easily distinguish a central potion (Ex 21: z-22: 16), where‘scntencs’ or ‘judgments’. mishpa$m, of civil and ctiminal law are groupedtogether: it is a law for a community of shepherds and peasants. The presentcon&t (cf. Ex 24: 3-8) connects it, l&e theDec&gue which precedesit, withthe Sinaitic Covenant. but the directions about slaves, cattle, fields, vine-yvds and houses can only apply to an already settled population. This codehas obvious connections with the curses of Dt 27: x5-26, the ‘law’ (Dt 27:~6) which was to be proclaimed on Mount Ebal (ot Garizim?) after the entryinto Canaan (Dt 27: 11-14). This command of Moses was carried out byJosue, according to Jos 8: 3c-35. the opening words of which recall in turnthe law of the altar with which the code of the Covenant begins (Ex 20: 24-25). But this passage in Jos 8 does not fit in with its present context nearly sowell as with the assembly at She&em, where Joshua gave the people D law(mishpn[) written in a ‘book of the law’ (Jos 24: 25-26). We cannot be certainthat the Code of the Covenant, in the form in which it has come down to us,is the actual law promulgated by Jow at She&em, but we can say thatinternal evidence and the witnerr, of tradition agree in dating this Code fromthe early days of the settlement in Canaan, before the organization of theState. It is the law of the tribal federation.

(c) Deuteronomy, in its legislative part (Dt u-26). forms another code

144 It: ClML INsTtTuTtONs

which brings together, in ill-dcfmed order. momc short collectiolw of lawswhich mly have originated in d&rent ways. Some of them repat the dircc-tions of the Code of the Covmant, others. e.g. the laws 0” the one svlctutyand on the slaves, modify then~. and mvly others are added. This code seemsdesigned to replacx the old code by tak@ account of a whole social andreligious evolution; it also reveals a change of spirit by its appeals to the heartand by the tone of exhortation in which its prescriptions are often couched.Fundamentally, it is certainly the ‘law’ discovered in the Temple in the timeofJo& (2 K 12: tlf.). It contains awicnr elements which xem to stem, at leastin part, from the Northern kingdom, but it is difficult to say how long beforethe reign of J&s they were co&cted and completed. One plausible hypc-thesis is that they were brought to Judah &a the fall of Sun& and puttogether u&r E&s.

(d) The Law ofHofiwrr (Lv 17-26) is also a compilation, containing P “urn-bcr of doublea. But it constimtes P unity which, like Deuteronomy. beginswith r&s about sacrifices and ends with blasings and curses. It differs fromit by its strong preoccupation with rites uld the priesthood, and its constantreminders of the holiness of Yahweh and his people. It may represent thecustoms in vogue at the end of the monarchy. originating in a d&rent milieufrom that of Deuteronomy. and ccdificd during the Exile. It may well havereccivcd wme additions before or after its in&ion in the Pentatewh.

(e) The Priestly Code. The rest of Leviticus is composed of other c&c-dons: laws about sacriflccs (Lv t-7); the ritual for the installation of priests(Lv 8-m); the law of purity (Lv 11-16). to which nwt bc added the legirla-dve texts xattercd throughout Ex and Nh uld associated with cvcnts of thedesert period. The sun total of these c”actme”ts and the narratives in whichthey are set, together with the Law of Holiness, form what critics call thePriestly Ccdc. It con& some ruler which are very mcimt md otherswhichare much m”rc recent. and it rec.&cd its M form only in the Jewishcommunity after its return from Exile.

This briefsurvey is enough to nuke clear how inorganic was the legislationof Israel, how it varied with the background and time, and how much moreclosely connected it was with religious than with civil life. These are points towhich we shall have to term, but before embatking on them we “ust can-pare this body of law with those of the other peoples in the ancient East.

It is a remarkable fact that Egypt, where there was so much writing and somuch litigation, has left us no body of laws (the Edict of Horemheb is onlya” administrative document); “or is there any record of any Egypt& king’shaving been a law-giver, apart fro”, some traditions collected at a verylate date by Diodoms of Sicily (I 94). which we cannot check. It was a

m: LAW AN” ,vsnca 143foreign co”quetor, Darius, who isswd the o”ly codifiution recorded by anEgyptian text. Egypt secnu to have felt no need for a writtm law baause ithad a living law, the Pharaoh, so” of Ra, a gOd upon earth. whose word laiddown the law. The lmguage has no word to dmote law as such. The nearestterm is ma’at, which covers the concepta of truth and justice and is an attti-bute, itself divine, of the Pharaoh. The judges gave their decisions accordingto the ptinciplcs of this ‘truth which is justice’ and by applying the unwrittencusto”ls or the directive of the sovaeig”.

Babylonin, on the other hand, has bcqueathcd scvcml coUections of lawsascribed to the initiative of a king or p&cd under his name. and tlxy are veryaxient. The Code of Ur-N-u ot Ur is to be dated about 2050 B.C., thatof Lipit-Isbtar of Isin, about 18$o; the law of the city ofEshn”““a was pm-mulgated by a” unknown king long before Hvnmwabi + perhaps beforeLipit-&tar; lastly. the Code of Hanmwabi of Babylon, imud about 1700,wan the fint to be discovered and is the most complete. Thcsc arc not, sttictlyspeaking, ‘codes in “UT modem sense, i.e. bodies “flaw to whichtbcjudgeisobliged to refer in giving judgmat. It is noteworthy that in Maopoamivltexts we “ever come across cxprnsiom like ‘by application of the law’ or ‘invirme of such uld such a law’. That is not eve” a”y word meaning ‘law’ ingeneral. The king govcms and the judges decide according t” ‘justice’(meshmu) or ‘the truth’ (kittu), following the accepted custom in simiLr uxs.The practice was therefore not vcty different from that in Egypt, but inMcsopotanG this legal tradition “I jutisprudencc was, in certain &cum-stances, collected and put into writing. rather for the benefit of the people, itscans, than for that of thejudges. These ‘coda’, however, were not bindingtexts, as is evident from the number of divergent solutions give” to the saxcases by contemporary juridical acts.

The Collection of As+” Laws, compiled about I too but making w ofolder material, ha long been recognized as a book of law. a manual ofjutis-prudence, but it coven only certain fields. and does not attempt to set forththe general law of the State. It is perhaps the work of a private jurist, but eve”if it was compiled for the USC of the judges by a” official authority, it wouldstill be a reference-book rather than a” authoritative code.

The Hit&e laws ax prcsetvcd in copies probably dating from the thir-tecnth century EX., but they were wmpilcd, apparently, about 1500.They frequently conttast ‘what must be done’ now with ‘what was doneformerly’, the change b&g usually a reduction of the penalty. They arebased, the”, on a” older custonwy law. They do not constitute a code; theyform an eve” looser collection than that of the Assyrian laws. They refermostly to very pa&& uses, the presumption being that ordinary castswill he scttlcd by sbnple md gencmlly accepted rules.

No si& collection is forthcoming from Syria or Palestine, wherejuridical texts UC extrcmcly rare, apart born the two lots recently discovered

148 II: avl‘ tNsnlwTtoNs

If this is granted, other p&as of resemblance appear between the legalcoda of the Old Testameat and Oriental treaties. The latter begin with ahistorical introduction, sometimes fairly long, recalJing the events leadingup to the treaty. Similarly, the two promulgations of the Decalogue areintroduced by a very short mmmary of previous facts (Ex M: I : Dt 5 : 4-5).This is more developed in the narrative ofthe pact at Shechem 00s 24: z-13),to which we assigned the Code of the Covenant; in the first chapters ofDeuteronomy it becomes a record of the entire history of the pcoplc.Oriental treaties end with formulas of coning and blessing, as sanctions forthe keeping or breaking of the engagements undertaken. So toa the Law ofHolinm and the Code of Deuteronomy conclude with blessings and curses(Lv 26: 3-41; Dt 28). The Code of the Covenant has no similar conclusion inits present context, but this context is not the original one. and if we wereright in lrsociating this Code with the pact at She&em, it too involvedculses and blessings (cf. Jos 8: 34; Dt II: 26-w 2,: 12-13): the curses wouldthen be those recorded in Dt 27: 15-26, which, as we have already noted,were closely connected with the Code of the Covenant.

Oriental treat& were inscribed on tablets, or engraved on a stele. andplaced in a sanctuary in the presence of the gods. The Decalogue was en-graved on two tablets and deposited in the sacred tent, in the Ark ‘of theCovenant’ or ‘of the Law’. The pact at She&m was written in a book,according to Jos 24: 26, on stones according to Jos 8: 35; Dt 27: 2-4, and therecord of tbia pact was preserved in the ranctoxy of Yahweh (~os 24: 26-27).Again, the ‘book of the law’, Deuteronomy, was discovered in the Templeat Jerusalem (2 K 22 : 8).

Finally, several Hit& treaties order the text to be read periodically beforethe vassal king and hj, people. So too Dt 3 I : z-13 prescribes a public readingof the law every seven years. It is very likely that such tea-linings xmally tookplace, perhaps even more often, e.g. in connection with an annual ceremonyfor renewing the Covenant, similar to that recorded by the Dead Sea scroll,among the Qumran sect. The historical books have recorded only readingswhich took place in certain exceptional circumstances, at the reform ofJmaphat (2 ch 17: g), after the discovery of the Deuteronomy (2 K 23: 2).and after the promulgation of the law by Esdrv (Ne 8: 4-18).

But since these pacts governed the relations of Israel’s dependence onYahweh. not on a human suzerain, the Isnelite law, for all its resemblances inform and content, differs radically from the clauses of the Oriental ‘treaties’and the articles of their ‘codes’. It is a religious law. It established the prin-ciplesofthe Covenant with Yahweh: its aim was toenmre that this Covenantremained in force. It is perfectly true that the Hit& and Assyrian tratiesinvoke their gods as guumntors, and that in the prologue and epilogue of theircodes Lipit-Ishtar purports to be the interpreter ofEnl& and Hammwabi tobe ‘the king ofjustice to whom Shamash has entrusted the law’; hot God

IO: LAW AND ,usncl3 149was not merely a guarantor of the Covenant, he was a parq to it, and noOriental code can bc compared with the Israelite law, which is ascribed inits entirety to God as its author. Ifit contains, and often mingles, ethical andritual prexriptions, this is because it coven the whole field of the divineCovenant, and because this Covenant governed the relations of men withone another as well as their relations with God.

The law was the charter ofthe covenant with God; hence it contained theobligations undertaken by the people, but it was also a body of teachingdirected to them. From this notion another characteristic of Israelite legisla-tion proceeds. Unlike all other Eastern laws, its prescriptions are often sup-ported by a justifying motive. This may be a simple explanation based oncommon sense: if a man has violated an already betrothed girl in the town,both are put to death, ‘the girl because she did not call for help, the manbecaw he ha abused his neighbour’s wife’ (Dt a: 24). #Iternatively, themotive may be moral: injudicial actions, gifts must not be accepted ‘becamegifts blind the eyes of the clear-sighted’ (Ex 23: 8). Often it is a religiousmotive, as in the Decalogue itself: idolatry is forbidden, ‘for I, Yahweh yourGod. am a jealom God’ (Ex 20: 5) : this is often found in the Law of Holiness,where the prescriptions are puncnuted with the refrain, ‘I am Yahweh. yourGod.’ Finally. it may bc an appeal to history, especially the remembrance ofthe deliverance fromEgypt(Exz3: g; Lv tg: 36; Dt 5: 15; 24: 18, etc.). Theexampla quoted show that these motives are attached to apodictical andcasuisitical laws alike and are found in different collections. They are pro-portionately more numerous in Deuteronomy and the Law of Holiness, butthey are found as early as the Decalogue and the Code of the Covenant, andthey are certainly a primitive feature of the law in Israel.

This connection between the law and religion explains one last charac-teristic of Israelite legislation. Because it is designed to safeguard the Coven-ant, it enjoins severe penalties for all crimes against God, idolatry andblasphemy, and for crimes which tarnish the holiness of the chosen people,c.8.. bestiality, sodomy and incest. But it is further distinguished from otherEastern codes (even the Hittite. which is the most lenient) by the homule-ness of its sentences. Bodily mutilation is exacted only in one vety special case(Dt 23: x1-12) which the Auyrivl law punishes in the same way. Flogging islimited to forty strokes, ‘lest the bruises be dangerous and your brother bedegraded’ (Dt 25 : 3). Certain dispositions in the Code ofthe Covenant, moredeveloped in Deuteronomy, protect the stranger, the poor, the oppressed,the widow and the orphan, even the personal enemy (Ex 22: zx.5; 23: 4-9;Dt 23: 16, 20; 24 p&m). Exemptions from military setvicc are verygenerous (Dt 20: s-9). The law of retaliation, however, the Iex ralionis, isexpressed in all its crudeness: ‘l&for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth. handfor hand, foot for fwt, butning for bumiog, bruise for bruise, wound forwound’ (Ex 21: 23-q; cf. Lv 24: 19-20; Dt tg: 21). But this formula seems

ISO 11: CIVIL INsnTwrIONS

to have lost its force, merely asxrting the principle of propottionatc com-pawion. In the oldest text, that ofExodus, it is in fact followed immediatelyby a law which orders the liberation of a slave in compaution for the loss ofan eye or a tooth (Ex 21: 2&a7), and it is preceded by a law which, for awound in&ted in a fight, orders only the payment of compasation andmedical cxpcnsa (Ex 31: In-19). Only in one USC is strict retaliation exacted:the guilty murderer must die and cannot buy his freedom. This rigour isjust&d by a religious reason: the blood which has been shed has profanedthe land in which Yahweh dwells (Nb 35: 31-34). Thus again we meet thereligious rlnctiom mentioned in the beginning of this paragraph.I TheIsraelites could repeat with pride these words of Deuteronomy: What greatnation is there whose laws and customs are so just as all this Law?’ (Dt 4: 8).

3. 7%~ bins’s legirhtive and judicial powen

The ‘codes’ which have come down to us from Maopotamia arc allattributed to a king. As we have seen, they were ratber collcct&ms of custom-ary law than laws of the State, decreed by the sovereign, but they were atlast promulgated by royal authority. In Israel, granted the religious natureof the law and im cotmection with the Covenant, nothing of the sort wasposziblc, and in fact the historical books never allude to any legislative powerof the king. The txxest example is the order said to have ban given byDavid, to share the booty between the combatants and those who bad beenleft to guard the baggage, which became ‘a rule and a custom for Israel (I s30: 24-25). But David was not then king: as comman der, he dccidcd aparticular case and his decision became a custom During the siege ofJerusalem, Sedecias ordered that all davcs should be freed; but this was &erhe had consulted the people-he did not act on his own authority (JI 34: 8).The king had of course an extensive administmtivc authority; he organizedhis kingdom, appointed bis o&i& and made decrees, but he did not enactlaw. It is remarkable that the two ‘laws of the king’ (I S 8: 11-18; Dt 17:14-20) make no allusion to any power of the king to lay down laws. On thecontnry, the fitst warm tbc people against his arbitraty acts, and the secondorders bin to have a copy of the divine law and obey it to the last detail. 1tis also noteworthy that apart from this pasage the king is nowhere men-tioned in the Deutctonomic Code. When Josapbat reformed the ndministra-don ofjustice, he told bin judges to apply the law of Yahweh (2 Ch 19: j-7).and his envoys were to take with them, and to explain ever/where, not alaw of the king, but ‘the law of Yahweh (2 Ch ‘7: 9). The king was noteven in the full sense the promulgator of this law, as ifit became the law ofthe State by his nutbority. That is not the meaning to be ascribed to the tead-ing of Deuteronomy by Josiv in the Temple (2 K 23 : I-Z). Joriv was the

10: LAW AND ,“STKE 151

human intermediary in the covcmmt between God and his people; he pub_lisbed its claws and watched over i@ observance. He performed the sanefunction as Moses on Sinai (Ex 24: 7-S). as Josue at Shechem (Jos 24: 25-26).andEsdras in days still to come at Jerusalem (NC 8). But the ldng could addnothing to the autbotity ofa law to which he himselfwas subject (Dt 17: Ig;I K 8: 58; 2 K 23: 3). There was no such thing as State law in Israel, and itwas only u&t the foreign rule of Artaxerxcs that ‘the law of God broughtby E&as’ was imposed as ‘the law of the king’ (Esd 7: 26).

On the other hand, the king was a judge, and held judicial power. This isan SJential fimction of the chief: every sheikb wields it in his tribe and Mosesexc&ed it in the dcscrt (Bx 18 : 16). Josue, Moses’ successor at the head ofthe people, ‘was filled with the spitit of wisdom’ and cvcryone obeyed him(Dt 34: g: cf. Nb 2.7: 18-23). He acted as a judge in condemning Akan(Jos 7: I~ZS). This wa. ofcourse, an exceptional case, but it xv’& natural thatthe nun who dctcrmincd the law of tbc people (Jos 24: zs) should also see toits enforcement. Between the death ofJosue and the institution of the mon-archy came the period of the ‘Judges’. This title has been wrongly extendedto the heroa who saved some part of the people from oppression, but itseems to belong properly m the ‘laser’ Judges, whose names are given in JgIO: 1-s; 12: 8-15, along with whom we should count at least Jephtbah (cf.Jg 12: 7), who combined this rblc with that of a great ‘saviout’ Judge. Itseems that these Judges wcrc P pamanent institution of the tribal federation:instead of a political head, it had a judge to whom all could appeal. Samuelperformed the same function when he judged Israel at his home-town,Fan&, and also at Bethel, Gilgal and Mispah (I S 7: 1617) ; he claimed thatno one could accuse him of denying any man justice or taking bribes (I S 12:3-5). In bis old age he appointed his two SON as judges at Bcctsheba, but they‘accepted gifts and bentjustice to their own ends (I S 8: 1-3).

It war &en that the Israelites begged Samuel to give them a king, ‘that bemay be ourjudge’ (I S 8: 5). There is no reason to suspect this passage, whichrcpraents the king as heir to an o&c which already had a long history inIsrael. The same passage says that the people a&cd for a judge-king ‘to be likeother nations’. Among the text9 lately discovered at Ras Sbamra and Alalakhtbcre arc, in fact, judgments given by the king and contracts guaranteed byhis seal. On a wider scale. the preambles of Maopotamian coda, the poemsof Ras Shamra, and Aramacan and Phoenician insctiptionr all demand as thefirst quality of a king the virtue ofjustice. In Israel, too, men prayed that theking might bc given justice (Ps 72: t-2). the foundation of his throne(Pr 16: 12; 23: 3: 29: 14; cf. Is g: 6).’ The list of David’s senior officials(2 S 8: 13) is introduced with &se words: ‘David reigned over all ~sracl.doing right and justice to all his people’, which seems to reserve the adminis-trarion of justice to the sovereign. In the same way, the list of Solomon’s

c.~

19 11: c1vII. niSTInnlONS

senior o&ials (I K 4: 1-5) is immediately preceded by the story ofthe famousjudgment which proved to all that there was in the king ‘a divine wisdom fordoing justice’ (I K 3 : 28) i.e. both to settle quarrels and to assist every man toobtain his rights. This was the wisdom for which Solomon had prayed, to‘judge the people’ (I K 3: 9). Thus ‘to judge’ was almost a synonym for‘to govern’ (& again .z K 15: 5). and ‘governors’ could be called ‘judges’(Ps 2: IO; 148: II). It is the king who is called the ‘judge of Israel’ inMi 4: 14. following what is still the likeliest interpretation.When Abs&m exclaimed: ‘Ah! who will make me judge in this land?’ If

everyone who had a lawsuit and ajudgment were to come to me, I would dothem justice’ (a S 15: 4, he was coveting the crown irrelf. The whole storyshows that there was at Jemsalem a king’s cart, to which every man inIstael could appal. So tea, Solomon’s palace contained a ‘porch of judg-ment’ where the king administered justice (I K 7: 7). The real ot fictitiouscases recorded in the historical books show that appeal was made to the kingeven in cases wbicb we should leave to lower courts: the theft of P sheep(a S 12: 6), a family blood feud (2 S 14: 4-11). the substitution ofa child (I K3 : 16&), the recovery of a house and land (z K 8 : 3). The woman of Teqoais supposed to be appealing from ajudgment given by her clan (z S 14: 4-11).and the king here appean as the judge in the final cotttt of appeal, which hecertainly wa, but the other examples presume that recoutse could also bemade to him in the fint instance.

In practice the majority of ass went to judges other than the king, andincrnsingly so as institutions developed. It war said that Moses himself wasunequal to this task and, on the advice of his father-in-law, J&o the Midian-ite. he appointed chiefr to administer justice, reserving to him.& only themost di&& cases (Ex 18: 13-26; cf. Dt I: g-17).

We UC by no means so well informed on the cow of Israel as on those ofMesopotamia, the composition and procedure of which are described inmany cuneiform documents. They reveal some interesting parallels with whatthe Old Testament tells us about the administration of justice. Like ancientBabylonia, Israel had three different jurisdictions, though it is hard to definewhat was the precise competence of each: the communal jurisdiction of theElders, the jurisdiction of the king and that of the priests.

In every town disputes and trials were settled by the Elders. that is, theheads of families in the clan, the leading citizens of the place.1 They sat at thegate of the town, where all the community’s a&in were &sassed (cf. Gn 23 :1~1,18;Jbzg:7;Prz4:7;31:z3).Th ese are the coum to which the prophcurefer when they demand respect for justice ‘at the gate’ (Am 5: IO, 12, 15;Za 8: 16). The Deuteronomic law desctibes ‘the Elders at the gate of the

I. cf. pp. 68 and ,111.

10: LAW AND JUSTICE 153

town’ (Dt 21: 19; 22: IS). ot ‘the Elders of the town’ (Dt 19: 12; 21: 3, 8;25 : 6) iu judges in ccttain uwcs. An actual example of the working of thesecourts is provided by Rt 4: 1-12. Bw sits at the gate of the town, stops thekinsman who has the right of redemption over Naomi’s field and chooses tenElders. They take their places beside him. The we is stated and discussedbetween the parties, the man renounces his right and Bou calls the Elders andall the people to witness it. When the judgment involves a penalty, theB&s imposeit (Dt 22: 18-19). Whenit is the death penalty, it is immediatelyattied out by the witnesses present (Dt a: 18-21). The practice is illustratedby tbc story of Nab&. The Elden and the lading citizens summon Nabbothto apput before them. and two talv witnesses accuse bin of cursing Godand the king, D crime which incuts the death pa+ (cf. Ex 22: 27; Lv 24:14).Then’theytookhimoutofthcdty,theystonedhimuldhcdied’(1K21:11-13). The ma&en of thex pop&t anuts UC addressedin the exhorta-tions ofEx 23: 1-3.68; cf. Lv 19: 15. 35: they must not beat false witnessnor follow the majority in defiance of justice, nor accept gifts; they mustacquit the innocent and condemn the guilty. In the Mesopotamian courtsthe Elders had a definite &lee; and among the Hittites they administeredjustice under the presidency of a royal official.

But there were also professional judges in Israel, instituted by an authoritywhich can onlyhave been the king’s, They could claim as their prototypes thecompetent laymen appointed by Moses to dispmse justice (Ex 18: 13-26).Among the c&ctiom of laws, the Deuteronomic Code is the only onewhich refers to them. It commands that judges and registrars, or scribes, beappointed in every town, and that they are to give just judgments (Dt 16: IS-20). According to Dt 19: 1618, the false witnesses in a religious trial mustappear before the priests and the judges then in office, and they are to conductthe enquiry. According to Dt 25: 2, when a judge finds a man guilty, theflogging is to take place in his presence. Dt 17: 8-13 orders the Elders or thelocal judge to refer cases they cannot decide to a higher mutt. They must goto ‘the place chosen by Yahweh’, that is, to Jcmsalem, and submit the case tothe priests and the offitiating judge (v. g) or to the priest (singular) and thejudge (v. 12). Theirjudgment is without appeal. There was then at Jerusalema firral court of appeal, both religious and secular. The text hesitates betweenone priest and several. but is defmite in denoting one secular judge. In thislegal context, it is not the king who can be called ‘judge’, u in Mi 4: 14. butan official appointed by the king.

The directions of Dt 16: 18-a and 17: 8-13 should be compared withJosaphat’s reform as described in 2 Ch rg: 4-11. This king appointed ‘inevery town. in each walled town’. judges who were to show them&aincorruptible. At Jerusalem he established a coun of priests, Levi% and theheads of Israelite families, who were to act as a court of first instance for theinhabitants ofJerusalem (according to the Greek) and as a mutt of appeal for

I54 II: cNI1. INSTITUTIONS

cases referred to them from other towns. This co”rt was presided “ver byAmaryab”, the high priest, for all matters touching Yahweh, and by Zebed-yahu, chief of the house of Judah, for all the king’s matters: the Levitcsserved as notaries. The literary expression of this text nuy have been influ-enced by Deuteronomy and may refiea certain special interests of the time ofthe Chronicler, but there is no reason to suspect its basic accuracy. It will thenbe admitted that under Jouphat, at the beginning ofJudah’s monarchy, therewas a judicial reform which established a royal jurisdiction alongside thecommuul jurisdiction and which relieved the king of his ot& of supremejudge. The texts from Deuteronomy which we have just awalysed probablyrefer to the sane institution.

With these measures ofJosaphat’s we may compare the Edict of PharaohHorembeb in the fourteenth century B.C. 1t concerns a reorganization of theco”rts ofjustice: the inhabitants ofevery town are to bejudged by the priestsof the temples, the priests of the gods and the magistrates appointed by thesovereign. These are me” of discernment who are forbidden to respect per-sons “I to accept bribes. The parallel is striking. But whereas the god-king ofEgypt had simply ‘taken counrcl ofhis heart’ in order to dictate t” the scribethese ‘excellent dispositions’, uld his judges had to apply ‘the words of thePalace uld the laws of the Throne-room’, Josaphat’s mel~wcs form part ofhis religious reform (2 Ch rg: 4; d 17: 7-g), and his magistrates ‘judge notin the name of men but in the name ofYahweh’ (2 Ch 19: 6). In the admini-stration of justice as in everything else, the di&ence between the royalideology of Israel and that of Egypt is conspicuous.

In Josaphat’s ordinance (z Ch 19: 8, II) and in Dt 17: 9.12; 19: 17. priestsare mentioned along with judges. There is no ground for disputing theexistence of this priestly jurisdiction; it is found in Mesopotamia, and alsoin Egypt, as we have just see” from the Edict of Horemheb. It was ahnostinevitable in 1~1x1, where there was no distinction between civil and religiouslaw, and where all legislation emanated from God. Mores brought thepeople’s disputer ‘before God’ (Ex 18: 19). The fact that Samuel exercised hisjudicial functions in three sanctuaries, Bethel, Gilgal and Mispah (I S 7: 16)and that his sons were judges at Beersheba, another place of worship ( I S 8 : 2)is “or a” irrelevant detail. I” certain cases the Code ofthe Covenant prescribesa procedure ‘before God’ (Ex 21: 6; 22: 6-S); the law of Dt 21: 1-9 o”“mrder by a person unknown prescribes a ritual act. All tbis presupposes thatthe priest rook a certain part in judicial affairs. The problem is t” knowexactly what their competence was. The priests gave t&&h, ‘decisions’ in thename of God, and according to Dt 33 : 10 (reading, probably, the plural) itwas their exclusive privilege. According to Lv 13-14. it is the priest whodecides whether a ma”, a gartnent or a hours are infected with ‘leprosy’ orare clear of it. I” Ag 2: I If., the priests arc asked for a t6rah on the conditionsin which cleanness and unclcannesr are passed on. In Za 7: 3 they xc asked

IO: LAW AN” ,usncB 15s

whether the fast in conunenmntion of the ruin of the Temple is still ofobligation. It would seem. then, that the priests’ rble was only to distin-guish between the sacred and the profane. clean and unclean, and this is cer-tainly the function assigned to them in Lv I”: IO and Ez 44: 23. But Lv 10:II extends their competence to ‘any law whatever’, and Ez 44: 24 adds ‘theyshall be judges in quarrels; they shall judge according to my law’. while Dt21: 5 says ‘that it is their office to pronounce on all disputes and all assaults’.~“t in the absence of any concrete exan~ples no certain conclusion cm bedrawn. It seem that the priests were the authentic interpreters of the law,that they judged all strictly religious matters. the ‘affairs of Yahweh’ (2 Ch19: II), and intervened in civil casa at least when these involved somereligious law or religious procedure. Their competence was perhaps ex-tended with time. when we read in 1 Ch 23 : 4, cf. 26: 29, of 6,000 Levirnwho were clerks andjudges under David, it is evidently the &lized projec-tion into the past of a later situation, probably after the Exile. In NewTestament times the Sanhedrin included priests, laymen and scribes; it waspresided over by the high priest and it acted as the supreme c”“rt ofjustice.

According to 2 Ch 19: II, the tribunal instituted by Josaphat at Jerusalememployed Levites as rhs,%t. The root xhp means, in Akkadian and severalother semitic langluges, ‘to write’, but the rhsrdM were nor mere scribes,for they are disdnguirhed from them in 2 Ch 34: 13, They seem to have beenclerks of the court, and more generally, clerks attached to the judges (cf. Dt16: 18: I Ch 23: 4; 26: 29). ‘Clerk’ would also be a good translation oftheother “ses of the word, which denotes the officials in charge of forced labour(Ex 5: 6f.; perhaps 2 Ch 34: 13), and alro the administrative officers of thearmy (Dt 20: sf.). To complete tbio review ofthe judicial authorities, we mayremember that there was a pen”” at the king’s co”rt called ‘the king’s son’.who seems to have been a police officer.~

The legislative codes tell us little about judicial procedure, but the processof a trial can be reconstructed by piecing together the allusions in otherbooks of the Bible and by making “se of passages which represent God’sdisputes with me” as a formal uial, especially in Job and the second part ofI&S.

Justice was administered in public, at the gate of the town (Dt ZI : 19; AI”5:1o),inaholyplaccorasanctuvy(Ex21:6;22:7;Jg4:s;1S7:16;J126:I”). The king gave his judgments in the porch ofjudgment (I K 7: 7). whichwas open to all. As a general rule the action, rib, was brought by a privateperso” who appeared as plaintiff(Dtz3: 7.8;Jb 9: ,g; 13: 18; 23: 4; Pr 25:8; Jr 49: 19; cf Mt 5: 23). In certain religious cases, such as idolatry (Dt 17:

I. CC. pp. x15-lro.

15-5 n: CIVIL INSmuIIONs

a-s) OF blasphemy against God and the king (I K 21: tot). the ttibunal tookcog”isa”cc of the case after a den”nciation.

During the arguments the judge was seated (Is 16: 5; Dn 7: 9-m; 13: 50;cf. Jb 29: 7). but he stood up to pronounce sentence (Is 3: 13; Ps 76: IO). Theparties remained standing (IS 50: 8, literally, ‘let us stand up together’; cf. 41:I) and ‘to stand before the judge’ (Dt 19: 17) means ‘to appear in court’. Theaccuser was the ‘adversary’. the &Ion; he stood on the tight of the accused(Ps 1~: 6; Za 3: I). The defender also stood on the right (Ps 109: 31; cf.16: 8; 142: 5). but he was rather a witness for the deface than an advocate,for which there is no word in Hebrew. Nor was there any public prosecutor:each party pressed or defended his own case.

In the majority of cases the accusation wa presented orally. but Jb 21:35b36 indicates that it could be done in writing (ct Is 65: 6; Dn 7: IO). Theaccusedwasheard(Dt,7:4;Jb,j:~~;Is4,:~t;cf.Jn7:st),butJbjt:~gndoes not prove that he did or could present a written defence. The examina-tion of the case then began (Dt 13: 15; 17: 4; 19: 18).

Both parties called witnesses. There were witnesses for the prosecution, likethe accusers of I K 21: IO, 13. like the hills and the mountains on whichYahweh calls in the action he brings against his people (Mi 6: I), and wit-nesses for the deface (PI 14: 25; Is 43: 9. IO, 12; Jr 26: 17). Otherwise ther6les were not very clcvly defined. The accuser gave evidence (I K ZI : IO,13 ; Mi I : z), and in actions heard by the Elders the latter could be witnessesas well as judges; Is 5: 3 and Mi 6: I can be understood in either sense. For adeath sentence the law required at least two witnesses for the prosecution(Nb 35: 30; Dt 17: 6; cf. I K 21: IO; Dn 13: 34; Mt 26: 59-60; He I O: 28),and possibly for every case, according to Dt 19: 15; cf. Is 8: 2. These wit-nesses accepted responsibility for the sentence, which is why they had tothrow the first stones if the condemned party were stoned (Dt 17: 7; cf. 13:IO; Jn 8: 7). But their evidence had to be verifwd by the judges, and falsewitnesses were condemned to the punishment which would have befallen theaccused (Dt 19: 18-19; ct Dn 13: 62). This prospect does not seem to havepreventedmixarriagaofjustice(Ps27: 12; 35: 11; Pr6: 19; 12: 17; etc.,andd the trials of Naboth in I K 21: mf., of Swanna in Dn 13: 28f., of ourLord in Mt 26: s9f., and of Stephen in AC 6: I If.). According to the historianJosephus, women and slaves could not give evidence; if the rule is ancient,Israel’s practice differed from that ofMesopotamia..~Proofs of fact were produced before the judges: the herdsman accused of

losiig a beast had to produce the remains of the animal ifit had been mangledbyawildbeast(Ex2z:Iz;cf.Gnj,:j9;Am3:,z).Thewifeaccusedbyherhusband of having lost her virginity before her marriage presented the bed-linenofthe wedding-night, showing thesigns ofhervirginity(Dt 22: 13-17).Tam?r, accused before Judah, made him acknowledge the signet, the corda”d the staff she had received from him (Gn ~8: 25).

10: LAW AND ,usTIce 157

When everything had been thoroughly examined, the court ‘de&redguilty’ or ‘declared just, innocent’, that is, gave ia verdict of condemnationorrcquinal(Ex22:8;Dt2s:t;IK8:3Z;Prt7:1~).Thcrdleofthejudge,however, was not so much to impose a sentence as to settle a dispute whilerespecting justice. He was more a defender of tight than a punisher of crime.He was a just arbitrator (Jb 9: 3,).

8. The judpmr of God

When no decision could be reached after the examination, or if thexcused could not produce witnesses for the deface, they had recourse to anoath. In the Code of the Covenant, several cases are grouped together (Ex 22:6-m) : if an object entrusted to someone disappears and the t&f is not found,the trustee goes to El&m to attest that he has not taken another man’sgoods; if P dispute arises over a lost object, the matter is brought beforeElohim, and he decides who is responsible; if a beast entrusted to someone’scare dies or is wounded or is stolen unseen, an oath by Yahweh decideswhether the keeper is at fault or not. The last case clearly presumes a judicialoath. so the two former cases must be interpreted in the same way, giving‘El&m’ its regular sense of’God’, not of ‘judges’, a some ancient versionsand several modem expositors t&e it, or of ‘domestic idols’ (reraphfm) ashas lately been suggested. It may be associated with another method ofreligious test, where the oath is perhaps understood. When P murder has beencommittedin the country by some person unknown, theElders ofthe nearesttown kill a heifer near a stream and wash their hands over the animal, saying:‘Our hands have not shed this blood and our eyes have seen nothing.’ Theyare then covered against blood-vengeance (Dt 21: 1-8).

The judicial oath by the gods or the king was also pracdsed in Babylonia,in Assyria, at Nuzu and in the Jewish colony OfElephantine, especially whenproperty righrs were in question; as in the cases quoted from the Code ofthe Covenant, an oath terminated the action. A ma” might refuse the oath,but that was to own himself guilty: he feared that if he perjured himself hewould be stricken by the CUIS~ accompanying the oath. 1t is to such arefusal that Qo 9: 1 alludes, speaking of ‘him who swears an oath’ and ‘himwho fears to swear an oath’. It was therefore an imprecatory oath, as inNb 5: 21.

The oath itself is therefore a” ordeal, a judgment of God (cf. I K 8: 31).In Nb 5: 11-31 it is only one action of a f&r ritual. The husband who sus-pnts his wife of misconduct presents her to the priest. The priest sprinklessome of the dust of the sanctuary over a vessel of water, proffers the oath tothe woman, dissolves the writing containing the words of the oath into thewater, and then makes the woman drink the mixture. If she is guilty thiswater becomes for her a ‘water of bitterness and cursing’ which makes her

IS8 I,: CNIL INSTITUTrONI

barren for ever, a fearful example to all. IC will be observed there is here noquestion ofbringing an action, and that the priest is not acting as a judge butas the minister of a rite. We may connect it with the last part of the story ofthe golden calf in Ex 32: 20: the I o 1s ground to a fme powder which the‘d IIsraelites are made to swallow in water; the conclusion is doubtless m befound in v. 35: ‘And Yahweh chastised the people.’ The story ofthe massacreby the Levites (vv. z5f.) would come from another tradition.

This ordeal of bitter waters has no analogy in the ancient East. On theother hand, 1srae1 knew nothing of the judicial ordeal by throwing theaccused into a river. It was practised in Babylonia, in Assyria, in Elan. eastof the Tigris at Nwu, and on the banks of the Euphrates at Mari and Car-chemirh. If it is not found in Palestine, tbis may simply be because, apartfrom the Jordan, the country has no river in which anyone could possiblybe drowned.

Another form of the judgment of God is the drawing oflots. ‘The lot putsan end to quarrel and decides between the mighty’ (Pr 18: 18). It serves topick out one guilty man from a group, as with Akan (Jor 7: 14-15), andJonathan (I S 14: 38-42). In the latter case it is stated that the sacred lots werewed, the urirn and the thumtnim, which only a priest could handle. The highpriest’s breastplate, which contained the lots, is called for that reason the‘breastplate ofjudgment’ (Ex 2.8: 15). Aaron bears on his breast the ‘judg-ment of the children of Israel’ (Ex 28: 30). But again we should note that theprocedure here is extra-judicial, and the priest is acting only as the ministerof the divine oracle.

The death penalty is laid down for the following crimes:Intentional homicide (Ex 21: 12; Lv 24: 17; Nb 35: 16-21) for which

monetary compensation is never accepted (Nb 35: 31; Dr 19: 11-12); theabduction of a man in order to make him a slave (Ex 21: 16; Dt 24: 7).

Grave sins against God: idolatry(Ex 22: 19; Lv 20: 1-5; Dt 13: z-19; 17:z-7; cf. Nb 25: 1-5); blasphemy (Lv 24: 15-16); profanation of the sabbath(Ex 31: 14-15; cf. Nh 15: 32-36); sorcery(Ex 22: 17; Lv 20: 27; d I S 28:3.9); prostitution by a priest’s daughter (Lv 21: 9).

Grave sins agaimt parents (Ex 21: 15, 17; Lv 20: 8; Dr 21: 18-21);abuses of sexual relations: ‘adultery (Lv 20: IO; Dr 22: 22); differentforms of incest (Lv 20: II, IZ, 14. 17); sodomy (Lv 20: 13); bestiality(Lvzo: 15-16).

Thus Israelite law, unlike other Ezaern laws, limits capital punishment tooffences against the purity of worship, against the sanctity of life and thesources of life, and this religious motive is usually expressed in the laws. It isa consequence of the peculiar character of Israel’s legislation.’

I. cf. p. r,g.

IO: LAW AND ,usmx I59

As to the execution of the penalry, the murderer WY handed over to theavenger of blood, who employed whatever means he chose. Stoning isordered for idolaters (Dt 13: IO-II: 17: 5-7). for blasphemers (Lv 24: 14.23),for a woman who concealed the fact that she was not a virgin at the time ofher marriage (Dr 22: a). for the guilty f&n& and her accomplice (Dt 22:24), for the rebellious son (Dt 21: 21) and the man who profvled the sabbath(Nb 15: 35-36). A man who disotxyed an order of extermination and onewho was guilty of lessmajesty were also stoned, according to Jos 7: z5 and1 K 21: IO. It was the normal method of execution and it must also be pre-sumed when the text does not state it precisely (cf. Jn 8: 5 for the womantaken in adultery). The condemned person was taken out of the town ( I K21: IO, 13; cfLv 24: 14; Nb 15: 36). The witnesses for the prosecution castthe first stones and the people continued till death ensue<. The collectivecharacter of communal justice was thus expressed to the end.

The penalty could be increased by exposure of the bodies of the con-demned. They were ‘hung on the gibbet’, but had to be taken down beforenight (Dt 11: u-23; cf. Jos 8: 29; IO: 27). This was not the punishment ofbanging, for the condemned had already been executed (cf. in particular JosI O: 26; 2 S 4: 12). It was a mark of infamy and an example. We shouldprobably interpret the texts of Nh 25: 4 and z S 21: 9 in this way and under-stand that the corpses of the guilty were impaled.

Death by crudfudon was a punishment unknown in the Old Testament.IC is attested among the Persians (impalement or crucifixion), sporadicallyamong the Greeks, frequmrly among the Remans. The first mention of it inPalestine occurs in Flavius Josephus, writing of the persecution underAntiochus Epiphanes.

Death by burning is prescribed in the law for two cases only: prostitutionby a priest’s daughter (Lv ZI: 9) and the incest of a man who weds bothmother and daughter (Lv 20: 14). The same mode of death is ordered in theCode of Hammurabi for similar cases. According to Gn 38: 24, the samepunishment was inflicted in ancient times on an adulterous wife.

The punishment of flogging seems to be applied by Dt a: 18 to the manwho has slandered his wife, and by Dt 21: 18 to a disoba&nt son, accordingto the parallels in I K 12: II, 14 and Pr 19: 18. where the same verb isemployed. According to Dt 25: 1-3. the judge could impose up to fortystrokes of the whip (or rod?) on the guilty man, who was stretched on theground before him (cf. Jr 20: 2). By P legalistic scruple, later Jewish customrestricted the number to ‘forty save one’ (& Y. Co II: 24).

Bodily mudlation as a consequence of the lex tdionis is fairly common inthe Code ofHammurabi and the Assyrian laws, but it is found in Israelite lawonly in the special case ofDt 25: II-I& where it is a symbolic retaliation.’

Strictly speaking, there arc no pecuniary penalties, in the sense of finesI. CT. p. 149.

I60 n: avl‘ INSTIT”llONS

payable to the State or the community. The money paid to the priests inwtis6ction for a crime or sin (2 K IZ: 17) is not in the nature of a fme andarises from religious institutions. On the other hand, a wrong done to anindividual in his goods or rights ti equitably redressed. and this compensationhas a penal aspect, as it is generally luger than the damage caused. A nunwho has slandered his wife pays her father a hundred pieces of silver, whichis much more than he had paid in order to marry her (Dt 22: 1s). A seducerpays damaga to his victim’s father (Ex 22: 16). A man who has let his beastsgraze in the field or vineyard of another reimburses him on the basis of hisbat harvest (Ex 22: 4). One who is responsible for a fire which has spread tohis neighbour’r land and destroyed his crop compensates him for what thefire has destroyed (Ex 22: 5). A man who has caused the death of an animalby leaving a pit open pays the price of it to the owner (Ex 21: 34). A man whohas stolen a beast and slaughtered it must pay compasation, fivefold forale, fourfold for sheep or goats (Ex 21: 37; cf. 2 S 12: 6; Lk 19: 8). The‘scvcnfold’c~medinPr6:3~uld~Stz:6,intheGreck,irnortoberakenliterally and simply means perfect ratitution.

Imprisonment by judicial order dces not appear till after the Exile, in Erd7: 26, as an application of a foreign legislation. But there were prisons, inwhich accused persons were kept pmding a decision (Lv 24: 12; Nb 15: 34).andsuspects were shut up by policeaction, often arbitrarily (I K 22: 27; Jr 37:15-18). Putting a man in the pillory or the stocks was a funhcr punishment(z Ch 16: IO; Jr 20: 2; 29: 26). Bodily restraint of one sentenced to n&erestitution or of a d&king debtor (Mt 5: zj-26; 18: 30; Lk 12: 58-59) issomething borrowed from Hellenistic law. Under ancient legislation,thieves who could not make restitution were sold as slaves (Ex 21: 2) and aninsolvent debtor would sell himself or his dependents into slavcry to dis-charge his debt (Lv 25: 3gf.; Df 15: zf.).’

The very ancient custmn of blood-vengeance, carried out by the go’el.1never disappeared and was recognized by law. But the same law tried tolimit the abuses which could easily arise from ti exercise of private justice.It did so by distinguishing between voluntary and involuntary homicide, andby establishing placa of refiuge where an involuntary killer could findsafety.

The principle is laid down in the Code of the Covenant: the man who haskilled without premeditation may take refuge in a place which God willappoint. but the wilful murderer must be dragged from the altar itself to beput to death@ 21: 13-14). The ‘place’ thus denoted is evidently a sanctuary,where them is an altar. apparently any lawful sanctuary of Yahweh, but first

I. a. pp. B-81. 1, a pp. I I all.3 x-22

10: LAW AND ,uYrlca 161

i and foremost the central sanctuary of the tribal federation, that of the Ark.There Adoniv took refuge (I K I : 50-53). and Joab after him. ButJoab. whohad murdered Abner and Amasa, was not protected by the law of asylumand was put to death in the sanctuary itself. which he refused to leave(I K 2: 28-31). There is no other actual example of this recourse to asanctuary as 1 place of refuge, though certain expressions in the Psahns seemto refer to it. Thus the Temple is a shelter against enemies and anyonedwells there in safety (Ps 27: 2-s); there one is covered by the wings ofYahweh (Ps 61: 4-5). but the wicked arc not allowed in (Ps 5: 5).

A more stable institution is that of the Cities of Refuge. Unfortunately thetern describing them are hard to interpret. In the order of the boalu of theBible they are as follows:

Nb 35: 9-34: the Israditcs are ordered by God to have ~$ici where aninv&ntay killer can take refuge from blood-vengeance. +here arc to bethree cities of refuge in Tramjordan and three west of the Jordan, but theyUC not indicated by name. Asylum is granted only to the involuntarykiller: the wilful murderer may not be received and must die at the hands ofthe avenger of blood. The community decides the question of guilt. rcjccUthe murderer and watches over the involuntary killer, who must not leavethe city of refuge till the death of the high print.

Dt 4: 41-43. unconnected with ia context: Moses chooses three cities ofrefuge across the Jordan: Beser. &moth of Giead, Golan.

Dt 19: 1-13: after the conquest, the land must be divided into threeregions and three cities chosen, which arc not named (vv. R-9, an obviousaddition, orders that ifthe land should become greater still, three other citiesshall be added). They are to welcome the involuntary killer, but the mur-derer is to be rearrested by the Elders of his city and handed over to theavenger of blood.

Jos 20: I+: at Yahweh’s command and in pursuance of the instructionsgiven to Moses, Josue chooses the cities of refuge where an involuntarykiller will be protected from blood-vengeance. It is the Elders of these citieswho admit the hrgitive after inquiry. He remains rhere till he has beenjudged by the cotmnunity. till the death of the high priest. The list of thesetowns is given in w. 7-8 : Qedesh of Galilee in the hill-country of Nephthali,Shechem in the hill-country of Ephraim, Hebron in the hill-country ofJudah; on the other side of the Jordan, Baa on rhe plateau, Ram& inG&ad. Golan in Bashan.

These passages show us the development of the institution in apparent con-formity with the course of events recorded in the Pentareuch. The co-dof Nb 35. associated with the period on the steppes of Moab. fixes the rulesbut states neither the number nor the names of the cities: the land is not yetconquered. In Dt 4, Moses chcxxa three cities in the territory already occu-pied by the Israelites on the far side of the Jordan. Dt 19 providw for three

161 It: ClVlL INS1ITUTIONS

cities in the land of Canaan, which has still to be conquered, but does notname them; the additional verses, 8 and 9. provide for three other unnamedcities in order to complete the traditional number of six, without seeing thatthe three missing cities ate those of Dt 4. Finally, when the conquest is com-plete, Jos 20 recalls the rules proclaimed earlier and at last gives the names ofthe six cities with their geographical positions.

The picture is changed, however. if we examine and compare the vocabu-lary and context of the various texts. The latest of all is obviously Nb 35: ther6le accorded to the religious community, the ‘edah. and the mention of thehigh priest, whose death is the occasion for P general amnesty, show that itwas edited after the Exile. This late date and the absence of precise detailsabout the towns show that it was never actually in force. Dt 19 and Jos xx 4and 9a. on the contrary, which allot a r& m the Elden of the murderer’stown or of the city of refuge, and which also preserve the primitive idea ofblood-vengeance, are ancient. But Jos 20: 6 and gb, at least, are later re-touchings, which mention the community and the high priest in order tobring the text into line with Nb 3 5. and even so they do not avoid all incohet-ence. On the other hand, Dt 19 was never P real law, for the mwns ate notnamed, which would be necessary for the law to bc applicable. But thispassage prescribes three cities and three territories in Canaan, which arcgiven, with their names, in Jar 20: 7. If no city in Tramjordan is provided forby Dt 19, that is because the land was no longer in Israelite hands. The addi-tion in w. S-9, however, shows that the tradition of six cities of refuge wasstill remembered. Dt 19 thus appears as a project of reform which was nevercarried out: this reform presumer that the institution described in Jos 20: 7-ga is known, and maintains its principles, but adapts it to new circumstancesand secularizes it by taking away from cettain tcwm a privilege which theyowed, as we are about to explain, to the existence of a sanctuary, now con-demned by the law on centralization of worship. The oldest element in allthis documentation is therefore Jos 20: ~+a, which guarantees the existenceof cities of refuge, with the motives and rules for their institution (cf. Jos M:4 and Dt 19: 11-12). The list of cities of refuge in Tramjordan in Dt 4 comein its turn from Jar 20: 8.

AU the towm menticmed in Jos 20 are mentioned elsewhere as Leviticalmwm. The list is not invented: Beset and Golan do not appear apart fromthese two contexts, but Beser is mentioned as an Israelite town by the stele ofMesha, and the name of Golan is still preserved in the Bashan region. Further.among the six towm named, Qedesh was captured by Tiglath-Pikser in734 B.C . and Beset was conquered hy Mesha about 850. &moth of Gilnd,before being finally severed from trrael, was a town over which Israel and theAramaeans disputed in the tirst half of the ninth century. Golan and its regionwere lost soon atier the death of ~alomon. I[ is di&ult m trace the list backbeyond Solomon to the tribal federation, ot even to the reign of David, for

__

10: LAW AND ,USIICE 163the towns are chosen and determined by their geographical situation, not bytheir attachment to a tribe; the mention of Reuben, Gad and Manassch inconnection with the three towm in Tramjordan simply gives a second gewgraphical designation and must be considered as secondary. The instimtionis therefore independent of tribal organization, and does not antedate thereign of Solomon. One may wonder whether it remained long in force andhow it developed, but there are no su&ient grounds for asserting that it wasa late invention to which nothing corresponded in reality.

Qedesh. the ‘holy town’, Shechem, hallowed by the memory of Abrahamand Jacob, by the tomb ofJoseph and the covenant under Josue. and Heb-ton, which possessed the tomb of the Patriarchs, had each its famous sanc-tuary. Very probably the three cities across the Jordan were also holy p&s.Thus the institution ofthe Cities of Refuge is linked with t$e tight ofasylumrecognized at the sanctuxies. But it appears on the other hand as the seculatiz-ing of an originally religious custom (d Er 21: 13-14). The prerogatives ofthe sanctuaries and their ministers were in the end transferred m the Cities andtheir councils ofElders.

CHAPTEQ. Erevm

ECONOMIC LIFE

I Landed pmpmy

IN Egypt all tbe land belonged to the Pbxaoh or the temples, and theIsraclires were astonished at this land system which was 50 differem fromtheir own (Gn 47: x-26). In Mesopotamia, though, the king and the

sanctuaries owned large estates, but the oldest texts show that communities,families and individuals already had certain lands, which the king couldacquire only by purchase from the owners. With these and other lands of hisestates. the king used to found fiefs. A fief is a grant of immovable property,made to an individual in return for the obligation to render personal services.This feudal system was very widespread in the Near Fast. The Code ofHammunbi and the Hit& Code devote several articles to it and it is fre-quently alluded to in the Nuzu and Ugarit documents. Thex texts span thesecond millennium B.C. At first the fief appears as an inalienable charge, towhich personal services are attached. Gradually it took on the character ofheritable property, of which a man might freely dispose, and the feudalservices attached to it became attached to the property, not to any person orpewxls.

This development of the fief was already far advanced when ~rrael firstappeared as a people. It was even later that this people became P centralizedstate, and apparently they never experienced a feudal regime. Those raretexts where some have tried to see an allusion to Gefs arc capable of anotherinterpretation. For example, I S 8: 14 predicts that the king will seize fieldsuld vineyards and give them to his officers; according to I S 22: 7. this wasalready happening in Saul’s time, but these lands were given as gifts ratherthan fiefs, for there is no mention of any service attached to them. WhenSaul promises to exempt the family of the man who slays the Philistinechampion (I S 17: ZJ), the reference is to exemption from taxes or forcedlabour rather than enfranchisement from the service of 2 fief. Only cmce isthere an unmistakable reference to feudal services: David received the townof Siqlag from the Philistine prince of Gath on condition that he ensured thepolicing ofthe desert and followedhis suzerain to war ( I S 17: 6, to; 28: I); itwas a military fief, but we arc on Philistine t&tory.

Neverthelns, the feudal idea war found in Israel, though transferred on tothe tbcological plane. As Yahweh is the only true king of Israel (Jg 8 : 23 ;

i ‘,

@I I : ECONCJMIC Lm. 16s

1 : I S 12 : I& so he is the sole lord of the soil.’ The Holy Land ia the ‘domain of: V=hweh’~oszt:~g),thc’luldofYlhweh’(0s~:3;cf.Ps.8~:z;Jr~6:r8:

___~ _,l.ItisthelvldhehadpromisedtorheFathers(GnIz:7;t3:rS;rS::. 18;d:4;Ex3~:t3;Dt1:3~-36),thellndhehasconqueredmdgiventohis

people (Nb 32: 4; Jos 23: 3. 10; 24: 11-13; Ps 44: 4). This property-tightwhich God retains over all lands was invoked as the basis of the law ofJubilee (Lv 25: 23).a It is also in virtue of God’s supreme dominion thatteligious law limits the rights of the human occupants: hence the duty ofleaving gleanings of corn and vines for the poor (Lv rg: *IO; 23: 22; Dty: 1+x; cf. Rt 2); the right of every passer-by to satify his hunger whenpassing &rough a Geld or a vineyard (Dt 23 : 25-26); the annual tithe due toYahweh (Lv 27: 3-32). to be uteri in Yahweh’s presence (Dt 14: z&27),given to the Levita (Nb 18: 21-32); the tithe every third year for the poor(Dt 14: 28-w; 26: IZ+), and the law about fallow gro&l in the sabbaticalyear(Ex 23: l-11; Lv 25: 2-79.3

In the second millennium B.C., at Nuru and in Assyria. the fief were distri-buted by drawing lots; in the same way, the Promiwd Land, at Yahweh’scommand, was shared by lot between the aibes. according to Jos 13: 6;1~:1;16:1;17:~;18:6-1g:.+g.passim:Jg1:3.Tbis sharingout bylotofthe ‘plots in which the uibes were in fact already settled, or which they hadstill to conquer, is the expression of God’s sovereign dominion over the land;in actual fact the tribes acquired their territories by the hazards of a conquestwhich is schematized in Jos 6-m, and represented in Jg I as still incomplete.But probably the drawing oflots among the Tribes for the Holy Land is onlyan imaginative extension to the whole people of what in fact took place at thelevel of the clan and the family. 1n the nomadic system, pastures and wateringplaces are the ccmmmn property of the tribe.4 When the tribe becomessettled, the same system ma.y be applied to the arable land. This idea ofcomnmn property still sutvives in modem times, and it is interesting to findit attested in ancient Mesopotamia, from the Kassite period onwards; it isparticularly noticeable among the Aramaean tribes on the T&is banks,whose social structure wa like that of the earliest Israelites. These communallands are often mentioned in the kudurwr, land-survey documents which wereused to authenticate the purchve of a tribal propetty by the king and itstransfer to an individual or a temple.

The use of these common lands, however, is divided among the membersof the group, each member of which cultivates a part for his own benefit.There has been a similar system in modem Palestine, traces of which stillremain. Outside the village and its immediate surroundings. which wereptivate property (mu/k), the test was Government land (miri) and allotted tothe village as commcm land (mesha’). This was divided into plots which weredistributed in rotation, generally every year. or drawn for by lot among the

1. cf. p. $4. 1. Cf. pp. *,5-L??. 1. cf. p 17,. 1. CF. p. 9.

166 II: cnm INSnIun0NS

heads of families. Except for its temporary nature, this is the same division bylot betwccr clans and families as that prescribed by Nb a6: 55-56; 33: 54;36: 2; cf. z.7: 7; this tocn is what Ezecbid foretold for tbc future Israel (Ez45: I; 47: 22). The same wordg&al, originally ‘a pebble’, means both the‘lot’ which 7uas drawn ad the ‘plot’ assigned by the lot. According to Is 34:17, Yahweh himself ‘drew by lot the portion of each one’. and ‘divided theland to them byline’; inMi z: 5, the monop&zenwill be dcspoiledand ‘willhxve none to cat the line for them on a plot in the assembly of Yahweh’:according to Ps 16: s-6, the faithful man has Yahweh for his plot, the linemarks out for him a choice portion. The USC of such figures would have nom&g u&s there existed an actual custom similar to the modern practice,and perhaps a partition of this kind is alluded to in Jr 37: 12.

This commual property, the temporary use ofwbicb was divided amonga number of families, is fir less in evidence than family property. which.it seems, was the normal system in Israel. In our texts the wordg&al, ‘lot’ and‘plot’, alternates with hekq, ‘portion’ and nahalah, ‘heritage’. This ancestralestate often contained the family tomb (Jos 24: 30, 32; I S 25: 1; I K 2: 34;cf. Gn 23). It was dcfincd by boundaries which it was strictly forbidden bylaw tO CCL,KWc @t IQ: 14; 27: 17; cf.37 24: 2; PI 22: 28; 23: 10; OS 5: 10).

The peasant was deeply attached to the piece of ground he had inherited fromhis fathers: Na.both refused to surrender his vineyard a.t Y&reel to A&b. andthe king could not legally force him to do so (I K 21). The social ideal warthat everv man should live ‘under his vine and under his fig-tree’ ( I K 5 : 5 ;Mi 4: 4;‘Za 3: I D) .

Public feeling and custom took care &at this patrimony was not alienated,or that at least it should not tnss out of the familv. It is mobable that when

I I I

land was inherited it was not shared like the other property but passed to thecl&t son or remained undividcd.~ If a man dies without male heirs, the landis bequeathed to his daughters (Nb 27: 7-s), but they must marry withintheir tribe, so that their portion may not be transf%red to another tribe (Nb36: 6-9). If& owner dies childless, the inheritance reverts to his brothers, hisuncles or his nearest kinsman (Nb 27: g-11). If the Law of Levirate bids aman to marry his widowed and childless sister-b-law, the object is no doubtto raise up descendants to the deceased, but it is also to prcvcnt the alienationof the family propcrty.~

!%metimes, however, an Israelite was obliged by poverty to sell his patri-m o ny. One of the duties of the go’d 3 was to buy tbe land which his nearrelation had to abandon. Hence Jcrcmias buys the field of his cousin Hana-meel (Jr 32: 69). and Boaz, in place of the ncarest go’rl. buys the land of

1. Cf p. 53. 1. CF. p. ,*, 1. Cf. pp. ,1 and 11-11,

The sale ofa property was recorded by a contract. This might be simply anoral contract, made in the presence ofwitnesses in a public place, at the towngate: thus Boaz acquires the property of Naomi and the right to marry herdaughter-in-law (Rt 4: 9-n). Abraham’s purchase of the field ofEphron is

I. cf. pp. 72-n. 2. Cf. p. 76. 1. Cf. pp. 111-x21.

Eli”,&. which Naomi, his widow. was Off&g for s& (Rt 4: 9). Note&at in these cases there is no question of the repurchase of a property alreadysold, but of a prior right to purchase a property offered for sale, and that &land is not restored to the impoverished kinsman, but becomes the propertyof the go’el. Thcx are the only concrete cases recorded in the Bible and it is intheir light that the law of Lv 25: z.5 must be interpreted: ifan Israelite fallsinto distress and has to sell his land. his nearest go’cf coma ‘to his house’(Bcnerally omitted by translators) and buys what he has to sell. The aim ofthis institution is to keep for kinsfolk the property which the head of a familycannot keep for bimsclfand his direct dcsccndants; it thus links up with thelaws on the marriage of heiresxs and inberitmce in the collateral line. But inLv 25 this ancient arrangement is recalled in a d&rent context: the object ofthe Law of Jubilee is in fact to restore property to the individual or familywhich used to possess it, not merely to retain it in the cl& compared withthe institution of thcgo’rl, it is something new an& as we shall see, Utopian.

But the go’el did not always exercise his right of prc-emption and theeconomic development of the fast centutica of the monarchy~ hastened thebreak-up offamily properties in favour of rich landlords. Is 5: 8 curses ‘thosewho add house to how and join field to field. until there is no room left formycane else’; Mi z.: 2 condemns those ‘who covet Gelds and seize them,houses and they take them’. These latijundia (large estates) wcrc worked byslaves (2 S Q: I O), or by paid workmcn.~ The system of rent-holding ormCtnyage, land tmurc in which the farmer pays a part (usually half) of theproduce as rent to the ovmcr. who furnishes stock and seed. was apparentlynever pracdscd in Israel in early days, though it was known in Mesopotamia,and was later provided for in the Rabbi& period. Am 3 : II blames the richfor taking tribute from the corn of the poor, which could be an allusion to amPtayagc, but it may refer to the tithe, the collection and profits of whichwere left by the king to his o&err (cf. I S 8: 13). The first mention of therenting of lands is found in the parable in Mt ZI : 33-41, and the earliest docu-ments UC the contracts of mhayage discovered in the caves of Murabbdar.dad A.D. 133.

Finally, it will be recalled that the king owned large estates.3 The royalestate was managed by stewards ( I ch 27: +31), and worked by the labourof State slaves and the levy of free men (I S 8: 12).

&u reprewted as an oral transaction, made in the sight of all who passedthrough the gate ofthc town (Gn 23: 17-18). But its terms are as precise as alegal deed and comparable to the cuntracts on cuneiform tablets: a de&ption of rhe land Icquired, the names of the contraning parties and the wit-ncsses. Mention of the gate of the town recalls the clause in certain contnctrat Nuzu, drawn up ‘after proclamation at the gate’. The transxtion atHcbrcm may welI have been condudcd by the drawing up of such Pcontract.

The use of written contracts. which had long existed in Canan and all theNear Eat, was certainly widespread in Israel. Two cuneiform tablets foundat Suer contain c~ntrxts of sale made under Assyrian rule in the seventhcentury B.C. and drawn up in Assyrian. It is mere chance dut Ihe Bible speaksonly once of a written contract, but it doa so in great detail (or 32: 614).Jeremias buys the field offered for sale by his cousin Hanameel. The contractis drawn up, se&d and signed by the witnesses; the money is weighed out.The deed is nude out in duplicate; one document is sealed, rhc other ‘open’.All is dune ‘according to the prescribed rules’ and the two copies are given toBan& to be preserved in an earthen vase. This has been compared with theduplicate documents of Mesopotamia: the tablet of the contract was wrappedin a sheath of clay on which the same text was reproduced. But in Jeremias’time this custom no longer survived in Mesopotamia, and moreover his deedof purchase, drawn up in Hebrew, would be written on papyrus or, lessprobably. on parchment. This is the earliest evidence of a type of documentof which there are many examples in Egypt, from the Hellenistic periodonwards; some, dating from the beginning of the second century of our era,have lately been discovered in ~&tine. On the same sheet of papyrus twocopies of the contact were written, separated by a blank space. The first cupywas rolled up and sealed, the other rolled up but not sealed: this is the ‘open’copy ofwbichJeremias speaks. It could be consulted at will but was liable tobe falsified; if a &pute arose the scaled copy was opened. Bamch was to putthe contmzt in an earthen vessel: the custom ofpreserving family archives inthis way is attested by many archxological finds.

The Old Testament tells w little about the value of land. Abraham buysthe field and ,~ve of Macpelah for 400 shekels (Gn 23: IS). Jacob pays Phundred qe,+h (due unknown) for the land of She&m (Gn 33 : 19; Jos 24:32). David buys the threshing-floor and oxen of Araunah for fifty shekclr(2 S 24: 24). Omri pays two talents of silver (6.~c.1 shekels) for the bill ofSamaria (I K 16: 24); Jeremias’ field costs him seventeen shekels (or 32: 9).These statements give us a certain order of values but nothing cuct, since weknow neither the arca of the lands nor the exact weight of the shekel, nor thepurchasiig powet of silver at the different periods. According to Lv 2.7: 16the v&e of a Geld is calculated at fifty shekels for every bomn of barleyproduced.

I I : BCONOMlC UFP. IasI,, early days the transfer of ptoperty was ratified by a symbolic action.

According to Rt 4: 7. it was once the custom in Israel to validate all transac_dons in this way: one of the parties removed his sandal and gave it tu theu&r. This action, performed before witnesses, signified the abandonment ofa right. Naomi’s first go’rl in this way renounces his right of pre-emption infavour of Bou (Rt 4: 8) ; the brother-in-law who declines the moral obliga-dun of the levitate has his shot removed (Dt 25 : 9-m) ; he is dispossessed ofthe tight he had over his brother’s widow.1 The shoe seems to have servedu a probative instrument in transfers of land: in Ps 60: IO= 108: IO, thepbrasc ‘ova Edom I cast my sandal’ implies taking possession. At Nuzu, theseller lifted his foot off the ground he was selling, and placed the buyer’s footon it. Here, too, a pair ofshoer (and a garment) appears as a fictitious paymentto convalidate certain irregular transactions. This may explain, in Am 2: 6;8: 6. the poor man who is sold, or bought, for a pair of sandals: he has beenunjustly dispossessed. while the exaction has been given a cloak of legality.The same meaning would then be found in the Greek of I S 12: 3, confirmedby Si 46: 19; Samuel has not taken a pair of sandals from any man, that is, hehas nut twisted the law to make an illicit profit.

Deposit is a free contract by which a man places an object in the safe keeping ofanother, who does nut make use ofit and gives it back on demand. TheCode of the Covenant (Ex a: 6-12) provides for the deposit of money, mov-able objects and animals. If the thing deposited disappears or is damagedthrough no fault of the depositary, he may exonerate himself by taking anoath; otherwise he owes compensation. The law of Lv 5: 21-26 adds that ifhe makes a false declaration he must restore the deposit and one fifth. TheBabylonian law of Esbnunna and the Code of Hammurabi contain similarprovisions, and the latter requires the deposit to be made before witnesses andregistered by a contract. A late example of rhis procedure occurs in the Bookof Tobias (Tb I: 14; 4: I, 20; J: 3; 9: 5). The elder Tobias deposited tentalents of silver with Gabael in sealed bags. The deposit was confirmed inwriting, signed by the depositor and the depositary, each of whom kept halfof the document. On presentation of the document the representative ofTobios was given back the deposit.

A deposit involves no charge on either of the parties. This is not true ofhiring, but this form of contract-apart from the hiring of services fromwage-amers~was scarcely known among the Israelites. There is only thetext of Ex 22: 14. which, if interpreted in the light of the Hittite law, mayrefer tu the hiring of a beast. We have already said that Am 5: II containsonly an uncertain &sion to the hiring of lands. The hiring of money and

I. Cf p. 1,. 1. Cf. p. 76.

170 1,: Clvn INSTIv.mONS

foodstut&. on the other hand, was developed in the form afloans at interest,in spite of legal prohibitions.

5. Loans

When an Israelite fell on hard times and was reduced to borrowing, heshould have found help among his clan or tribe. Lending to the poor is agood deed (Ps 37: a; 112: 5; Si 29: I-Z; cf. Mt 5: 42). But many refusedbecause the bottowero did not honout their obligations and did not dischargethem, even when they were able to (Si 29: 3-7; cf. 8: 12).

AU this concerns loans without interest, the only kind of loan allowed bythe Code of the Covenant (Ex 22: 24), which contemplates only loansbetween Israelites. This provision is developed by the law of Dt 23 : 20; onemay not take interest on money. food ot anything whatever lent to one’sbrother, and the same precept is found in Lv z.3 : 35-38; but one may lend atinterest to a foreigner (Dt 23: 21; cf. 15: 6). Lending at interest was in factpractised by all Israel’s neighbows.

Interest is called in Hebrew neshek, literally. ‘a bite’, and tarblrh, literally,‘increase’. The former word is found alone in the laws afEx and Dt and inPs 15 : 5. In later texts it is always used along with the second, and it is hard todistinguish between them. Possibly nerhrk at first referred to any kind of loan(cf. Dt 23 : 20) and was later restricted to loans ofmoney, torblth then applyingto loam in kind (cf. Lv 25 : 37, where we have, as an exception, the cognateform mmbith). In that case the Aramaic of Elephantine, in the fifth centuryB.C., would give us the final stage in the development: here marbith is the onlyword used for interest, even in money. Possibly, too, the vocabulary reflectsan evolution in the system oflending: either the borrower signs a receipt forsixty shekels and only receives forty (nerhek, a bite) or else he signs a receipt forforty shekels and undertakes to pay sixty on maturity (tarbEth, increase).Alternatively, rarbirh may be an increaw provided for in care of non-execn-tion, or finally an increment to take account ofthe depreciation of the provi-sions borrowed in winter and restored after the harvest, when pricer standlower. Information is so satce that we can only guess.

Economic development and example from abroad led to frequent viola-tion of these laws. The just man does not lend at interest, says Ps 15: 5. butthe wicked does so (Pr 2.8: 8; cf. Ez 18: 8, 13. 17), It is one of the sins forwhich Jerusalem is condemned (Ez a: 12)). Things were no better after theExile, and in Ne 5: 1-13 we find the people burdened with debts. Lending atinterest, at rates which stnke us a usury, was practised by the Jews atElephantine. From Rabbitic sources it appears that the Jer~nalem Templeitselflent at interest, and the parable in Mt 25: 27; Lk 19: 23 presumer thatthe custom was common and accepted. The Greek papyri ofEgypt, however,show tha: the Jews did not take to these strictly banking operations till a lateperiod.

I I : BCOtiOMlC LIFE 171

The ant~w.l rate of interest in the an&nt Near East was very high: inBaby&a and Assyria it was generally a quarter or a fifth for money Icans, athird for loans in kind, and often much more. In Upper Mesopotamia and inElam, the interest on money was higher-up to one-third ot a half, but theinterest on loans of corn was the same as in Babylonia. In Egypt the tatedropped in the Ptolemaic period and seam to have been twelve per cent perannum at Elephantine; this was also the maximum pctmitted fate at Rome atthe beginning of our era. We do not know what the practice was in Israel.The Massoretic text of Nc 5: II was interpreted by the Vulgate, in the lightof Roman usage, as meaning an interest of one per cent a month, but this textis corrupt.

6. Securities

To guard against his debtor’s defaulting, the creditor could demand asecurity. In Gn 38: 17-18, Judah gives Tamat his signet, cord and staff aspledge, ‘erobdn (whence, through Greek and Latin, comes the English ‘anearnest’), of her fee. According to I S 17: 18. when David W&E sent to hisbrothers he had to bring back to his father a pledge, ‘arubbah, as proofthat hehad fulfilled his errand. In credit operations the pledge is a surety, an objectin the possession of the debtor which he hands over to the creditor as guaran-tee for his debt.

A movable pledge is called @bol, (uibolah, or ‘db& ‘abtft, and the cognateverbs mean ‘to engage’. In spite of attempts to &ting& between theirmeanings, these words seem to be synonymous (ct the identical presctip-dons ofEx 22: 25-26, hbl, and Dt 24: 12r13, ‘bt). These pledges were suretiesaccepted when the loan was granted: they remained the property of thedebtor and there is nothing to show that the creditor had the tight torealize them in order to recoup himself: the pledge must be retuned (Ez 18:12, 16; 35: IS). According to Dt z.4: 10-11, the creditor may not enter thedebtor’s house to take his pledge for himself; it must be handed to him out-side, no doubt in order to avoid all appearance of seizure. It was forbidden toaccept as sureties objects which arc means of livelihood, such as the mill or themillstone (Dt 24: 6). The pledge was often a garment, a substitute for theperson, but the code of the Covenant says that the poor nun’s garment mustbe given back to him at dusk, because it is all he has to covet himself with atnight (Ex 22: 25-26; the law is repeated in Dt 24: 12-13; cf. Jb 22: 6; 2.4: 9(tort.); Am 2: 8). This garment, which the creditor was forbidden to keepexcept in the dayrime, was not P real pledge, proportionate in value to thecredit, but a symbolic instrument, a probative pledge, which seems to havebeen generally ttne of movable pledges in Israel. But the orphan’s ass andthe widow’s ox (in Jb 24: 3) are real sureties, which can even be used top&it.

Only once is there any question of immovable pledges: according to Ne

r?2 tt: cwu. INST*TunONS

5 : 3 the Jews pledged their fields, vineyards and houses in order to get corn.It is more than a mortgage, for the creditors were already installed in theseproperties (v. 5) and Nehemiah demvlded restitution (v. 11). It is at least aprofit-bluing surety, the revenue from which gwr t” pay off the debt; it isperhaps a” alienation pure and simple, since the pmpxty ‘belongs toothers’ (v. 5). a fact which contradicts the notion of a pledge.

It is possible that movable pledges, especially g-en”, were only ptc-bativc instruments of a weightier guarantee, the pledge of a man’s ownpcrso”. According to Dt 24: I”, the ma” who lends against security(mahrkiah) must not go into the debtor’s house to seilc the pledge (Lb&)which, according to w. tz-13, is a garment. Now in Dt 15: z the maskrkrkis a person who works for the creditor, and this is also the sense which mustbe given to mashska’ in NC IO: 32, referring to the sabbatical year, like Dt 15.The context agai” allows UJ to understand it as a personal pledge in Ne 5 : 7.IO, II (corr.), where the same word is used. The debt contracted on thisguarantee is called markska’ak (Dt 24: 10; PI 22: ~6).

The person who stood as security was hvlded “vet to the creditor onlywhen the debt matured and in case of “on-payment. He passed into theservice of the creditor, who employed him to recover the interest and, ifnecessary, the principal. This is clear from the story in 2 K 4: t-7: the lenderagainst security, the n&he’, comes to take the widow’s two sons to make themhis slaves, but they are still with her, and thanks to the miracle ofEliseus sheredeems her pledge (n’skf) and keeps her children. The same passage shows LUthat the pledge was someone dependent on the debtor and not the debtorhimrelf. In Ne 5 : 2 (co~r.) and 5, the Jews pledge their sons and daughters, whoare handed over into slavery (d Is so:, : Yahweh has not sold his children,the Israelites. to lenders on pledge). Such me” easiiy made themselves odiousthrough the exercise of their rights. The Code of the Covenant rebukes thepractice (Ex 22: 24) and Nehemias was bitterly angry at it (Ne 5: 6f.; cf.I s 22: 2; Ps 109: II).

If he had no personal pledge the defaulting debtor had to enter the serviceofbis creditor, or sell himself to a third party so as to repay his debt (Dt 15:12; Lv 23: 39, 47). Insolvency was the main cause of Israelites being reducedto slavery.1

7. Sureties ad bail

The seizure of the pledged person or the actual debtor could be preventedby entering bail or surety 1n Biblical law the surety is the person who, whenthe debt matures, ‘intervenes’ (the rcmt ‘rb), in favour of the insolvent debtorand assunxs responsibility for the payment of the debt, either by obtainingit from the debtor or by substitudng himself for him. The collections of lawsdo not mention it, but there are many allusions to it in the Sapiential books,

I. CL p. 81.

I I : ECONOMIC LIFE 173and the texts in Pr I I: to; 17: 18; 20: 16=26: 13. which belong t” the’ salomonic’ collectio”s, show that the practice was not of late date in Israel.There is very early evidence of it in Mesopotamia.

The surety intervened by the symbolic gesture of ‘striking the hands’, thatis,shakinghands(Pr6: I; II: 15; 17: 18;~~: 26;Jb 17: 3).InMesopotamiahe ‘struck the forehead’ of the debtor, but the resemblance between theactions is probably only outward. The surety had to try to free himself byimportuning the debtor till he paid up (PI 6: 3-5); otherwise he himselfbecvne &able to seizure (Pr 20: 16=2.7: 13; 2~: 27). The Book of Proverbswarns rash me” against thus going surety for their friends or for strangers.Sira& is less unfavourable to the practice: a good nun goes surety for his“eighbour, but his beneficiary is not always grateful, and going surety hasbrought nuny to their ruin; in any case, one must not go svety beyond one’smeans (Si 29: t4-20; d 8: 13).

8. Tkc sabbaricd year

Alienation of family property and the development of lending at interestled to the growth of pauperism and the enslavement of defaulting debtors ortheir dependants. This destroyed that social equality which had existed at thetime of the vibal federation and which still remained as XI ideal. Religiouslegislation attempted to remedy these evils by two institutions. the sabbaticalyeat and the jubilee year.

The Code of the Covenant provided that a” Israelite slave should not bekept more than six years: he was set at liberty in the seventh yeax. ““less hepreferred to stay with his master (Ex +I : w5).’ This passage apparently meanvthat the six years are counted from the time a ma” enters into service.According to the Code of the Covenant again, the fields, vineyards andolive groves are to lie fallow every seventh year and their produce is to beleft for the poor (Ex zj : IHI). The text doer not say whether this reckoningvaries with each field and owner. or whether the law orders a generalmeasure, applicable at a fixed date. The latter solution is favoured by thefollowing verse, which refers to the sabbath day and is formulated in theante way (Ex 23: 12).

There is no such ““certainty in the law of Deuteronomy (Dt I 5 : 1-18). The‘remission’ (sh’mi&zh) occuts every seventh year, and then all persons whohave been enslaved for not~-~a~tnent of a debt ate set free (w, 1-6). Verses12-28, which repeat the law of Ex ZI : z-6 in this new context, are an invita-tion to interpret that law in the same manna: the slaves are inrolvent debtorswho have ‘sold’ themselves or have been ‘sold’, and setting them free in-volves writing off the debt. Vv. 7-11. however, prove that this retision isgeneral and bappem at fixed dates: no one may refuse a loan to his poorerbrother, thinking: ‘Soon it will be the seventh year, the year of remission.

I. cf. p. (I?.

174 It: ClYlL INSTI~UIs”NI

The genenl and pctiodic nature of this institution is confirmed by Dt 3 I : E-11, which orders the reading of the Law’evcty scvcn yexs, the time fixedfor the year of remission’.

The law of Ex 23: IO-I 1 about land, not found in Deuteronomy, is re-peated by Lv 25 : z-7: every seventh year the land is to have its sabbatical rest,zucording to a cycle which is reckoned to begin, by 1 ubbath year, from thepeople’s entry into the Promised Land. God pledges his bluing for the sixthyear. the produce of which wilI enable them to live through the year offallow and the next year too, till the harvest (Lv 25: x8-22).

From all these provisions it appears that the sabbatical year was marked by2 rest for the land and the setting free of Israelite slaves, signifying theabandonment of debts. The cycle ofseven years is obviously inspired by theweek of seven days, ending in the sabbath rest. whence the use of the sameword ‘rabbxh’ to denote both this year of rest uld the whole period (LV zs :8; 26: 34, 35. 43). The seven-year periods recur in other Biblical contexts(Gn 4r: 25-36; Dn 9: 24-27), and in OrientsI literature. But no exact parallelhas been found for the remission in the sabbatical year; a Ptolcmaic papyrusremitting a debt contracted seven years earlier does not necessarily implyeither the same practice ot Jewish influence.

In the Bible itself there is scarcely my evidence for the institution apxtfrom the legislative texts. 1t is very unlikely rhat the ‘sign’ given by IS&~(2 K s9 : zp= Is 37: 30) refers to the sabbatical (or jubilee) year, in spite of theanalogies of the text with Lv 25: 21-z The freeing of the slaver underScdecias is an exceptional measure, in connection with which Jeremias quotesDt IS: u-13. but complains that the law is not observed. According to thetradition of Lv 26: 35-36, 43; cf. 2 Ch 36: 21, the Holy Land was never ableto ‘enjoy its sabbaths’ tiU the Jews were deported. After the Exile, Nehemiasmade them promise to give up in the seventh year the produce of the soiland persons held ar sureties, which obviously refers to the prescriptions of thesabbatical year (Ne 10:32). Though Nc 5: 1-13 makes no allusion to it, thisdoes not mean that the law was then unknown, nor even that it was knownbut not observed, for the social crisis demanded an immediate solution (cf.v. II) without waiting for the sabbatical cycle.

It is not, however. till the Hellenistic period that we find clear proof thatthe law was applied, at least in leaving land fallow: in 163-162 B.C. the Jewslacked provisions, ‘for it was a sabbatical year granted to the land’ (I M 6:49, 53). Other historic& data are provided by the historian Josephus; these. ifthey were more reliable, would allow us to trace this observance down to thebeginning of rhe reign of Herod the Great. For the reign of Herod we haveanother piece ofevidence that the law existed and was a source of embarrass-ment to lenders. During this period H&l invented a way of circumventingthe law by the prosbol: a clause was inserted in the contract by which thedebtor renounced the advantage he would have gained from dx sabbatical

1 I: ECONOMIC LIFE 175year. An xknowledgment of a debt containing such a &use hu hm dis_covered at Mutabba’at. The land, too, was given rest: it is signifunt thatcontracts of mt+aymyage found in the same place arc concluded up to the nextsabbatical year (sh’mitbdt). They nre dated in Febmaty, A.D. 133. which wouldmark the beginning, more or less, of il sabbatical period, the time whencontmcts of land tenure would be renewed.

The sabbatical yeu is therefore an ancient institution, but it is hard to sayhow ftithfully the Israelites observed it. Positive cvidmce is rare and late, andcomes from periods of national and religious fcrvour.

In Lv zs prescriptions about the sabbatical year are combined with those onthe jubilee year (Lv 25: 8-17, 23-55. several parts of which gpply equally toboth). This text raises some difficult problems. The jubilee (ySbrl) is so calledbecause itp opening wap announced by the sound of the trumpet (y6bel). Itrecurred every ffty years, at the end of seven weeks of years. 1t was a generalcmmcipation (d’r&) of aU the inhabitants of the land. The fields lay f&w:every man re-entercd his ancestral property, i.e. the fields and houses whichhad been s&mated returned to their original owners. cxccpt for the townhouses, which could only be m-purchased in the year after their sale. Conx-qucntly, tramactiom in land had to be made by UlcuLting the number ofyears before the next jubilee: one did not buy the ground but so many har-vests. Finally, defaulting dcbton and IsraeIitc slaves were set free. so the pur-chase price of these slaves was reckoned from the nmnbcr of years still toelapse before the nextjubilee. Religious grounds are given for these measures:the land cannot be sold absolutely, for it belongs to God; Israclitcs cannot bccast into perpetual slavery, for they are the servants of God, who broughtthem mu of Egypt.

The practiul application of this law seems to mcountcr insuperableobstacles. Unless we arbiuarily suppose, against the cvidcnce ofw. 8-10. thatthis fif&th year was really the forty-ninth, the lxst of the sabbatical years, thelands must have been left fallow for two consecwive years. The law presumesthat the transfer of property, loans at interest and enslavemat for debt arccurrent practice, and such was indeed the ca~c in the period of the monarchy.But in such a developed society it is hard to suppose dut there was z generalreturn of lands and real propc’ty to theit original owners or their heirs.Secondly, the ditections on the redemption or liberation of the slav.z wouldbc in&ctive in them&as and arc in contradiction to the law of thesabbatical year, which provides for their libuation every seventh year.

There is no evidence that the law was ever in fact applied. Two legi&tivepassages refer to it (Lv 27: 16-2~ and Nb 36: 4) but they belong to the fmal

I. Cf. p, **.

176 u: CIVIL ,N~Trrun0N$

revision of the Pentatcuch and clearly depend on Lv z.5. No historica textmentions it, even when it seemr to be required by the context. On the sob-jectoftheliberation ofthe Hebrew slaves, Jr 34: rqquotes Dt 15. but not Lv25. Nehemias makes the people promise to observe the sabbatical year, butsays nothing about the jubilee year (Ne IO: 32). In the prophetical books.Ez 46: 17 apparently refers to it: if the prince makes a gift from his domain toone of his servants, the gih reverts to the prince ‘in the year of emancipa-tion’ (&Sr). as io Lv 25: IO. But Ezechiel’s directions are for a future time.and moreover this particular text is generally considered to be an addition.Another even less probable allusion may be found in Is 61: I-Z, where theprophet proclaims a year of grxe and emancipation (d’r8r) for the captives;but this text is port-E&c.

The Law of Jubilee thus appears to set out an ideal of justice and socialequality which was never realized. It is d&cult to say when it was thoughtout. It forms pan of the Code of Holiness (Lv 17-ti), which is the oldest sec-tion of Leviticus and may have been compiled by the priests at Jerusalem atthe end of the monarchy: but the Law ofJubilee is an addition to the Code ofHoliness. It is set forth as a development of the sabbatical law, and is stillunknown in the dme of Jercmias. It might have been written during theExile, in which case Ez 46: 17 would reflect the same preoccupations. if thispassage is the work ofEzechic1. Or it might have been written after the Exile.even after Nehemias, for he does not refer to it.

Some arguments, on the other hand, would favour a much earlier date.The inalienable nature of the patrimony, which this law safeguards, is anancient idea. The seven sabbatical years, followed by the jubilee of the fiftiethyear, have their parallel in the seven sabbaths between the presentation ofthefirst sheaf and the Feast of Weeks, celebrated on the fiftieth day, Pentecost(Lv 23: 15-16). Now the cycles of fifty days are the basis of an ngricolturaIcalendar which may have been used in Caman and which still survives tosome extent among the peasants of Palestinc.l But we must note that no-where outside the Bible is the fihieth year marked by a redistribution of theland 01 a remission of debts and of persons taken as sureties; nor is there anyevidence whatever of such a general liberation, at any time whatever. Somehave appealed to the evidence of cuneiform tablets which mention that thetablets (of contracts) have been broken, but this action merely signifies the~cpudiation or annulment of an agreement, or its invalidation for a legal tlaw.or the folfilment ofthe obligation. A connection has been suggested with theAkkadian word a(n)duraru of duraru, meaning exemption, emancipation ordeclaration of a state of freedom, which is obviously related to the Hebrewd%: but this term never denotes a general and periodical remission ofobligations.

Taking al! these elements into account, one may advance the hypothesisI_ a. p. *so.

II : BCOciOM,C LCFE 177that. the Law ofJubilee was a late and ineffective attempt to make the Jabb&cal law more stringent by extending it to landed property, and at the s-etime to make it easier to observe, by spacing out the years of remission. IC wasinspired by aocient ideas, and made use of the &amework of an archaiccalendar, which had not lost all its value in rural practice and in the religioussphere. But it was a Utopian law and it remained a dead letter.

CHAPTER TWELVE

D I V I S I O N S O F T I M E

W

E read in Gn I: 14 that God created the EUI~ and the nmo” ‘todivide the day from the night and to serve as signs, for feasts uldfor the days and the years’, and time is in practice reckoned by

the cwrser of these ova bodies. The day is measured by the apparent revolu-tion of the sun round the earth, the month by the moon’s revolution mundthe earth, the year by the earth’s revolution round the sun. The day, theeasiest ““it t” observe, which regulates all life, public and private, hasnecessarily been taken as the basic unit by all systems, but the lunar monthdoes not equal an integral number of days, and tw&e lunar months amountto 35~ days, 8 hours and a fraction, whereas a year based on the sun has 365days, 5 ltoun and a fraction. The lunar year is therefore nearly eleven daysshorter than the solar year. I” a primitive society these di&cnces are of littleimportance and only need to be corrected &om tbnc to tinte by cmpiricllreadjustments. But very early in the East, the development of civil andreligious institutions, the taxes periodicdy due to the state, religious festivals,contracts between individuals, all made it necessary to fw past and futuredates, in short, to establish a” &i&I calendar. These systems varied indifferent times atld places, and the ancient history of the calendar is verycomplicated.

The Egyptians adopted at first a lunar calendar, adjusted to ensure that theheliacal rising of Sirius (Sothis)-whose feast had to t%ll in the 1st month ofthe year--should mark the year’s end. In order to keep this agreement betweenthe lunar and solar years a lunar month was added from tie to time. Thiscalendar regulated the seasonal religious feasts thmughout the whole ofEgyptian history. At the beginning of the third miuennium B.C., to avoid thesearbitrary readjusmxtlts and t” meet the needs of civil life, a solar year wasdecreed, with twelve months ofthirty days each,plurfive supernumerary days.making 365 days, starting from the heliacal rising of Sirius. It ~1s the nearestpossible number of days to the natural year, but the latter dropped a daybetid the civil year every four years. The Egyptians took a long time to dealwith this, and the civil year gradually drew apart from the natural year: thef&t day of the first month could not fall on the h&al rising of Siriur foranother 1460 years (Sotbiac period). After a century or two of the ‘New’

tz: “t”tStONS OP TlME t79civil calendar. the discrepancy htweat the civil and natural year had &cometoo flagrant; but since they did not dare to touch the civil ye%, they dup&utcd it by a new htnar calendar, in which a supplementary month was inter_alated, according to P simple tllle founded o” a twenty-five-year cycle. Theright solution would have bee” to add a day to every fourth civil yw; butthis was “or proposed tilI 237 B.C., by the decree of Campus, which remaineda dead letter. It was only applied by the reform of Julius Caesar instituting aleap year, the system which is still with us.

Mesopotvnia was faithful to a lunar calendar from very early days: theyear comprised twelve months of 29 or 3” days without ftxed order, the nextmonth beginning on the evening when the new crescent moo” was sighted.The names of the months varied at first in d&rent regions, but from thetime of Hanunurabi the calendar of Nippur gradually won favour. The Nuzucalendar, however, in the middle of the second millennium. ha! a high propor-tion of Hurtire names, and Assyria had several calendars concurrently downto Tiglath-Pileser I, who had the Babylonivl calendar adopted. In this, theyar began in the spring, on the first day of Nisan”, and ended on the last dayof Addam The discrepay of eleven days between this lunv year and thesolar year wu corrected every two or three years by the addition of athirteenth month, called second Ulul” (the sixth month), or second Addam(the twel&h month). Public authority decided the years in which intercala-tion was to be made. Thur Hammurabi wrote to one of his officials: ‘ThisYear ha at intcrcakq month. The coming month mat then be calledsecond ~htlu.’ This was s!iIl the practice in the Persia” period. Babyloniana~tro”om~r~ were well aware that the two years coincided at the end ofnineteen years if seven lunar months had been intercalated, but it was0”ly at the beginning of the fourth century B.C. that rules for intercalationwitbi” this cycle were fixed.

The Moslem calendar, which follows a non-rectified lunar year, in whichthe months do not remain constant with the seasons, is not primitive. It is arather practical innovation of Islam. The pr&lamic Arabs followed a lunaryear. adapted to the natunl year by itttercalay monthshs, and the names oftheir months were partly connected with agricultural operations.

WC still know little about the ancient calendar of Syria and Palestine. Theywere subject to various inA”ettcn under the stress of invasions and foreignr&. When theEgyptians were nrasters they introduced their own reckoning,at least for official documents: a” insaiption of the thirteenth century B.C.found at Tell ed-Duweir (L&h) mentions deliveries of wheat in the secondand fourth months of the flooding (of the Nile), one of the three seasotts ofthe Egyptian year. In Northern Syria the Hwrite names of months appearside by side with Sentitic names, and the “omencla~re is in every usedifferent from that of Maopotamia. I”.%riptio”s revell D certain number ofpbomician month-names, but do “of enable us to determine their order. The

180 n: Cl”” lNSTlTUT*ONS

general impression is one ofgreat confusion, but it is probable that a rectified1~ calmdar was followed everywhere, for this is the only one based on theobservance of the months which preserves a year related to the rhythm ofagricultural operations. There is no proof that a real solar calendar was used,apart from the superficial and temporary influence of the Egyptian system.

There has recently been an attempt tci prove the existence of an entirelydifferent system in ancient Mesopotamia. The theory is that the Assyrimmerchants who traded in Cappadoda at the beginning of the second mil-lennium B.C. divided the year into seven periods of fifty days, each fiftycomprisiig seven weeks, plus a day of festival. As seven fifties make only 350days, and since the needs of both agriculture and mmmerce required agree-ment with the natural year, a period of sixteen days (the shapattum) WY addedat the end of this year This calendar, it is claimed, was used in Cappadociaconcurrently with that of the rectified lunar year. The system could be ex-tended to longer periods, and they reckoned by periods of seven years andfifty years (the d~rum). About the same time in Babylonia, there is evidenceof a reckoning by seven-year periods. But this hypothesis rests on weak argu-merits; the key argument is the word hamushtum, translated by ‘a fify’ ofdays, but the word means far nmre probably a period of five days or a fifthof a month. Besides, the use of this reckoning in Assyria and Babylonia musthave been restricted to the first centuries of the second millennium B.C. How-ever, we have traces of a similar system in the institution of the Jubilee: andthe festal calendar of IsraeLa The calendar of the Qumran sectaries enumeratesagricultural feasts which were celebrated approximately every fifty days. Apartial application of this quinquagesimal system is found also in the calendarof Nest&m Christians and, through this Chrirtian adaptation, in the calendarof Palestinian pensants, who reckon seven fifties of days, going from one feastt0 another.

The same complexity is found in Israel, which stood at the crossroads ofseveral civilizations and was subjected to varied influences in the murse of itshistory. But na one can deny that the complexity has been increased by thecontradictory hypotheses of modem scholars, and it seems that a simpler andmore coherent solution can be found than those which have recently beenproposed.

As everywhere, the basic unit is the solar day. The Egyptians reckoned itfrom one morning to the next and divided it into twelve hours of day timeand twelve of night; the hours varied in length with the latitude and theseason. In Mesopotamia the day was reckoned from one evening to the next;it was divided into twelve b&u of two hours each, and each /&II had thirtyunits of four minutes each. The night and the day were divided into six

I. cf. pp. r75 In. I. cf. p. 193.

1%: DtvIS,ONS OP TlME 181

watches, each tsting for two b&u, or four hours. Thus there was, as inEgypt, a difference between the seasonal hour and the real hour, but theywere able to fix tables of concordance for the different months.

In Israel, the day was for a long time reckoned from morning m morning.when they wanted to indicate the whole length of a day of twenty-fwrhours, they said ‘day and night’ or some such phrase, putting the day first:smtes of references could be quoted (Dt 28: 6447; t S 30: 12: Is 28: 19; Jr33 : 20, etc.). This suggests that they reckoned the day starting from the motn-ing, and it was in fact in the morning, with the creation of light, that theworld began; the distinction of day and night, and time too. began on amorning (Gn I: 3-j. cf. t4.16,18). The opposite conclusion has been drawnfrom the refrain which punctuates the story of Creation: ‘There was anevening and there was a morning, the first, second, etc., day’; this phrase.however, coming after the description of each creative work (which clearlyhappens during the period of light), indicates rather the vacant time till themorning, the end of a day and the beginning of the next work.

In the latest books of the Old Testament the expression ‘day and night’ isreversed: Judith praises God ‘night and day’ (Jdt II: 17); Esther asks for afast ofthreedays ‘night and day’(Est 4: 16); Danielspeaksofz.3~ ‘eveningsand mornings’ (Dn 8: 14). The same form is found in texts which are not soLte but certainly pa-Edlic: Ps 55: t8,‘at evening,at morning and at noon’;Is 27: 3. ‘night and day’, Is 34: IO. ‘neither night nor day’. This order isfound in only two pre-exilic passages, I K 8: 29 and Jr 14: 17. but the parallelof 2 Ch 6: 20 in the former case and the readings of the ancient versions inboth cases suggest that the Massoretic text should be corrected. On the con-trary, where we find the order ‘day and night’ in late passages, it F explainedby the importance, in the context, of the day as opposed to the mght (Za 14:7; Qo 8: x6), or by the survival of a formula rooted in the spoken language.

The sane cm&sicms clearly emerge from certain biblical stories. Thus inthe story ofthe daughters of Lot: ‘The next day the elder said to the younger,Last night I slept with my father; let us make him drink wine again tc-night’ (Gn 19: 34). In the story of the Levite ofEphraim: he stays three dayswith his father-in-law and stops the night there. The fourth day, he wakes andwants to depart. He is detained and again stops the night. The fifth day, thefather-in-law says to him: ‘Behold, the day is fat advanced towards evening.Spend the night here again. To-morrow, early in the morning, you willdepart. .’ (Jg 19: 4-9). Saul’s henchmen arrive at night to take David bysurprise, and Mikal says to him: ‘If you do not escape to-night, to-mOtrOWycw are a dead man’ (I S 19: I I). In the how of the witch ofEndor, Samuelappears to Sad during the night and says to him: ‘To-morrow, you and yamwns will be with me’ (I s 28: 19). other passagcr could be quoted, but theyare less decisive (Jg 21: 2-4; t S 5: 2-4).

Nehemiu, on the other hand, to prevent the merchants breaking the

tabbath. orders the gates of Jerusalem to be shut at nightfall, before thesabbath. and not to be opened till after the sabbath (NC 13: 19). Here the daySeems to begin at sunset.

The same duality ir found in &e liturgical texts, but it is more d&cult toargue from them since their dates are uncertain. According to Lv 7: 15 and22: ,o, the meat of sacrificer must be eaten the same day, not leaving mytbingto bt eaten to the morning of the next day. Had the day begun in the even-ing the wording would have ordered the meat to be eaten before the evening.The Passover is celebrated on the fourteenth day of the first month, after sun-set; the feast of the Unleavened Bread, which lasts seven days, begins on thefifiecnth day (Lv 23 : 54: CC Nb 28: 16) and this fifteenth day is the day afterthe Passover (Nb 33: 3; cf. Jos 3: IO). All this presumes that the day beganin the morning. But the other reckoning appears clearly in the date ofthe day of Atonement, ‘the evening of the nin& day of the month, from thisevening to the next evening’ (Lv 23: 3z), and in Ex 12: 18, in which Un-leavened Bread must be eaten from the evening of the fourteenth day to theevening ofthe twenty-first. These two passages belong to the final redactionof the Pentateucb. This method of reckoning is wed in New Testamenttimes and under later Judaism for the sabbath, the religiousfeasts and civil life.

The change of reckoning must therefore have taken place between dte endof the morurchy and the age of Nehemiat. One could date it more preciselyifit were certain that in Ez 33 : 21-x the evening and the morning of v. 22both applied to the fifth day of v. 21. This would bring us to the beginningof the Exile: unfortunately the text is not explicit.

The day was divided without precision according to natural phenomena:the morning and the evening(Ex 18: 13. etc.), midday (Gn 43: 16, ~3; I K18: 29. etc.).dawn (Gn 19: IS; Jos 6: 13; I S 30: 17), the setting of the sun(Gn IJ: 12, 17). the breeze which blows before sunrise (Ct 2: I,; 4: 6), theeveningbreeze(Gn3:8),thehottestdmeoftheday(Gnt8:t;~~,~:~t;I s 4: 5). Sometimes reference was made to the ritual: the time of the even-ing sacrifxe is an indication of time in I K 18: 29; Esd g: 4. 5; Dn g: 21.Cc&n religious actions had to be performed ‘be~een the two evenings’(E~1~:6:t6:1z;~9:3~.4t;3~:8;Nb~:3,3,~~;~8:4,8).Thi~expre~sio~denotes the time between the sun’s disappearance and nigh&U, that is to say,twilight, which in the East is vety short. So the Samaritans continued tointerpret it: the Pharisees explained it as the time preceding sunset.

The night was divided into three watches: the first watch (perhaps Lm a:Ig), the midnight watch(Jg 7: Ig), and the last or morning wawh(Ex 14: 24;I S II: II). This was on the whole the Mesopotamian practice, but by NewTestament times the Egyptian and Roman custom of four night watches hadbeen adopted (Mt 14: 25; Mk r3: 35).

We know of no terms for the smaller divisions of time. The word shn’ah,which lata meant ‘hour’, is only employed in the Aramaic of Daniel, in the

12: DlvwONS “P TIMB 183

v~ucsenKofamon~entorinsPnt~4:r6;cf,3:6,~3;4:3~;3:3).But~~Israelites bad ways of t&ng the hours of the day. In Mesopotamia and Egyptwater-clocks and gnomcms were used from the second millennium B.C. andan Egyptian sundial of the thirteenth century has been found at Gezer. The‘degrees of A&z’ on which the sun receded six degrees at the prayer ofIs& (2 K 20: ~II=IS 38: 8) are not a gnomon, but a stairway built byA&z, perhaps in connection with the ‘high chamber’ mentioned in a glossin 2 K 23: 12. The miracle in question is not that ofa ‘clock’ going forwardsor backwards, but of the sudden mownunt of a shadow cm a stairway.

3. The month

As the Egyptians reckoned the day from morning to morning, so theyreckoned the lunar month to start from the morning when the last quarter ofthe preceding moon disappeared. The Babylonians, who reckoned the dayfrom one evening to the next. made the month begin from the appearanceof the crescent new moc.n at mnset. As long as the Israelites counted the dayfrom morning to morning, rhey probably followed the Egyptian custom tofix the beginning of the month, but this cannot be stated for certain. If itcould, the detailed story in I S 20: 18-3~ would be more easily understood,and the transfer of the beginning of the feast of the Unleavened Bread fromthe fifteenth day (Lv 23: 6) to the fourteenth (Ex tz.: 8), and its being joinedwith the Passover, could be explained by a change of reckoning; the Baby-lonian merhod of reckoning the day had replaced the Egyptian one.

What is certain in any case is that the Israelites followed a lunar month.Like the Canaanites, they called the month yerah, which alro means the moon:the month is a lunation. But very soon, too (cf. Ex 23: 15; 34: 18; 1 S 6: I:IO: 27; I K 4: 7) and more often thereafter, they called the month Eoderh.which means primarily the new moon. In I K 6: 38 and 8: 2 the wordyen&, with the Canaanite name of the month, is glossed by the word hoderhwith the number of the month:

As a lunation takes 29 days, IZ hours and a fraction, the lunar months hadag and 30 days alternatively. At first they were given Canaanite names,which were connected with the seasons; Abib, the month of the ears of corn(Ex13:4:23: 15; 34:r8;Dfr6:1);Ziv,themonthofflowers(rK6:1,37);Etmim, the month in which only the permanent water-courses still flow(I K 8: 2); Bul, the month ofthe great rains (I K 6: 38). The last three namesare found with others in Phoenician inscriptions: Abib has not yet beenattested there, but has been deciphered in the proto-Sinaitic inscriptions,though the reading is uncertain.

This Canaanite nomenclature was long preserved, since it WPP still used inDeuteronomy, which fixer the feast of the Passover in the month of Abib (Dtr6: I), and it is only by chance that the names do not appear in the historical

1. Cf. p. IQ.

184 II: clvn. *NsTtTUItoNS

books after Solomon. 1t was an of&al calendar, and it seems that in daily lifeother names were wed. A limestone tablet has been discovered at Gezer,which has an inscription attributed to the tenth centmy B.C . The text wascertainly drawn up by an Israelite. It is a calendar, giving the followingtable:

Two months: ‘sp = IngaththeringTwo mauhr: 2,’ = SeedtimcTwo months: Iph = Late seedtimeOne month: ‘~ddprhr = Flax gatheringOne month: z,$r s‘rm = Barley harvestOne month: gv wkl = Harvest (of what) and accounting(?)Two months: an, = Pnmin8One month: &IJ = Summer fruits

This is not a memorandum oftasks to be carried out in the different monthsofthe year, but D concordance table between twelve Iunations (the months ofthe official year, listed here without their proper names) and the periods ofthe agricultural year, which the peasants called aher the tasks they performedin them. The Old Testament uses several of these terms to mark dates. Inthe oldest liturgical calendars, Ex 23 : 16 orders the feast of the Harvest,&r, to be observed, and that of the Ingathering, ‘aslph; Ex 34: 32 prescribesthe feast ofweeks at the wheat harvest and the feast ofInga&ring. Ruth andher mother-in-law arrive at Bethlehem ‘at the beginning of the barley har-vest’ (Rt I: a). Reuben goes out ‘at the time of the wheat harvest’ (Gn 30:14). Samson comes to visit his wife ‘at the time of the wheat harvest’ (Jg 15 :I). In I S 12: 17, ‘the wheat harvest’ is an indicaion of the season, like ‘thebarley harvest’ in z S ZI : g-m. Amos sees the locusts swarming ‘at the timewhen the late growth, leqesh, begins to shoot (Am 7: I). Much later, theRule of the Qmnran sect, naming the four seasons borrowed from theGreeks, gave them names drawn Gem agticulture, qa$r, harvest; qtiy’yh sum-mer fruits; zem‘, seedtime; de&‘, tender shoots. The first three were alreadyin the Gezer calendar, but here they are matched with the Greek seasons andthe order is that of a year beginning in the spring. There seems to be evidencethat this same Qumran community had a more complete agriculturalcalendar, comparable to the ‘fifties’ of the modem Palestinian peasants.~

In the official calendar the Canaanite names of the months were at sometime replaced by the ordinal numerals: they were then counted from the firstto the twelfth month. As an argument for the antiquity of such P system, onemight quote the Egyptian practice of numbering the months of the threeannual seuons from one to four, or Mesopotamian passages such as these:‘From the beginning of the year to the fifth month, and from the sixthmonth to the end of the year’ (in the Code of Hammurabi), or ‘I have taken

I. cc p. 1%.

1a: “MSIONS OF nhm 18s

the cnnem . . for the six& mot& (in the at&w of Mari) or ‘I,, the &&month I shall send’ (in the Amama letters). But the Egyptian di.$,n ofthe year into three seasom never penetrated into Israel, and the Akkadianexpressions just quoted arc exceptional and do not form part of genuinedating formulae.

There is in fact no evidence of this system in the historical books before thexcmmt of the capture of Jerusalem by Nabuchcdonoror (2 K zj= Jr sz).The other pwaga (Jos 4: 19 and I K tz: jzf.) are from the hand of theredactor, and in I K 6: 38 and 8: 2 the numeral of the month is a gloss, ex-plaining the Canaanite name. In the Book of Jeretis, the practice appearsunder Joiqim (Jr 36: 9. u), under Sedecias (Jr 28: I, 17; 39: I, 2; cf. I: 3).and after the fall ofJerusalem (Jr 41: I). The change was made, then, after thereign ofJo+ and this is confirmed by Deuteronomy, which still uses the oldname of the month Abib (Dt 16: I). As we shall see, the change coincidedwith the adoption of the Babylonian year, beginning in the spring.

But the Babylonian month-names were not accepted at first, probablybecause of their association with heathen worship, and the ordinal numberswere substituted for them. Two cuneiform tablets of the seventh centurytx., found at ~ezer. are dated with the Babylonian name of the month, butthey are written in Assyrian and under Assyrian rule. Reference to themonths by the ordinal numbers remains the regular practice inEzechie1 and,after the Exile, in Aggaem. In the Book of Zacharias. the eleventh monthis explained as being the month of Sbebat (Za I: 7), the ninth as beingthe month of ~isleu (2% 7: I), but these are later glosses. The Babyloniannames are used in the Aramaic document ofEsd6: IJ and in the memoirs ofN&et&s (Ne I: I; 2:~1; 6: IS), which is not surprising, since the Persivlshad adopted the Babylonian calendar’. But the redactor of E&as andNehemias and Chronicles never uses any but the ordinal numbers. The Bookof Esther always refers to the months by an ordinal, followed, with oneexception, by the Babylonian name. In the Books ofMaccabeer, the ordinalnumber is sometimes given alone (I M 9: 3, 34; IO: 21; 13: 51) and some-times followed by the Babylonianname (I M 4: 52; 16: 14; 2 M 15: 36). butthe Babylonian name in its Greek form is generally given alone. Thesevariations show that the Babylonian names were only introduced long afterthe Exile and did not become current till very late. Apocryphal works likethe Book of Jubilees and the Qumtan literature show what obstinate resis-tance there was in some religious circles. In spite of it, however, the Babylon-ian month-names were in the end accepted by orthodox Judaism. We givehere their order in the year, beginniug in the spring, with their approldmatcquivalenu in our calendar:

I. Nidn March-ApriiII. Iyy” April-&y

III. Siw8n May-Junez And also, at the rune p&d. u,d for dl.5 same mroQ in *c pawi of flS$~fiuC.

186 n: cm” lNSnlIJT”JNS

IV. Tmmmz Ju”*J~YV. Ab July-August

VI. Ebd August-ScptcmbcrVII. Tirhri September-October

VIII. MarheshwSn October-NovemberIX. K&u November-DecemberX. Tckth Dcccmbcr-Jmuaty

XI. Shcbat January-FebruaryXII. Adar February-March

From the Heflcnistic period onwards the Macedonian names of monthswere introduced into o&ill usage. A man of lcttcrs like the historianJosephus uses this system, but it “ever became familiar to the Jews. In theGreek Old Testament we e”co”“ter only thy months of Xanthicus mdDioscwus (?) in the foreign dowmenu of 2 M I I: Z.I, 30, 33. 38, and themonth of Dystros in Tb 2: 12.

4. The weekIII the Egyptian civil calendar the month of thirty days was divided into

three decades. Some think they can find traces of a similar reckoning in theOld Testament. The mourning for Moses and that for Aaron each lastedthirty days (Nb 20: 29; Dt 34: 8). and it may be compared with the mourningof the captive wotnan which lasted D month (Dt 21: I,; cf. also Est 4: II;Dn8:13).TendaysiraunitoftimeinGnz4:55;1S25:38.Thetenthdayof the month appears as the date of a feast or a” event (Ex 12: 3 ; Lv 16: 29(parallels: 23: 27; 25: 9; Nb 29: 7): JOE 4: 19; z K 25: I (parallels Jr 52: 4;Ez 24: I); Ez 20: I; 40: I); the twentieth day is mentialed less frequently(Nb 10: II; I I: xg). At Tell el-Farah in the south, and at Tell cd-Duweirbone tablets have bee” found, pierced with three parallel lines of ten h&seach. These are perhaps ‘calendars’ for counting the days of the month: theydate from the beginning of the monarchy.

AU this does not amount to proof. Since dte luar months had alternatelytwenty-“inc and thirty days, one can speak in round terms of thirty days as amonth, and if the little ‘calendars’ found in excavations had to serve for aI1the months, they would have needed thirty holes. The fact that a feast wascelebrated orthataneventtookplaceonthe tenth ofrhemottthprovcsnothingabout the month’s division in time. The context of Gn 24: 55 and of I S 25 :38 show that this ‘decade’ is only a rough reckoning, ‘ten days or so’.

The only unit less than rhe month for which there is good evidence is theperiod of seven days (rhubi?g), the week. The origins of this institution, sofamiliar to us, are very obscure. In a lunar calendar the month would natur-ally be divided according to the moon’s phases. The most obvious division isthat marking the full moo” in the middle of the month, uld in fact the fif-teenth day was of special importance in the Assyrc-Babylonian calendar: it

I*: D*“ISlONS OF Tfm 187

was the shapatm. Now there are certain passages in the Old Testvnent (a K 4:~3;Is1:13;66:~3;Os~:13;Am8:~)inwhichrherhabbarhiscoupledwiththe new moo” II, a festal day. Ps 81: 4, in an identical context. employs thevery rare word krre’ (‘full moon’) so that rhabbath may possibly have thesame sclue in the preceding passages as rhopothr has in Akkadian. It m”st beremembered that the two great Israelite feasts. the Passover and Tents, werecelebrated on the fcwteenth-fifteenth days of the first and seven& monthsrespectively, that is, at the full moo”; the later feast of Purim was also fixedat the full moo”, in the twelfth month.

The division of the month into four according to the moon’s quarters ismuch less evident in the texts. It is true that in the Babylonian Poem ofCreation the moo” is assigned the function of marking the periods of themonth by its phases, and that the Babylonian calendar at least from theseventh century B.C.. picks out as ‘unlucky days’ the 7t+I , 14th (Igtb), ~1stand 28th days, which correspond with the lunar phases; but the Assyrc-Babylonian calendar, at least till the cleventb century B.C., noted several other““lucky days. If a division into weeks is indicated by the later calendar-which is far from proved-tbe cycle was interrupted at the end of eachmonth, which comprised twenty-nine or thirty days, and started again at eachnew moo”. I” Egypt there scenu to have been a ditiion of the months intoseven, eight, eight and seven days, with Iuar names, but it is obvious that dx“umber of days is not constant, a fact which contradicts the very idea of theweek.

some novel explanations of the week have recently been proposed.According to one a&x, the seven days of the week are derived from theseven winds which blew from the seven directions, according to the mostancient Babylonian cosmology. Another says that the &mushtu ofthe Cappa-d&an texts being interpreted ar a fifth of the month,1 a ‘week’ of six days inthe old Assyrian calendar was supplemented by the Israelites with a seventhday, reserved for rest. A discussion of these hypotheses would be to littlepurpose: it will be more useful to recall the sacred and symbolic value of thenumber seven and the seven-day periods which recur in the Babylonianpoem of Gilgamesh and the poems of Ras Sbantra. One of the passages in theGiigamesh poems has a” exact parallel in the story of&e Flood (Gn 8: ma)and seven-day periods are often found in the Old Testament: for marriagecelebrations (Gn 29: 27; Jg 14: IZ), for mourning (Gn 50: IO), for the con-dolences ofJob’s friends (Jb 2: 13); for banquets (Est I: s), for a long march(Gn 3 I : 23 ; 2 K 3 : g. etc.). These expressions have no formal connection withthe calendar, but their frequency makes it probable that from a” early datethe period of seven days was a calendar-““it.

If such a reckoning is uniformly applied, it is independent of the lunarmonths, since these are not exactly divisible into weeks. It is possible that the

I. cf. p. 180.

188 II: Cl”“. INsnNnclNS

idu of the week arose from rough obxrvaion of the moon’s phases, but itbecame the element of a cycle of its own, overriding those of the months andthe years. This in itself distinguishes the Israelite week from the Egyptian andthe Babylonian ‘weeks’. There are more imponmt differences: the week ismarked by the repose of the seventh day. the sabbath. which is an ancientreligious institution, peculiar to Israel. We shall deal with it at greater lengthin connection with religious institutions~ and would here note only one con-sequence; the reckoning by weeks-not merely the indication of seven-dayperiods, as in the passages just quoted-is only found in liturgical texts, exceptfor thelatepassaga inDn IO: z and 9: 24-27 (where they are weeks of years).

The calendar of one religious group in Judaism is entirely governed by theweek. It is found most clearly in dx apocryphal Book of Jubilees: fifty-twoweeks make a year and 364 days. divided into quarters of thirteen weeksthat is, of ninety-one days; seven yeas make a week of years (as in Daniel),sevenwe&sofyean form ajubilee. Thissamccalendaris foundina part oftheApocrypha ascribed to Henoch, and in the Qumran literature. The purposeofthis reckoning is to make the same fears fxll every year on the same days ofthe week. The liturgical days are the first, fourth and sixth days of the week;the sabbath is the day of rest. The originators of this calendar do not seem tohave been concerned over the divergence between this year of 364 days andthe real year of 36s: days. But this discrepancy must have appeared wrysoon, and this calendar cannot have been followed for long, unless there werep&w&J adjustments not mentioned in any text. The recent attempt toconnect this with an ancient priestly calendar, whose influence may be foundin the redaction of the Pentateuch, is still no more than a hypothesis. Weshall now see, moreover, that the Pentateuch gives evidence of anotherreckoning.

5. The year

The 364day year of this calendar of Jubilees is a solar year, only lessaccurately reckoned than the Egyptian year of 365 days. The latter wasevidently known to the Israelites and appears in two passage of Genesis.According to Gn 5 : 23, the patriarch Henoch lived 36s years. If we remem-ber that according to later tradition Henoch was favoured with revelationson astronomy and the c&dation of time, WC realire that 365 represents aperfect number, that of the days in a solar year. The chronology of theFlood is even more convincing: the disaster begins on the seventeenth day ofthe second month (Gn 7: II) and ends on the twenty-seventh day of thesecond month of the next year (Gn 8 : 14). Hence it lasted twelve months andeleven days, the exact period required to equate the year of ovelvc lunarmonths, 354 days, with the solar year of 365 days. The redactor wanted tosay that the Flood lasted exactly one solar year. I” the same context, compari-

12: DlvlSlONS OP TIME I89

son of Gn 7: II, 24 with Gn 8: 3-4 indicates that five months make a total ofI_$O days, that is. five Egyptian months of thirty days. This passage is of lateredaction; it appears as a scholar’s note to show the correspondence betweenthe solar year and the rectified lunar year, or ltisolar year. which regulateddaily life and the liturgy. But in this hmisolar year the feasts did not fall eachyear on the same days of the week. The calendar of the Jubilees, mentionedabove, must have been a reform aimed at tying the feasts to fxed days of theweek.

Apart from there scholarly calculations and abortive attempts. there is noproof that a truly solar year ever prevailed in Israel. The intentional chronc-logy of Gn 7: II; 8: 15 itself emphasizes that the description of the monthsby the ordinal numbers belonged to a lunar reckoning. We noted earlier thatthe ordinal system had done away with the use of Cam&e names. Thesenames, being drawn from seasonal events, can only fit a year which is at leastapproximately adjusted to the natural year; this might be either a solar yearor a ltisolar year with an intercalary month. This latter solution is indicatedby the Canaanite word for a month (ye& meaning the moon) and byMesopotamian analogy. There is no reason to doubt that it was the same inancient 1srae1, where the same word stood for the month and the moon, andthe beginning of the month was marked by the new moon.

The intercalary month, however, is never mentioned in the Old Testa-ment, except at the very end, for a non-Israelite calendar: rhe Macedonianmonth of Dioscorus (2 M I I : 21) is perhaps an intercalary month. The sacredwriters invariably speak of only twelve months (I K 4: 7; 1 Ch 27: I-IS; cf.Jr 52: 31: Ez 32: I; Dn 4: 26) and we saw that the Gezer calendar tooreckoned twelve months. But in I K 4: 7 one would have expected the inter-c&y month to be mentioned: Solomon’s twelve districts had each tosupply the king and his household for a month of the yeu; and in I Ch z.7each ofDavid’s stew& war on duty for a month. What happened when theyear had thirteen months? The uncertainty arises from our lack of informa-tion: these parsaga only tell what happened in ordinary yean.

In any case, the intercalation of a supplementary month was, for a longtime, made in an empirical manner. Even at the end of the first century of ourera, the Rabbi Gamalicl II was writing to the communities of the Diaspora:‘The lambs are still too weak and the chickens too small: the grain is not ripe.Therefore it has seemed good to us and our colleagues to add thirty days tothis year.’ In the end, the Babylonian cycle of nineteen years was adopted,with intercalations at fixed dates. The duplicated month was Adar, the lastmonth of the year; there is no proof that a second Elul month was some-times intercalated, as in Babylonia.

The year was divided into two seasons, the winter, horeph, and summer,qq~, corresponding roughly to the cold and hot seasons, to seedtime andharvest (Gn 8: 22; cf. Ps 74: 17; Is 18: 6: Za 14: 8). Kings and the rich had

190 II: Cl”,‘ INSTIT”TIONS

their summer and winter houses (Am 3: IS; Jr 36: 22). This simple divisioncorruponds to the climate of Palestine, where the hot, dry season and thecold, wet season succeed each other fairly quickly. leaving no distinctsensation of spring and autumn. as in more temperate countries. The Egypdam had three seasons. governed by the rise of the Nile and its effects:Flooding, Seedtime and Harvest. The Greeks at first had three seasom andlater four, by the addition of aummn. They were defined by the spring andautumn equinoxes and the summer and winter solstices. This division wasintroduced among the Jews in the Hellenistic period. We have noted earlierthat it appeared in the Qmnran documents. with agricultural names. Later,the seasons were called after those months which included the equinoxes andsolstices.

The two oldest liturgical calendars (Ex 23: 14-17 and 34: 18-23) list tkeegrnt annual feasts: Unleavened Bread, Harvest and Ingathering. As rhcUnleavened Bread was celebrated in the month of Abib, later called Nisan,one might see in this order the indication of a year beginning in the spring, ifa date were not deiined for Ingathering. According to Ex 2): 16. it fallsb’p’rh hashrhmnah, at the ‘going out’ of the year, which most probablymeam the begtig of the year, as the same word elsewhere means the risingofthesun~g~:~~;Is~~:1a)o~ofthcrfars(Ne4:x~).AccordingtoEx~4:12. the feast ofthelr~gntheringmarks thet'qllgharh hoshrhmnnh, etymologicallythe ‘revolution’ of the year, but strictly the end of this revolution (cf. I S I:M: Ps 19: 7. and the use of the corresponding verb in Jb I: 5). and thereforethe end of the year. We must not introduce into these ancient texts thenotion ofsolstice and equinox which later Judaism gave to fq+hoh. How thefast was tied, whether at the beginning or at the end of the year, is a prob-lem which will claim attention under religious imtitutions~: here it is enoughto show that the two calendars presuppose a year beginning in autumn.

The list of agricultural tasks in the Gazer tablet also begins in autumn: it isnot the natural order. which would begin with the sowing, but the textshows that it agrees with a civil year beginning in aw”mn.’

In2S1t:1=tChzo:tandintKzo:22,26,~efllldrheexpressiont’rhdbarh haslrrhannoh, litedy the ‘return of the year; in the first text and itspxallel it is explained as ‘the time when kings take the field’. and in the othertwo it is used to date a military expedition. According m repeated indica-tions in the Assyrian annals, this war usually in the spring. This ‘return’ ofdx year would be the rime when the ycar was half over, and beginning torcmm from winter to smnmer, when the days began to equal the nights. ourspring equinox. This again presumes an autumnal year. The expression con-tinued m be atcached to this time of the year after the change of the calendar,

13: Dl”lSl”NS OF TlME 191

and in 2 Ch 36: 10 it again refers to the spring: from other sources we are ableto date the event referred to, the capture ofJerusalem. in March 597.

The story of Jo&s’ reform (2 K 22-23) tells of the discovery of the Bookof the Law, how it was read before the king, then before the whole peopleambled in Jerusalem, how measures of reform were applied in the capital,in Judah and the former kingdom of Israel, and fmally of the celebration ofthe Pusover. All these events took place in the eighteenth year of the king:this would be impossible if the year began in the spring, just before thePassover, and postulates a year beginning in autumn.

Finally we may recall that Mesopotamia too origimlly had an autumnalyear: the seventh month of the Babylonian spring year kept its name ofTeshritu, that is ‘beginning’.

But there are other Old Testament texts which presume a differentreckoning. When the scroll of the prophecies ofJeremias wa?read to Joiaqim,the king was in his winter home, warming himself at a brazier, because ‘itwas the ninth month’ (Jr 36: 22). evidently the ninth month of a year be-ginning in spring, that is, November-December.

According to 2 K 25 : 8= Jr 52: 12, the Temple was destroyed by Nabucho-donosor in the fifth month. Josephus and Jewish tradition say that it was atthe same time ofthe year that the second Temple was burnt by the Roman%and we know that this event took place in August. The tradition is ancient:according to Zacharias, at a time when the spring calendar was certainly inme (cf. the dates of Aggaeus in connection with the years of Darius), thedestruction of the Temple was commemorated by a fast in the fifth month(Za 7: 3 and 5). This is confirmed by Jr 40-441, which records the eventsimmediately after the capture ofJerusalem: wine, fruit and oil were gatheredin (Jr 40: IO), and after the murder of God&as. in the seventh month of thesame year, wheat, barley, oil and honey were already stored (Jr 41: 8); allthis is inexplicable except in a spring year.

Some of the liturgical texts are quite explicit. The law of the Passover be-gins thus in Ex 11: 2: ‘This month comes to you as the head of the months;it is for you the first month of the year.’ This insistence is intention,emphasizin g something new. According to Ex 23: 15 and also Dt 16: I, thePasnover mmt be celebrated in the month of Abib in the autumnal year.Between these texts and the redaction ofEx 12, the date of the feast was notaltered, but the calendar was changed: a spring year was being followed.(The same remarks apply to the religious calendars of Lv 23, Nb z8-zg andEz 45: 18-25.)

All the Old Testament passages in which the months are denoted byordinal numbers are easily explained if the vear beeins in the s&w. We

L I

have already shown &at .&is new nomenclature VI”, introduced after thedeath ofJosiu1; if we compare the story ofJosias’ reform (2 K 22-23) with

I. cf. p. 16%

192 II: ClVlL INSTIT”TIONS

that of the capture ofJerusalem (2 K 23). we observe that the spring year hadalso been introduced by this date. Possibly, too, this was the time when theybegan to reckon the day from evening to evening,, and the months from theappearance of the new moon at sonset.l All this points to the adoption of theBabylonian calendar and is explained by the historical circumstance thatunder Joiaqim, son of Josias, the kingdom of Judah became a vassal State ofNabuchodonosor.

Thex conch&m hold good for the kingdom of Judah, about which weare better informed. It may be presumed that the autumnal calendar was alsofollowed in the kingdom of Israel so long PI it remained independent, butthat the Babylonian calm&r was imposed, at least for official use. in theAssyrian provinces constituted aficr the conquests of Tiglath-Pileser III in733 II.C., and then for the rest of the territory after the fall of Samaria.. Thecuneiform contracts at Gezer. &ted in the Assyrian manner, are evidence ofthis. An earlier date has been suggested for the adoption of the spring calen-da in Israel, in order to throw light on the way in which the Books of Kingssynchrooize the reigns in Israel with those in Judah; but this synchronizationraises d&colt problems in itself, which the addition of another unknownclement is not likely to solve.

The spring year was naturally retained when the Babylonian month-names replaced the ordinal numbers. only one passage raises a diflicolty.According to Ne I : I and 2 : I, the month of Kisleu and the following monthof Niran fell in the same twentieth year of Artaxerxes, which would implyan autumnal year. But it is unlikely that Nehemiar, living at the Persiancourt, where the Babylonian calendar was followed and the Babylonianmonth-names were used, did not also follow the official reckoning of theyeas. On the other hand, the Hebresv text of NC I : I has only ‘the twentiethyear’, without the name ofthe reigning l&g, which is strange. The text mostbe corrupt, and the likeliest explanation is that originally it did not contain, orit accidentally lost, the mention of the year, which was later suppliedme&nicaUy from Ne 2: I; it was really the nineteenth year of Artaxerxes.It has also been suggested that an autumnal year is found in one of theElephantine papyri, but the date is apparently incorrect.

The Seleudds introduced an autumnal year at Antioch and in theMacedonian colonies, but in Babylooia they conformed to the spring calcn-da. which the Jews had already adopted. The first Book ofMacc&es datesthe events of general history by the SyrwMacedonian reckoning, but keepstheBabyloG.nreckoning for facts directly concerning the Jewishcommunity.The few dates in the second Book are given according to the sane calendar,except for the foreign documents of 2 M 1 I.

These variations in the course of the old Testament history puzzled theRabbis, who did not distinguish between the relative ages of the texts. They

I. CT. pp. 181-181. 1. ct p. 15.

12: mvIsloNs OP TIME 193reckoned four beginnings to the year: in Nisan, the New Year for kings andfor festivals; in Elul. the New Year for the tithe on cattle; in T&i, the NewYear for years, the sabbatical year and the Jubilee year; in shebat. the NewYear for the tithe on trees.

7. The era

An era is the starting-point of a chronology which in theory continues forever, such as the Christian era, the Moslem era, etc. Jewish chronologers havecalculated an era of Creation, based on Biblical data, which is still followedby Judaism: the year 5718 of Creation began on September 26th, 1957. Butthe Old Testament knew nothing of the kind. It has been suggested that Nb13 : a, according to which Hebron was founded seven years before Tanis.and Ex 12: 40. which gives the sojourn in Egypt as 430 years, refer to an ‘eraofTanin’, going back to the establishment ofthe Hyksor inEgypt. It is a merehypothesis, and this chronology is in any case foreign to 1$x1. Figures likethe 3w years of Jg II : 26 and the 480 years of I K 6: I are based on calcola-tions of the redactors of the Bible. To fix a date, reference ~1s made to aroughly contemporary event which had made an impression: the prophecyof Amos is &ted ‘two years before the earthquake’ (Am 1: I). The oracle ofIs2o:If.isin ‘the year that the chief cupbearer came to Ashdod and tookit.’ Ezahiel reckons the years from the deportation of Joiakin (Ez I : 2; 8: I ;20: I; 24: 1; 26: I, etc.) andz Kz3: 27(=Jr 32: 31) does thesame.

This way of reckoning simply carries on the official reckoning of the king-doms of lsrael and Judah, in which events were dated by the years of thereign of each king. This system lasted till the end of the kingdom of 1srae1(I K 17: 6). and of the kingdom of Judah (2 K 25: I-Z), and it went back atleast to Solomon (I K 6: I, 37, 38). Something of the same sort may even befound in the time of the tribal federation, if we suppose that the ‘lesser’Judges ofJg IO: 1-s; 12: S-15 represent a permanent institutions : men wouldhave reckoned time by the years of their &ice, the precise duration of whichis noted in the texts.

It has been suggested that in the lists of Solomon’s of%als (I K 4: 3) thereis an official of the priestly caste ‘over the year’; he would be an eponymoo~magistrate, one whose name sewed to describe the year: the list of theseeponyms would provide a chronology. 1~1x1 would then have the equivalentof the eponyms of Assyria (I;mu) and of Southern Arabia (kablr). But thisinterpretation of a word which both the text and the versions represent as aproper name (Elihoreph or Elihaph) is a very fragile theory.

If dates were computed by the year of the reigning king, and if, as seemslikely, this year coincided with the civil year, all that remains is to decide howthe beginning ofthe reign was reckoned. The months between the enthrone-ment and the next New Year might be counted as a complete year. the firstyear of the reign: this is the system of antedating, in which the year of a

I. Cf. pp. 9, annd IsI.

194 n: avu MSTtTuTIoNs

king’s death and his successor’s enthronement is counted twice. Alternativelythe months before the New Year could go uncounted. the first year of thereign being reckoned from the New Year following the accession. This is thesystem of postdating.

The reigns of Assyria and Babylon were postdated. This system, it seems,was followed in Judah at the end of the monarchy: Jr 26: I gives as a date the‘begiig of the reign’, re’rhfth mamlekefh, of Joiaqim. which is the exactequivalent of the Akkadim r&h shwruti, meaning the incomplete year of thexcasion. On the other hand we cannot take into account Jr 27: I and 28 : I,where the same expression is found in passages which are corrupt or glossed.The re’rhtth malk;rh of Sedecias in Jr 49: 34 could be interpreted in the sameway and would give a precise date: recently published Babylonian docu-ments have shown us that there war exactly a month between the accessionof Sedecias and the next New Year. We have na reliable information onearlier times. Various conjectures have been made, some of which result in aregular crisxross of antedating and postdating between Israel and Judah. Theobject of these hypotheses is to support the synchroniw.tion given by theBwk of Kings, but, as we have already remarked, this raises a special prot-lem of chronology, which is perhaps insoluble. Simply on the basis of theevolution of the calendar, as we have traced it in the preceding pages, onewould be inclined to suppose that postdating, a Babylonian custom, beganwith the adoption of the Babylonian calendx under Joinqim, and that inearlier reigns the custom was to antedate, as it was in Egypt.

It was only under the Seleucids that a genuine era ~1s inaugurated, the enof the ‘kingdom of the Greeks’, as it is called in 1 M I : IO. Its beginning wasfvred by Seleucus I in the year in which he conquered Babylon. The differ-ence between the autumnal year observed at Ant&h and the spring yearobserved in Babylon makes this era begin in the autumn of 312 B.C. in theSyrc-Macedonian reckoning. but in the sprig of 311 B.C. in the Babylonian.The dxtes in the Books of Maccabees are divided between these two reckon-ings in the manner already stated with reference to the beginning of theyear.1 When the autonomy of the Jewish nation was recognized in IQ B.C..XD and ccmtracts began to be dated ‘in the fast year, under Simon the highpriest, eminent general and leader of the Jews’ ( I M 13 : 41-42). This was notthe foundation of a new era. but a return to the custom followed under theindependent monarchy. All the same. the era of the Greeks continued inuse (I M 14: I; 15: IO), and even xrxs to date the death of Simon (I M 16:14). The Jews resumed an independent but short-lived reckoning during theirtwo revolts against the Remans in A.D. 66-70 and 132-135.

The special era of the free cities of Syria and Palestine at the end of theHellenistic and Roman periods, and the more general ens of Pompey and ofArabia, are of no interest for the Old Testament.

I. cf. p. 191.

W E I G H T S A N D M E A S U R E S

i

!-I. Israelite ‘mehology ’

METROLOGY is by definition an exact science. It presumes thatunits of length, volume and weight can be mathematically deter-

Imined and rigorously classified. In practice. it requi&es the sanction

of a,, a&&y to impose a system and to ensure that the measures used byevervone are in conformio, with the statutoiy standards. This is the law inmodem states and was, in varying degrees, the practice in the great empiresof antiquity, but it is doubdul whether any such regulations existed in 1srae1.Some have claimed that 2 S 8: I contains a mention of a ‘standard cubit’ uptured by David from the Philistines, but the text is corrupt and may conceala geographical name. We hear of swindlers who gave short measure andovercharged (Am 8: 5). ofweights which were ‘heavy’ or ‘light’(Dt 25: 13).ofa short bushel and of faked weights (Mi 6: IO-II; cf. Pr 20: IO). By con-trast, Lv 19: 35-36 prescribes just weights, a just measure. a just ephah (cf. Ez45: IO). But all these texts refer to commonly accepted estimates. not toof&al standards. The Rabbinical tradition that samples ofthe standard cubitwere kept in the Temple is unverifiable and is perhaps based only on I Ch 23 :29, where the Levites are placed in charge of the loaves of oblation, the Aourof wheat, the wafers and all sorts of measures. From the context, this simplymeans they were to see that the offerings were of the required quantity (cf.,c.8. Ex 29: 40) and that God was not defrauded (cf. MI 3 : 8-10). We must notturn them into inspectors of weights and measures. We may appreciate thesetexts better if we see what happens tc-day in Jerusalem, even after the metricsystem has been imposed, and all are required to use the authorized measures;certain shopkeepers in the bvaars weigh their wares with a small stone or ahone-shoe, peasants measure out milk or oil in jam-pots, Bedouin measurethe rope they buy with outstretched arms. Like the Arabs of to-day, theIsraelites of old were satisfied with a measure which conformed to custom.we shall see tint in certain cases tbis measure was guaranteed by a mark orinscription on the receptacle or the measuring instrument. but this was not asaccurate as our modem systems, nor, it seems, as those of ancient Mesopo-tamin or Egypt. It is usefd to compare the data of the Bible with theseancient Eastern systems and (by way of&g the gaps) with the Graecc-Roman metrology. But it must be remembered that our estimate of their

1% n: CIVIL INsTnwlloNE

units is often uncertain and that there is no guarantee that the Israelitemexmres were exactly equivalent to those used in these foreign countries. Inour own day, measures with the same name have had, and sometimes stillhave, appreciably different values in Syria, in Egypt and in Palestine. and evenin different regions of Palestine itself. Moreover, values changed with thepassage oftime, both in Israel and in the adjacent countries. Finally, when weare confined, as here, m the Old Testament. the data gleaned from the textsand excavations is very inadequate.

These factors should incline us to a degree of prudence which has noralways been observed by authors ofspecialized works on biblical metrology.One may, with P certain degree of probability, arrange the measures of eachcategory in their order, but it is futile and misleading to give their modemquivalents to four or five placer of decimals. when we can be sure neither ofthe ancient standard nor of its relation to our system. Approximations are allthat can be given. Biblical ‘metrology’ &ill probably never become anexact science.

According to the universal practice of antiquity, the commcmest measuresof length were named from the limbs of the human body, and in Israel, fromthe arm and the hand which the craftsman employed for his art.

The cubit, ‘ommah, is the distance between the point of the elbow and thetip of the middle finger. The span, zererh, is measured from the tip of thethumb to the tip of the little fmger, the hand being extended and the fingersapart: the Vulgate, by translating this as palmur, has caused confusion with thefollowing term. The palm or handbreadth, tephah or cophnb, is in fact thebreadth of the hand at the base of the fmgen. The fmger or thumb, ‘e$bo’.which is frequently mentioned in ancient metrologies and in the Talmud.is found only once in the Old Testament as a unit of measurement(Jr 52: 21).

The rod, qaneh, employed in Ezechiel’s description of the Temple, is aninstrument for measuring rather than a unit of meamrement (cf. Ez 40: 3).This rod of Ezechicl was of six ‘great’ cubits, like the measure of the samename in Mesopotamia. The flaxen cord ofEz 40: 3 and the measuring cordof Am 7: 17; Za I: 16; 2: 5. are also mearming imtcuments. and we do notknow whether they were standardized, like the Mesopotamian cord.

Fiily, Jg 3 : 16 says that Ehud had a sword onegomed in length. The wordis a hapaxlegomenon in the Bible, and neither the conjectures of ancientversions (‘span’ or ‘palm’) nor those of modem scholars (‘short cubit’)throw any light on the size of this measure.

The old Testament nowhere indicates the relatiion of these units to oneanother, but they obviously had the same proportional relations xs the limbsof the human body from which they took their names. Probably, too, these

13 : WEEms Arm MWURBS 197

relations were adjusted in the same way as in Mesopotamia and Egypt, &&hltave an identical subdivision of the common cubit:

Cubit Ispan _,........... 1 IPalm . . . . . . . . . 6 , IFinger 14 12 4 I

According to Herodotus, Mesopotamia had, in addition, a ‘royal cubit’which mcamres 27 fmgen. In Egypt, too, there was a royal cubit of 7 palmsor 28 fmgers. A greater and a smaller cubit seem to have existed in Israel also,though not at one and the same time. Repeating the dimensions of Solomon’sTemple as they are given in the books of Kings, 2 Ch 3 : 3 states clearly thatthey are ‘cubits of the old measure’. The rod of the heavqly meamrer inEz 4c-42 (cf. Ap 21: 15-16) measured six cubits ‘of a cubit and a palm’ (Ez40: 5; d 43: 13). Probably Ezechiel adopted the ancient measure for thedescription of the future Temple and gave its equivalent in the meamre ofhis time: the old cubit would then have 6 palms of 24 fmgers, but these werebigger. On the other hand we must not forget the Egyptian royal cubit,divided into 7 palms or 28 fingers.

The length of a cubit according TV our modem systems of measurement canbe found by comparing the neighbowing systems; but these are not all thesame. The graduated rules engraved on two statues of Gudea, prince ofwagash about xoo B.C., show a cubit of 19: inches (0.495 metres), which isprobably the greater cubit of the time. According to graduated rules foundin Egypt, the royal cubit measured 201 inches (0.525 or 0.53 metres).Excavations in Palestine have so far not yielded any similar standards, and wehave only one positive piece of information to use: the inscription engravedin the tunnel of E&as says that it is 1,200 cubits long, and it is in fact583 yards long (53j.m metres); this would make the cubit r7’49o inches(0.44425 menes) long. Such precision, however, is absurd, for I,~M) is evi-dently a round number, like the 100 cubits in the same line of the inscriptionindicating how far underground the tunnel is, and secondly, there is theinevitable margin of error in the measurement of its winding course. Next,one would have to decide whether this cubit of Ezechias’ time was still theold cubit mentioned in 2 Ch 3: 3, or the longer cubit of Ez 40: 5. or theshorter cubit implied by the same text. There is consequently something

rather arbitrary in the estimates given in books, and they vary from about17’716 inches (0.45 metres) for the common cubit to about 20.472 inches(0.52 metres) for the cubit of Ezechicl.

These calculations are in any case rather pointless because there was nooil&I standard. In practice. the architect. masons and craftsmen measuredwith their own arms, their extended hands, their palms and their fingers

198 It: ClvtL ,NSTlTUIlONS

Arab mcttology mentions a ‘black cubit’: it was one measured by a tallnegt” in the setvice of the Caliph.

Travelling distances are indicated only by empirical methods in theHebrew books of the Old Testament. The step “ I pace (p&z’) is menfionedonly in I S 2”: 3. and then as a metaphor: ‘them is but one step betweenme and death’. The reckoning by days of marching is equally vague: oneday (Nb II: 31). three days (Gn 3”: 36; Ex 3: 18; Jon 3: 3). seven days (cn31: 23). I” Go 35: 16=48: 7; z K 5: 19. the distance is indicated by theexpression kibmth hn’orq ‘an extent of country’: it is anything but an exactmeuurement, and simply meam ‘some distance’.

Two Hellenistic measures appear in the books of Maccabees. Bcthsur isabout five whoinoi from Jerusalem (2 M I I : 5). The rchoinor is an ancientEgyptian measure, which in the Ptolemaic period was equal to approximately3: miles “I 6 kilomares: Betbsur is in fact 18 miles (29 kilometres) fromJero.&m. The stadion is mentioned several times, all grouped, a it happens,in the same chapter (2 M 12: 9, IO, 16, 17. 29). The stadion is a Greek unitwhich was in “se in Palestine doting the Hellenistic, and later, during theRoman, period. The Alexandtian rtadion, which the author of 2 M must havehad in mind, for it was almost certainly the one employed by the Jews inPalestine, measured jest over 202 yards (a little less than 185 metres). Thedistance off&o stadia (2 M 12: 2.9) between Jerusalem and Scythopolis (BethSbao) corresponds exactly to this mearote: the two places are just over 68miles (IIO kilometres) apart. The 248 stadia of 2 M 12: 9. however, if c&u-lated at the same length, are definitely to” short for the distance betweenJemsalem and the pat of Jamnia. The 75” stadia of 2 M 12: 17 cannot beestimated because the terminal points ate unknown.

There ate no terms in Hebrew for measutes of area, and these are indicatedby gitig the lengtlu of the sides of a rectangle “I square, the diameter andthe circumfere”ce ofa circular space (I K 6: zf.; 7: ~3; a Ch 4: I, 2; Ez 4”:47, 49; 4t: 2, 4. etc.).

Agticukural mea~oremcnts were empirical. The acre (+wwd), literally a‘yoke’ “t ‘harnessing’, is the area which a team ofoxen can work in a day: itis mentioned as a mexsu~emenf in Is 5: IO and in the corrupted text of 1 S 14:14. The area of a piece of ground was also calculated by the amount of grainneeded to sow it. This method was also used throughout the ancient East andis attested in Palestine in the Talmudic period, but in the Bible it occurs onlyin I K 18: 32, a passage which is d&cult to interpret. Elias digs a ditch roundthe altar, with a content of two <‘ah of seed. Whatever the size of the f’ahmay have been. and however densely we ruppose it to be sowed, whether weapply the measue to the surface area of the ditch itself “t extend it to thespace it enclosed, the estimate is still highly exaggerated.

It is not likely that Lv 27: 16 means that a field is to be valued at fiftyshekels pet home of barley needed to sow it, for that would mean a vast atea

t3:wmt”msANDMBnsuaat 199could be bought for a ridicoloosly small price. The text mwt refer to hegrain to bc hatvested, and is an estimate of the v&c of the field, not “fiauea.

The names used are generally those of the receptacles which con&cdprovisions and which wcte osed to measure them, as in many metrologies,included those “foot own country, like the tnn, the hogshead. the boshel andso on. When &se wotdr ate used to translate Hebrew terms, it is only toindicate a measure of roughly the same size, not to give an exact equivalent.To avoid all confusion, we shall here “se only ttansctiptiom of Hebrew words.

The &wr is. by derivation. an ‘us-ioad’. It is a large measure for cereals~v.v7:16;Ez45:13;0~3:2).InNb1t:32,rhe~omerisused,bywayofexception, as a meamte for the quails which fell in the desert&y covetedthe ground to a depth of z cubits for a day’s match around the camp. andeach man gathered ten homer; the figures ate deliberately fanrut+. to showthe people’s gluttony and to justify their chastisement. The text of Is 5 : IO ismeant to produce astonishment, but for the opposite reason: a homer of seedwill produce only an ‘ephah of crop: it is a cure.

Similxly. the kor is a large measote for flour (I K 5: 2). for wheat andbvley(tK3:z3;~Chz:9;~7:s;Esd7:z2).ThementionofkorforoilinI K 5: 25 is a mistake for bath (cf the Greek word and the parallel in I Ch 2:9). but the confused and overloaded text “fEz 45 : 13 makes kor a meamte forliquids and the equal of the homer.

The letek is mentioned ooly in OS 3 : 2 as a measure for barley. smaller thanthe Eomer. The vetsions interpret it as half a Eomer.

The ‘ephah in the vision of Za 5: 6-10, denotes a large receptacle, closedwith a lid and large enough to hold a woman. It is often the name for ameasuring instrument: there most be a just, a petfect ‘ephah (Lv 19: 36; Dt23: IS); the ‘ephah must not be made to” small (Am 8: 5; Mi 6: IO); theremust not be two kinds of ‘ephah, large and small @t 2s: 14; Pr 2”: IO) .Usually the word means the measure itself: an ‘ephoh og 6: 19; Rt 2: 17;I S I: 24, etc.), one-sixth of an ‘ephah (Ez 4s: 13; 46: 14), one-tenth of an‘ephah(Lv~:11;6:t3;Nb~:1s;~S:~;cf,Ext6:36).Theattidesmearuredate flout, meal, barley “t toasted corn, but never liquids. It is the commonest““it of measure for solids.

For liquids the equivalent is the bath. The measure must be just (Ez 4s : IO).Itisusedforwater(~K7:26,38:~Ch4:~).wine(zChz:9;Is~:1o)andoil(z chz: 9;Ez45: 14; I K 3: z5,corrected).

The rhalfrh, found only in Is 4”: IZ and Ps 8”: 6, is an instrument formeasuring one-third of an indeterminate ““it.

The /ah is a measure for flour and cereals in ancient histoticzJ texts (Gn18: 6; I S zs: 18; I K 18: 32; zz K 7: I, 16, 18).

L?aa n: CIVIL MSmmONS

The hln is a mexwre for liquids. Apart from Ez 4: I I, where one-sixth of akin represetxs the minimum a man needs to drink in a day, the htn is onlymentioned in rituals, for offerings of wine and oil: the whole hln (Ex 30: 24;Ez 45: ~4; 46: 5. 7. I I), the half-& (Nb 15: 9. IO; 28: 14). one-third of ahfn (Nb 15: 6, 7; Ez46: I4), one-quarter bin (Exzg: 40; Lv 23: 13; Nb 15:4 . 5; 28: 5. 7, 14).

The ‘omer, a word meaning ‘sheaf’, is used only in the story of the manna(Ex 16passim): every man gathers an ‘omn a day. The gloss of Ex 16: 36reckons it as one-tenth of an ‘ephah.

The ‘ii&r& (onctenth) is a measure of meal in the liturgical texts (Ex 29:40; Lv 14: 10, ;I, etc.).

The qab appears only in z K 6: 25 : during the siege of Samaria a quartcr ofa wb of wild onions is sold for five shekels of silver.

The 102 is a smaI1 unit for liquids, mentioned only in the ritual for thepurification of lepers (Lv 14 p&m).

If we try to arrange these t~rnu in order of size, the gloss of Ex 16: 36indicates that the ‘omn is one-tenth of an ‘ephah, and probably the ‘tenth’(i&n%) is also one-tenth of an ‘ephah. According to Ez 45 : I I, the ‘ephah andthe bath are of the same capacity and are equal to one-tenth of a Eomer. Thisgives the f&wing reties:

(wwr I‘<ppk?h=barh IO I

‘omer= ‘i&won Iw IO I

This is all that can be deduced from the Hebrew text alone. But Mesopc-tamian metrology enables us to establish another series: in the Neo-Babylon-ian period the proportions between the three unitr of measure are: I gur= 30s&u= 180 pa. The resemblance of the names justifies our drawing up thefollowing table for the exilic and post-exilic period:

fur=kor. I

r&u = r”.h 30qc,=q,,b 180 : I

These proportions are confirmed by the documents of the Jewish periodand the Talmud.

These two series, one of which is founded on the decimal system and theother on the sexagesimal, are apparently independent. Their interrelation isonly a hypothesis, founded on the Greek version ofEx 16: 36 and Is 5: IO,which renders an ‘ephah by Tpia uhpo; now uhpov is the ordinary tranrla-tion of f’oh, which would then be one-third of an ‘ephah. On the other hand,though the text ofEz 45: 14 is obscure, we can deduce that the komer and theka are equivalent, and so we can draw up the followmg table:

I3 : WBIGErn AND MBASURES 20x

bomn= km I

‘cphah = bath IO I

r”ah 30 3 I

f ~mltcr = ‘i~fd” ID3 IO - Iqrzb 180 18 6 - I

The position ofthe hi and the Iof can only be deduced from sources which

i ax even later: the comparison made by Josephus with the Graeco-Romanmetrology, the interpretations of St Jerome and Talmudic data. From themwe conclude that I qab=4 fog and I bath= 6 hfn. Leaving aside the lerhek andthe shokh, which are too seldom mentioned to concern us, the complete

i table would be as follows:s

Eomer= kor I

‘rphoh = bath IO I ,.

i;r”ah 3h i ” . . . : : : : : 6 : I

1 ‘omcr = ‘~fcv~n IO0 IO - - Ii qab 180 18 6 , - I

;

Ill&7 720 72 24 12 - 4 I

This table, we must insist, is hypothetical, and in any case is valid only fora very late date. It depends on identiftcations which are sometimes uncertainand always late. the oldest being those ofEze&iel. And even of these last, noone an say whether they record measurements which had fallen into disuse,

1F or foretell a reform which was perhaps never put into effect in biblical times.

It must be admitted that we have no meam ofdrawing up a table, howeverI limited in its accuracy, for proportions in use before the Exile. The only useful

term of comparison would be the Assyrian system, which preceded the Nec-

k Babylonian used above. The Assyrian nomenclature was as follows: I i&ui = IO s&u= IOO qa. As it is generally agreed that the qa did not change its

value in Mesopotamia, the in&u is almost half the Babylonian sPtu. The He-brew homer has the same name as the in&, which also means ‘an ass-load’.

/ This makes it doubtful, in spite of Ez 45: 14, whether the Eomer was theequivalent of the kor, which corresponded to the gur. The position of the<‘ah= sdtu is equally puzzling: according to the Assyrian system, it should hef6 of an i&u= bomn, and therefore equal to the ‘ephah= bath, s it was laterdefmcd in Ez 45: II. All the same, it would be surprising if the s”ah of themo,,arcbical period had the same value as the ‘ephah= bath, also mentionedin ancient texts, though we do not know their relative values.

These gaps in our knowledge make it impossible to give, for the OldTestament period, a table ofequivalents with our modem systems. The tn~~tone could attempt would be to determine the value of a particular unit at aparticular period. We can compare the Hebrew measures Eomer, kor and/ah with the Mesopotamian measures of the same names, which are bate1

202 n: CnlL INSmnJTIONS

known. In the NewBabylonian period, according to recent calculations, theLor was equal ro 53 gallons and & pint (24rw1 litter), and the f’ah to 14.15pints (8.04 lirres): the basic unit. the +I was 2.35 pints or I ‘34 litres. In theAssyrian system the i&w= !to~~ter would be 29 gallons 3 pints (134 litres),the rt?rtr (=?a/~? ‘ep,ka/z?) 2 gallons 7: pints (13 ‘4 litres). Unfortunately, theestimate of the qn is uncertain and other authors value it as I .42 pints (0.81limes); an inscribed vase recently found at Pcrsepohs would point to a 4’ ofI .62 pints (0.92 litter), or a little more. Egypt hadameasurec&d’pt= ‘ephahfor solid and bns= hbz for liquids; but their values are even more doubtful.Different authors reckon the hnw between 43 and 8j pints (2.5 and 5 litter),and rhc number of hnw in the ‘pt is nor certain-perhaps 40; wcn taking rhclowest estimate for the huts, this would demand a higher capacity for the‘ephnh than anything ycr proposed.

One might think that a start could be made from the apparently precisedata of the Bible: the sea of bronze in So1on1on’s Temple had P diameter ofIO cubits, a depth of 5 cubits and it contained z,wo bat/t (I K 7: ~3. 26). Butwe do nor know exactly cithcr the value of the cubit or the form of the recep-tacle. and the parallel passage in 2 Ch 4: 5 gives a capacity of 3,000 both, withthe sane rneasurcmcnrs in cubits. The facrs about the bronze basins ( I K 7:38) are even less adequate.

Archaeology alone might provide us with more reliable information. AtTell ed-Dnweir (Lakish) the upper part of a jar has been found on which hasbeen engraved br m/k (royal bnrh): the same inscription can perhaps berestored on a handle from Tell en-Nasbeh, and a fragment inscribed br comesfrom Tell Beit-Mirsim (Debit?). Having been engraved before baking, theseinscriptions are evidently meant to indicate a recognized official capacity.Unfortunately the largest fragment, that from Tell ed-Duweir, does notallow of our calculating the capacity of these jars with any accuracy. Othervases had only the stamp bnlk. lt has been possible to reconstruct entirely onlyone example, also from Tell cd-Duweir, whose capacity is nearly IO gallons(45 ‘33 litter). But at Tell cn-Nasbch there is an ahnost complete jar, stampedItnIb, which contains only 40.7 litrcs. If this stamp certified that these jarsconformed to an off&l measure, and if, as used to be thought. the jarsstamped 61 or br lmlk had the same capacity, we could then arrive at theapproximate size of the bath. But the fragments marked br certainly belongro rcceptaclcs smaller than the jars marked hnlk. It has therefore beensuggested that the latter wrrc of double capacity and represented rv,o both;the size of the beth would then be about 4 gallons 7 pints (22 or 23 litrus).Such a string of hypotheses hardly lads ro a certain conclusion.

The inscriptions br lwlk are of the eighth century B .C . and some of thestamps lmlk are rather later. A final piece of evidence comes from theRoman period. In a cave at Qumran an unbroken jar was discovered onwhich is written in charcoal: ‘z <‘ah 7 /og’. Its capacity is about 61 pints or 35

13 : WElGaro MD hsc&tSuBBs =3

Litrcs, which would make the log just about one pint (0.64 liws) and &/ah about 2, pints (IS ‘30 litres). This could agree w+h the ~~&,r, (Is_litre) arinure of the lmlk jars , which contained I bath=3 /ah. U&X_rrmvely, rhis inscription, being traced in charcoal and nor inscribed beforebaking, may nor be an indication of capacity at all, but simply the anmnnr ofprovisions put in rhe jar, wirhour filling it. This makes it useless for fixing ametrology. Moreover, it would only hold good for rhe Roman period. Herewe need only say that the tables which have been drawn up for rhis period,after comparison with Graecc-Roman metrology and after consnlring theTalmud, vary as much as IOO%, and are then, quite wrongly, applied to theIsraelite period. If such rabies must be given, the probabilities, at least, shouldbe rcspecred: a honrcr. being originally an ass-load. may have been u much as5 bushels. 6 gallons (zag litres). the lowest figure proposed, but certainlynor the IZ bushels, 3 gallons (450 litres) suggested by an altemarivereckoning.

While foodstuffs were measured by volume, precious materials and metalswere weighed. Small things were weighed on a beam-b&we with twoscales. The weights, usually of hard stone, were called ‘eben, which meansboth ‘stone’ and ‘weight’; they were kept in a purse (Dr 25: 13; Mi 6: 11;Pr 16: I I) .

‘To weigh’ is rhapol and the rheqel or shekel was consequently the basic nnitof weight. This unit is cormrmn to all ancient Semitic metrologies. Theoriginal text of 2 S 14: 26 speaks of zoo shekels ‘at rhe king’s weight’, and aseries of post-exilic texts mentions the ‘shekel of the sanctuary’ (Ex 30: 13.~4;38:24-26;L~~:1~;~7:j,2~;Nb3:47,so;7pllssim;18:16).Inallthesereferences it is the weight which conforms to the offkial standard, or else atit of the same name but heavier; some of the Ugariric rcxts reckon in‘heavy’ shekels and in Mesopotamia there was a series of ‘royal’ weights,double the ordinary weights. In a story from the patriarchal period, beforethe institution of the State, there is a reference to shekels which were ‘currentamong the merchants’ (Gn 23: 16). But it sometimes happened that tradershad large and small ‘stones’ (Dt 25: 13), two kinds of weights (Pr 20: 23).according to whether they were buying or selling.

The multiples of the shekel arc the n&a and the talent. The mina (maneh)appears only rarely and is apparently late ( I K IO: 17, perhaps radactional;Ez 45: 12; Esd 2: 6g; NC 7: 70. 71; cf. Dn 5: 25). The mina is often men-tioned in Mesopofamian texts, but we may note that at Ugarir it is attestedonly in Akkadian texrs offoreign origin, or by Ugariric translations of&m:in practice, however, weights of 50 shekels were used, the equivalent of onemina. The talent (kikkar) takes its name from rhe fact that it is a weight ofcircular shape (root: kn). 1t is a unit for gross reckoning, often used in the

w n: av”. “is-ONS

historical books but seldom in the Pent&u& (Ex 23: 3% 37: 24; 38:

24-w).several &actions of the shekel are mentioned: a half-shekel (Ex jo: I j).

one-third of a shekel (Ne IO: 33). a quarter-shekel (I S 9: 8). But there arealso special names for the small units of weight. The beqa’, literally a ‘frx-don’, is mentioned only in Gn 2.4: 2~. and Ex 38: 26, and is a half-shekel. Thegemh (probably ‘grain’) is the smallest unit ofwkght (Ex 30: 13; Lv 27: 25;Nb 3: 47; 18: 16; Ez 45: 12). Thepayim, familiar to archaeologists. is men-tioned in 1 S 13: 21, a text which was for a long time incomprehensible; itrepresents two-thirds of a shekel (cf. Za 13 : 8). Another term occurring onlyonce in the Bible, but known in Akkadian, is quoted in Dn 3: 25, 28 (Ara-ma&), along with the mina and the shekel: it is the p’res, with the phual or

re:+/in (IP=o Presenting half a mina or, more probably, half a

Finally we must mention the q’&h, M otherwise unknown unit of weight,used by Jacob when paying for the field of Shechcm (Gn jj: 19; cf. Jos 24:32, and repeated inJb 42: II by a deliberate archaism).

The basic elements of these units are found among Israel’s neighbours. In~esoportia they are arranged on a sexagesimal basis: the shekel contains180 ‘grains’ and is also divided into multiple fractions, from two-thirds to atwenty-fourth of a shekel. The mina is 60 shekels and the talent is 60 minas=3,600 shekels. At Ugarit the talent is only 3,000 shekels; the value ofthe minais not given by the texts where it is mentioned, but it appears from the seriesof weights that it was only jo shekels, and so there were 60 minas in thetalent.

For Israel, the following values are given by the texts : according to Ex 3 8 :25-26, the talent is worth 3,000 shekels and the beqo’ is a half-shekel. FromLv 27: 23; Nb 3: 47; 18: 16; Ez 45: I& the shekel contains mph, and thefirst three texts make clear that this is the shekel of the sanctuary. Evaluationof the mina is more d&cult: the Hebrew ofEz 45: IZ. reads: ‘the mina shallbe for you 20 shekels and 25 shekels and 15 shekels’, which gives a total of6oshekels, like the Babylonian mina. The manner of counting is odd, but isperhaps explained by the existence of weights of 15.10 and 25 shekels, thelast representig half a mina of 50 shekels, as at Ugarit. Ezechiel seems to tryto revalue the mina, as Ez 40: 5 would revalue the cubit and Ez 45 : I I wouldperhaps revalue the ‘ephah and the bath. Reckoning the shekel as aogerah Ez43: 12, followed by the later texts, would then be part of the scheme ofreform. The best plan is therefore to draw up two tables. One depends on Ex38: 25-26, and runs as follows:

talent I. . . . . . . . . . ..ti I

shekel j.m 50 1bsq.’ 6.w 100 2 I

I3 : WHIGHTS AND MBAOTJm.5 20sThese values seem to be confirmed by the penalties of 100 shekels (Dt 32: x9)and 50 shekels (Dt 22: w) and the tax of 30 shekels imposed on the wealthyby Me&em (2 K 15: 20). We mwt remember that the name of the mina isvery rare and that here we have its equivalent in shekels. The system is of arespectable antiquity, and, as we have seen. obtained at Ugarit.

From the data given by Ezechiel. we can produce another table:

talent Imim 60shekel : : : : : : : : : : : j.600 :, I

gnah 7woo I,ZCQ 20 I

This value for the mina seems to be found in an ancient text: according toEx a: 32, a fine of 30 shekels is imposed in a case where the Code of Ham-murabi imposes half a mina.

,”

To transpose these weights into our modem systems is very di&ult. Inthe system most commonly used in Mesopotamia, the shekel weighed 0.30ounces (8.4 grams), but there was a series derived from the ‘royal’ talent inwhich all the units weighed double. At Ugarit a collection of weights postu-lates a light shekel of 0.34 ounces (9.5 grams), and the texts speak of a‘heavy’ shekel, perhaps its double, which would give a weight of 0.67ounces (18.7 grams).

For Israel, excavations in Palestine have yielded nwnemus weights, someof which bear a numerical mark OI the name of a unit of weight, or bothtogether. Though their archaeological context is rarely beyond dispute, theseinscribed weights can generally be dated, by epigraphic criteria. towards theend of the monarchy. But there are notable differences of weight betweenspecimens belonging to the same type and apparently to the same period, andfound in the same site (e.g. at Tell cd-Duweir, which has produced a largecollection). Only the small units are represented by inscribed weights, andnone bears the name ‘shekel’; it is replaced by a symbol, followed by anumber. Since it was the commonest unit, the word ‘shekel’ must also besupplied in many reckonings in the Bible.

The longest series of inscribed weights bears the symbol and the numbersI, 2, 4 or 8. At least twenty-five examples are known, a dozen of them foreight units. The mark is &at of the shekel, and they weigh about 0.41 ounces(11.3 grams). A small bronze weight, found at Gerer, is marked lmlk with afigure 2; this would be a ‘royal’ weight. It actually weighso. ounces(~~~28grams), which would give a shekel of 0.39 ounces (11.14 grams), but themetal may have lost some of its weight through oxidization.

Half a dozen weights connected with this series are inscribed gym: the wordcan be recognized, as we said, in 1 S 13: 21, and stands for two-thirds of ashekel. Judging by what they weigh, a shekel is about 0.42 ounces (12 grams).

206 1,: CNIL INsTlmONS

The weigh@ inscribed bq’ evidently represent half-rhckcls (cf. Ex 38: 26).The six known specimens weigh roughly 0.~1 ounces (6 grams) and suggesta shekel of at least 0.4~ ounces or IZ grams.

Besides tbcsc, we possess a dozen weights inscribed n$p. This seems to meanthe ‘half’ of a unit, but the unit is not the Israelite shekel, forjudging by whatthey weigh the n;p averages 0.35 ounces (IO grams). It belongs, therefore, toanother system, also represented by a small weight, marked + nzp, weighing0.09 ounces (2.54 grams). and perhaps by certain uninscribed weights, someof which weight 0.18 ounces (5 grams) and others 0.72 ounces (20 grams).Clearly, they represent ; and 2 n$p respectively. The name is never found inthe Old Testament as that of a weight, but it is found in the Ugaritic textstogether with the shekel. and is perhaps represented by a weight of 0.34ounces (9.5 grams) in the weight system: in the Ugaritic system, the t?pwould be a ‘light’ shekel, ‘half’ of the ‘heavy’ shekel. Perhaps the VPweights found in Palestine were lost there by ‘Cammite’ traders.1

uncertainty about the exact value of the shekel and the theoretical natureof Ezecbiel’s classification prevent us suggesting more than approximatevalues for the mina and the talent. The ancient mim must have weighedbetween 1.213 and 1.3~3 pounds (550 and 6on grams), the talent between 75and 80 pounds (34 and 36 kilograms). In Ezcchiel’r system the mina wouldhave weighed about t ‘54 pounds (700 grams). It is useless to be too precise inwhat hu always been a fluctuating metrology.

5. The coinage

Study of weights leads us naturally to that of the coinage. The earliest formof trade was bartering merchandise, and payment was made, at first, ingoods which could be measured or counted-so many tneawres of barley oroil, so many head of cattle, etc. For the sake of convenience. metal was soonadopted as the means ofpayment; sometimes it was wrought, sometimes iningots. the quality and weight of which determined the value in exchange.Metal was used in large quantities for the payment of tribute (2 K 15: 19;18 : 14. etc.), in small amounts for individual transactions with foreigncowmies (Gn 4~: ~5, 35; 43: Izf.; 1 S 13: 21; I K I O: 29), and zhvays, itseems, for the purchase of land (Gn 23: x4f.; 2 S 24: 24: I K 16: 24; 21: 2;Jr 32: 9). Solomon paid Hiram in kind ( I K 5: 25) and Mesha used to pay atribute ofrheep and wool (2 K 3 : 4). The two methods ofpayment might becombined: Owe acquired bir wife for 15 shekels of silver, a Eomcr of barleyand a lerhek of barley (0s 3 : 2).

The metals of exchange were copper, gold and, chiefly, silver. The wordkwph. silver, thus came to mean both the metal itself and the medium ofpayment, like krrspu in Akkadian, argent in French and ‘silver’ in Scottish

I_ cf. pp. n-78.

I3 : WKIGRTS AND MBASURES =-?usage. At a very early date in the Eastern Mediterranean. at My-e, hCyprus. in Egypt, in Mesopotamia and in Syria, the metal was melted intoingots of different shapes, or into discs, bars, brooches and rings. sometime,bearing signs certifying their weight and purity, but this was not yet coinage.Paymeno were always made by weight. The weight of the silver or gold isoften mentioned on Egyptian monuments and is described in one of the RasShainn poems. This remained the only method of payment among theIsraelites until the Exile; the @l@fi of Gn 33: 19 is not ‘coinage of theparriarchal period’, but a weight of unknown value. The verb rfinqal meansboth ‘to weigh’ and ‘to pay’, and the shekel became the basic unit in theJewish monetary system after fust being the basic unit of the Israelite weight-system. To pay for the cave of Macpelah Abraham ‘weighs’ 400 shekels toEpbron (Gn 23 : 16); Jercmias ‘weighs’ 17 shekels to his cousin for the field atAnathotb(Jr 32: 9. etc.). Merchants arc called ‘weighers of’silver’in So I: II.The State acted in exactly the same way. To fmance the repairing of theTemple, King Joas placed at the entrance to the sanctuary a chest, prototypeof our church alms-boxes, in which the faithful deposited silver of everyshape. When they saw the chest contained a large amount of silver. the royalsecretary came and the silver found in the Temple of Yahweh was melteddown and calculated. Then they sent the silver, after checking it, to themuter-builders. who paid it out (2 K 12: 10-13). This should be comparedwith what Hercdoms relates about Darius: ‘The gold and silver of the ttib-ute are kept by the king in this tubion: he has them melted down andpoured into earthenware jars. When the vessel is fidl, the day covering istaken offand. when the king needs money, he has so much metal broken intopieces as is required for each occasion’ (Hirt. III, 96).

But between Joas and Darius came the invention of coinage. A coin h Ppiece of metal stamped with a mark which guarantees ia denomination andweight. In theory, then, it can be accepted at sight, without weighing orchecking. It was invented in Asia Minor in the seventh century B.C., and thecustotn spread through the Near East, largely through the ineuence of the Per-sians. The earliest coins were made of elecmun, a natural alloy of gold andsilver, which was collected in the sands of river-beds. especially in thePact&s. Croesus invented a bimetallic system of gold and siiver waters.These ‘croesids’ were replaced under Darius by ‘da&s of gold and shekelsof silver. The dark bad no rival as a gold coin, but the use of the Medianshekel was not w&spread and it did not compete with the Greek silvercoins.

Naturally. then, the fust references to coinage in the Bible appear in thepost-e&c books. Gold darics are mentioned in Esd 8: 27 and. by ananachronism, in I Ch 29: 7. which refers to the time of David. The reckon-ings of Ed 2: 69 and Ne 7: 69-71 arc made in gold drachmas. The silverdrachma was the Greek coin most highly valued, especially the Athenian

208 n: CnlL lNSTIRpFIONS

drxhm, the ‘owl’ of the f&h century KC. But the gold dradmv werestruck only rarely, aad were “ever in wide circulation. It seems certain, then,that the ‘drxhmas’ of Esd a”d NC are darics, the cm&ion being due to theredactor, or to a copyisr’s fault. We cannot tell whether the silver shekels ofNe 3: 15; 10: 33 refer to a weight or a coin; but they are certainly not Media”shekels, for these were never cwrent in Pale&e.

The oldest coins discovered in Pale&e are Greek Macedonia” coins: a”elcctr”“l coin dared circa 300 B.C. coma from the latest excavations atB&u (Shcchem), and a silver four-drachma piece struck at Aegaea about480 has been found in a tomb at Athlith. It is obvious that these coins fromremofc lands were not current in Palestine, and circulated only for theirvalue 1~ ingots, estimated by their weight.

But Judau, like other provinces of the Petian Empire, eventually struckits own coinage. The first Jewish coin seems t” have bee” a small silver pieceof the fifth century B .C ., originating from Hcbron uld sin&r to those, ofunce& series, from Arabia and Philistia in the sane period. Ir hears theinscription bq’ in old Hebrew script, uld weighs 0.14 “unces (3.88 gram),which is approximately the weight ofthe Attic &a&ma. Ir has bee” ascribedto the time when Nehemias wa governor of Judaea, hur this is only ahypothesis, and it is not we” certain that the coin is Jewish: the type is “ofcharacteristic, uld the Phoenician alphabet was then in “se far beyond thebou&,ries of Judaea. More authentic are two silver pieces with the legendyhd, that is, Wwd, the c&&l name of the Persia” province of Judah in theAraazicEsd3:1,8;7:I4(cf.D”2:~3;~:13;6:’4).AsilvercoinfoundatB&w also carries the stvnp Y‘had and the proper name ‘Ezechia?.‘. This isprobably the priest Ezechins who, according to Josephus, became in old agethe friend of Ptolemy I around 313 B.C.; but it is scarcely probable that thePtolemies would have authorized silver coinage t” be struck locally. Thecoin must date from the time when E&as ad&wed the province ofJudaea, imme&tely after the conquest of Alexander or at the very end of thePersia” rule. The other two coins inscribed YhCd are earlier.

P&&e, uld indeed, the entire Near East, the” cane under the monetarysystems of the Se&ids or the Ptolemies. This followed the Phoenicianstandard. the silver drachma of o. 13 ounces (3.6 grams) and the tetradrachnu,or shekel. of approxbnately 0.51 ounces (14.4 gram). It was o”ly whenSimon Maccabaeur was recognized by Andochus VII Sidetes as priest uldedmarch of the Jews that he received the right to strike a coinage (I h4 15: 6).As in sin&r concessions made by the Sdeucids, thin only extended to abronze coinage for Ical use. This event took place in 138 B.C. But Simon didnot “se his privilege, and it must have bee” revoked by the same Antiochr~,who very soon tuned ag&st him (I M 15: 27). and Simon died shortlyafter. in 134. In any case. no bronze coins of his age have reached us: thesilver and br0”z.c c&s which were for a long dme attributed to him date in

13 : WElGHls AND MEASURES aogfact ,fiom the First Revolt, in A.“. 66-70. Jewish coinage began only withSimon’s successor, John Hyrcanus, and then only when he considered him_self independent, after the conquest of Samaria, around IID B.C. It was aninferior bronze coinage, which continued under his successors, the Humon-eanr; among silver coins, Tyrian money, which was valued for its alloy,circulated almost to the exclusion of alI others. The history of this coinageand its successors under Herod and the Procurators does not concern us here.The Jews began to strike bronze and silver coins again during their tworevolts against the Romuls, in A.“. 66-70 and 132-135. Their coins have aninscription in Hebrew and are dated from the years of the ‘deliverance ofSian’ or the ‘deliverance of Israel’. But this has taken us far beyond the OldTeswnent era.

,.

III

MILITARY INSTITUTIONS

.

THE ARMIES OF ISRAEL

ETu have a fair knowledge of the military organization of theEgyptians, the Asryro-Babylooians and the Hittites. R&e&paintings and drawings portray their soldiers, their battles, their

camps and their strongholds; inscriptions describe their campaigns; andcopies of peace treaties record the titles, fimcdoos and careen of particularindividuals in the army.

Our information about the military organization of Israel is by no meansso complete. Not a single relief or drawing of a military kind has rwvived;perhaps there never were any. Even the fortifications and weapons broughtto light by excavations belong, for the most patt, to the Camant‘tes. whomthe Israelites conquered and displaced. There are, of course, numerous texts,and the historical books of the Bible xc full of wars. But these narratives arenot contemporary records of the events. There ate, it is true, some very oldtraditions in the books of Josue and Judges; but it war nearly six hundredyears later, just before the Exile, when the militaty history of this pcdodreceived its final literary form in the books as we possess them to-day. Thebooks of Samuel and Kings, on the other hand, do contain passages com-mitted to writing very soon after the eveon took place, but the vivid and life-like character of these passages does not compemate for their lack of pr+c&ion about military derails. Quite the most detailed information on themilitary organization under the monarchy is to be found in Chronicles; but&se two books were written in an age when there was neither independencenor an ntmy to de&d it. Lastly, the Exodus itselfand the wandetings in thedeserts were described, cemorien later, as the movements ofa well-disciplinedarmy. Such are the sauces of our information, and yet they can be used togood purpose, provided they are carefully tested and dated by literary and

toncal cnunsm

P’ “..

The military institutions of a people change more rapidlythan any other form of its social organization, for they are subject to many

1 kinds of influence. The army is affected by every change in the type of:,, govemmcnt, by the varying requirements of policy, by the enemy it may;we to face, and, of coutse, by progress in the development of armnmentr.The period between the Conquest under Josue and Nabuchodonosois siegeof Jerusalem is longer than that which separates the Hundred Years’ Warfrom the second world Wu, and though the orgaoiwtion of the army and

314 m: ?.uLrr*xl~ INsrmJn0NS

field tactics evolved more slowly in ancient times. those six centuries sawextensive changes in both.

It is obvious. therefore. that the military institutions of Israel must bestudied in the order in which they developed. Secondly, the general cbamc-rcr of the scmrces must be taken into account: the texts are religious texts, andas a rule they are not concerned with merely military matters such xs theconstitution of the army or the technique of war. Moreover, even the textsaeating directly of war need careful interpretation, and this is particularlytrue of the older texts, for war was regarded as a sacral undertaking with aritual of irr own. Indeed, this notion of a holy war persisted to the very endof Old Testament times; bur the concept underwent many transformationsuntil it emerged as P kind of holy ideal. The religious character of these mili-tary institutions will bc treated at the end of this part of the book; we mustfirst concern ourselves with their non-sacred apats.

I. A people under (mm

Among nomads~ there is sw distinction between the army and the people:every abl&.mdied man can join in a raid and must be prepared to defend thetribe’s property md rights against an enemy, under his she&h or anothercommander. As a rule, each tribe acts on its own, but from time to timescvcral tribes will unite for a common enterprix. There are customs of warand rules far fighting, but there is no stable military organization. This wasprobably true of 1srae1 also, as long as it was leading a semi-nomadic life, butit is not easy to perceive the true situation which underlies the stories ofExodus and Numbers. Ex 12: 37; 13: 18 and 14: 1pz20 picture D people inarms marching out ofEgypt; Nb I: 3. 20, 22, etc.; 2: 1-31 and I O: 11-28show them marching through the desert in formation; but these pictures areidealizations composed in a later age when the entire people was called toarms in times of national danger. In Josue. too, the Conquest is presented asthe achievement of a unified Israelite army, though certain passages, with theparallels in Jg I, give a more realistic picture of what acrually happened.These latter texts show tribes or groups of tribes, such as Judah and Simeonand the house of Joseph, conquering their part of the Holy Land indcpend-cntly of each other; and the very ancient notes preserved in Nb 32: I, 16,3~42, which record the setdcment of Reuben. Gad and Manasseh (E&ternhalf), are irfa similar character. There was never any question of an organizedarmy.

We are somewhat better informed on the period of the Judges. Each tribeis securing its hold on its own territory and defending this land against thecounter-attacks of the Canaanites who formerly held it; neighbaring Peopleswage war against them. and nomads make raids. Sometimes the tribes, who

I. CT p. 9,

were bound together by the pact of Shechem (JOS 2.4) join together for d_tary enterprises. Gideon, for example, mmmons to arms not only his owntribe, Manasseh, but Aser, Zcbulon and Nephthali as well (~g 6: 33); h heend he calls upon Ephraim too (Jg 7: 24) where men were compl&+because they had not been called to arms at the beginning (Jg 8 : I). The prosenarrative in Jg 4: 6f. tells how Baraq mobilized &b&n and Neph&&&nst the Cbtites, but the Song of Deborah (Jg 5 : 14f.) in&da in iolist contingents from Ephraim, Benjamin, M&r and Issachar as well, mdtakes to task Reuben, Giiead, Dan and Ascr for remaining neutral. Sin&rly,to avenge the outrage committed at Gibcah, all Israel, except the ma ofYabcsh in Gilead (Jg 21: 8f.) rakes up arms (Jg 20).

In the sane way Saul called ‘all Israel’ to arms against the Ammonites (I SII: I-II), and the subsequent victory ensured him the throne. By this,political unity ~1s at last achieved, and the people had a king ‘who wouldlead it forth and fight its battles’ (I S 8: 20). Saul called upon the entirepeople for the holy war against the Amalekites (I S 15: 4) and assembled ‘allIsrael’ against the Philistines (I S 17: 2, II): this is the reason why David’sthree brothers went to the war (I S 17: 13), leaving in Berblehem only theiraged father and David, who was too young to bear arms. According to I s 23 :8, the king even called auf ‘the entire people’ to pursue David when he tookrefuge in Q&h. For&e battle of Gilboa, where he would meet defeat anddeath at the hands of the Philistines, Saul had gathered ‘all Israel’ (I S 28: 4).Certainly things had changed considerably since the period of the Judges, butit was a smooth evolution. The ‘Judges’ were ‘saviours’ marked out by Godto set his people free, and Saul himself was a leader of the charismatic type,moved by the spirit ofYahweh(l S 10: IO and especially II: 6), smashing theAmmonitcs in P way which recalls the military successes which marked outthe greater Judges.

There were various ways for the leader, Judge or King, to call the peopleto arms. Sometimes a trumpet was sounded (Jg 3: 17. Ehud: 6: 34, Gideon;I S 13: 3. Saul). or messengers were sent around the tribes (Jg 6: 35; 7: 24).Sometimes the message was underlined by a symbolic action, as when Saulcut to pieces o yoke of oxen and sat their quarters to every part of the tcrri-tory of Israel with the threat: Whoever does nor follow saul to battle willhave his own oxen treated in the same way’ (I S II: 7). When the men ofGibeah so maltreated a Levite’s concubine that she died, the Levite cut herbody into twelve pieces and sent one to each tribe in order to rouse the entirepeople against the men ofthat town (Jg 19: 29-30). During the period of theJudges, the response to these appeals depended on each group, which madeits own decision. The Song of Deborah twice insisrs on rhis freedom to fightor not to fight (Jg 5: 2 and g), and expresses nothing stronger than reproachor regret about the tribes which chose to stand aside (Jg 5: 15-17). Mcrozalone, a town in Nephthali which did not f 11o ow its tribe, is cursed (Jg J : 23).

216 m: MILITARY lNsTrnmONs

for Nephthali was the first of all the tribes to take up arms. Threats might beutorcd against those who refused to do their duty (Jg 21: 5; 1 S II: 7), butwe do not know what sanctions were in fact applied. According to the tradi-tion recorded in Jg a: 6-q the expedition against the mm of Yabesh wasnot a ptitive expedition because of their abstention; its sole purpose was tofind wives for the rest of the tribe of Benjamin without breaking the oathwhich the other combatants had taken.

In spite of this mass call-up, the number of fighting men was small.Exaggerated numbers have crept into the older narratives; they tell us thatqoo.ooo men marched against Benjamin (Jg 20: 17). that 3cqoca Israelitesand 30,ooa men ofJudah answcrcd the call of Saul (I S II: 8). that xqc.xinfmtrymen followed him when he marched on the Am&kites (I S IS: 4).Other texts are more sober: Jg 4: IO reckons the joint forces at Zabulon andNephthali at not more than ID,OM), and Jg J: 8 gives 40,ca as the greatestnumber which could be mustered from all the tribes; this latter figure, 40,000,is also the six of the entire army of Israel facing Jericho (Jos 4: 13). But thnefigures, too, are symbolic.

The men assembled in battle dress bal&fm (literally, ‘unclothed’, ‘stripped’,i.e. in &art cloaks). They provided their own arms, of a very simple kind.The usual weapons were swords and sliigs (the tribe of Benjamin had someexpert slingers, Jg XI: 16). In Deborah’s day there was’not a shield or spearamong the forty thousand men of 1srx1’ (Jg 5: 8). The Phil&tines disarmedthe Israelites at the beginning of Saul’s reign, and at the battle of Mikmasonly Saul and Jonathan bad a sword and a lance (I S 13 : rg..zz). Saul’s spearbecame the symbolofbis royal rank (I S 22: 6; 26: 7.16,~~; 2 S I: 6; cf. I S18 : II; 19: 9), but his shield is mentioned only in David’s elegy (2 S I: 11).

Jonathan, on the other hand is shown as an archer (I S 18: 4; w: zof.; 2 S I:2~). The bronze helmet and the breast-plate which Saul wanted David towear produce a splendid literary e&ct, but they are probably an machron;ism (I S 17: 38f.).

The units of the army were based on those of society. The unit was theclan (mishp&h), which in theory provided a contingent of 1,000 men, thoughin fict the number was far smaller; compare I S I: IO (‘eleph) with verse 11(miskpaFah), and the use of ‘a thousand men’ for ‘a clan’ in Jg 6: 13; I S 23:23, When the people take up arms, they are referred to a~ the ‘thousands ofImncl’(Nb3~:~;Jos~z:~~,3o;Jg~:8).Thaeuniuwerecommvldedbya‘leader of a thousand’, iar ‘eleph (I S 17: 18; 18: 13). They could be dividedinto small units of IOO men (I S 22: 7; cf. Jg 7: 16) and 50 (I S 8: 12). Theterm limush&, wbich(apartfromEx 13: 18 and Nb 32: 17. corrected by theancient versions) occurs only in Jos I: 14; 4: I3 and Jg 7: 11, is sometimesexplained by the fact that the atmy was divided into groups of fifty. Moreprobably. however, the word refers to soldiers drawn up in ‘five’ corps onthe march and in amp. Arabic dictionaries give, as one meaning of the

*:mBmMms0*IsuEL 117

Arabic hat&h (‘five’), the formation ofan army with a vanguard, &body,two IYanks and a rearguard. This brings to mind the urangemcnt of the cz,mpin the dercrt, where, according to Nb 2: 2-31, four divisions ($&n) sur_rounded the Tabernacle, which was guarded by the Levites-five tie inall; it recalls the ~amurhEm in the Midianin camp (Jg 7: II) and the ma&gorder described in Nb I O: 11-28: first the division of Judah and Reuben,then the T&made with its Levites, lastly the divisions ofEphraim and Dan.(Compare also the Fnnturhlm ofEx 13: 18; Jos I: I); 4: IL)

These ill-armed and pcaly trained troops were terrified at the fortifiedcities of Canaan (Nb 13: 28; Dt I: 28), at iron-clad chariots (Jos 17: 16-18;Jg I: 19; 4: 13; I S 13: 5; 2 S I: 6) and at the heavily armed Philistinew2.rri0n (I s 17: 4-7). Yet, in the very first stages of the conquest, the Israel-ites took advantage of the fact that the Camam‘te forces were scattered, andthat the withdrawal ofEgypt bad left a void. They infdtqted where victorywas theirs, but stopped short at the edge of the plains, where fortified citiesandcbariotr barred their way(Jos 17: 1z,16; Jg 1: ~27-35). Whenever thecapture of a town is related in any detail, it is always prepared by espionage,and victory itself is secured either by treachery or by guile (cf. Jericho in Jos6, A&which was already in ruins-in Jos 8; Bethel in Jg I: 23-25). TheCanaanite endaves which survived were only gradually absorbed.

Pitched battles were fatal for the Israelites (I S 4: I-II: 31: r-7). To com-pensate for their inferior armament and for their lack of military formationthey would attack with a small group of picked men (cf., even during theirdays in thedesert, Ex 17: 9; Nb 31: 3-4). The men ofDan who set offto con-quer land were a mere 600 (Jg 18: I I); Saul picked 3,ow men out of all 1srae1to wage war on the Philistines (I s 13 : 2) and he gained his first victory with aforce ofonly 600 (I s 13: 15; 14: 2). By the skilful use of daring attacks, boldtricks and ambushes, these small groups of troops, under the firm control ofgood leaders, succeeded in worsting enemy forces which were superior innumbers or in weapons. Jonathan and his armour-bearer went forward un-accompanied to attack the Philistine post at Mikmas and threw the placeinto pmic; then 600 of Saul’s men fell upon the enemy, the ‘Hebrew’auxiliaries deserted from the Philistine side, the Israelites from the hillcountry ofEphraim joined in the chase, and the Philistine defeat was turnedinto a rout (I S 14: l-23). Gideon’s action against the Midianites is even moretypical; of the 32,000 men who answered his call, he sent home all who hadno heart to fight, and only IO,COO remained; of these, he chose 300, anddivided them into three columns. Reconnaissance showed him that themorale of the enemy was low, and he made careful preparations for a nightoperation. His troops covered their torches with jars until the signal forattack, when the trumpet-sounds and the war-cries were calculated to throwthe enemy camp into confusion by creating the impression of a vast force.The trick succeeded; the Midianites lost their heads and took to fight (Jg 6:

,,,,

a18 m: &lmrrrnY MS-ONS

33-7: 22). There follows the exploitation of victory; other Israelite contin-gents took part in the pursuit (as in I S 14: 22). the Epbraimites cut off thec+ny’s retreat (Jg 7: z3-25), and Gideon’s tiny force harassed the survivorsright to the edge of the desert (Jg 8: 4-12). Though the story combiies aseries of distinct episodes, it gives a fair idea of warfare in the period of theJudges.

From time to time, two enemy forces would agree to settle the issue bysingle combat. There is evidence of this custom as early as the 18th centuryB.C.; an Egypt&~ story about a certain Sin&t says it was practixd amongthe Canaanite semi-nomads. The Philistine’s challenge to the Israelites inI S r7: 8-10 is quite clearly a proposai that the fate of the two peoples shouldbe settled by a ringlc combat. The individual feats of arms attributed toDavid’s hcrocs (t S 21: 15-x) can be explained in the same way. The cham-pions, it menu, were called ‘Irh habbemym. ‘the man-between-two’ or ‘theman for combat between two’ (I S 17: 4: 23). The term is never found againexcept in the Qumran work entitled ‘The Order of the War’ and there iameaning is not the same; in the Qumran scroll it meam light infantry.

During the war between Saul’s partisans and those of David, Abner pro-posed to Joab that they should decide the issue by a fight between twelvepicked men from each side, but no decision was reached, because all twenty-four were killed and a general fight ensued (2 S 2: I4f.). These customsusedto obtain among Arab tribes, and persisted until modem times. At the mostcritical moment in the conquest of Algeria, when the Duke of Aumale hadbeen sent by his father Louis-Philippe to take over command of the army,the Emir Abd-el-Kader suggested to the Duke that they should end the wareither by .a single combat between the two of them before both armies, ot byengaging an equal number of soldiers picked from either side.

This study of military institutions before the time of David has not takeninto account their religious aspect, which will be d&used later.’ But it mustnot be forgotten, even now, that the warrion of Israel were upheld by theirGrm b&f that Yahweh fought with them and that he could grant themvictory whatever the odds against them (I S 14: 6; 17: 47).

The enemies of Israel, the Canaanites and the Philistines, had standingarmies, including bath infmtry and charioteers; the soldiers were professionalsoldiers, some native-born, some foreigners. Such a military organizationwas incompatible with the spirit and the traditions of the federation of theTwelve Tribes. There were exceptions, ofcourse, but these can be explained.Abimelek recruited mercenaries (Jg 9: 4), but he was only h&Israelite bybirth and was scheming to set up a kingdom on the model of the Canaanites.

I. cf. pp. Irs-la,.

T:TmAm.msoPlsllABL 2x9

Jcphtbab, too, collected a band of armed supponers. hut this was outside theterritory of Israel (Jg II: 3). Nevcrtbeless, the setbacks encountered in thewar against the Philistine proved to the Irraeliter that wholesale consaiptionof the nation would not provide a force capable of effective opposition to aprofessional army; the latter might be the smaller force. but it would be welltrained and ready for action at a moment’s notice. The creation of a similararmy was the work of the first kings of 1srae1.

(a) The corps of mercmdes. Saul began the recruiting of mercenaries:whenever he saw a brave and fearless man, he took him into his service ( I S14: ~2). He preferred, pmumably, men from his own tribe. Benjamin (cf.I S 22: 7), hut he took men from other Israelite t&a also, like David, fromJudah (I S 16: 1st; 18: 2). and even foreigners, like thcEdomite Doeg (I S21: 8; 22: 18). They were never very numerous, for they had to bc paid (cf.Jg 9: 4). and Saul’s kingdom was poor. After brakin$with Saul. Davidrecruited mercenaries for himxlf: he had 400 men at first (I S 22: 2). andlater 600 (I S 25: 13). with whom he went over into the service of thePhilistines (I S 27: 2). These partisans stayed with him when he baame kingofJudah and of Israel, and their numbers increased as the victories of Davidwidened his field for recruiting and provided the neccrsary income to paythem. They came from everywhere: among the Thirty heroes of David(z S 23 : 24-39), whom we shall discuss later.1 the majority came from Judahand the neighbowing regions, hut there was also an Ephraimite. a man fromManusch, a man from Gad and several foreigners, including an Aramaeanfrom Sobah, an Ammo& and Uriah the Hittite, the husband of Bathshebx(cf. 2 S II: 3f.). After conquering the Phil&tines. David recruited amongthem~dndthdrvass~acorprofK’rerhiuldPlerhi(~S8:18;~~:18;~~:7.23; I K I: 38, 44). There was also a contingent of 6.x men from Gath inPhilistia (2 S 15: 1st). By this policy David was copying an institution of thecanunite and Philistine principalities. It has recently been suggested that thespecial term for these mercenaries may have been preserved in the expressionsy’lidg ha’anaq (Nb 13: a., 28; Jos 15: 14) and f/id+! horaphah (2 S 21: 16, 18).The word yalid would not mean ‘descendant’, hut ‘dependent, serf’, andwould be applied to professiona soldiers because they gave up their freedomto enter a military corps, such xs the corps of Anaq or of Raphah (the mean-ing of these words remaining open to investigntion).~ The other uses of theword y&d, in the expression y’lid! bayfh would be a confirmation of thishypothesis: it refers to slaves who have a particular status in the family, andGn 14: 14 shows they were used for military purposes. The hypothesis is notwithout interest, but for lack ofa sufficient number of clearer texu it cannotbe classed as certain.

These mercenaries did not enjoy the rank of free men. They were directlyunder the king. They were Saul’s ‘men’ (I S 23: 25-26) or David’s ‘men’

I. CT. p. 110. 1. CT p. 1,1.

zto m: b”LITARY INsIITUnONS

(I S 23 p&m; 24: If.; 27: 3.8, etc.). the servants (‘abadlm) of Saul (I S 18: 5.3o;z.: 17)orDwid(1 Sz5:4o:zSz: 17; 3:zz; II:~. II, 13; 18:7,9: 20:6; I K I: 33). The king acknowledged their servicer by exempting themfrom taxes or forced labour (I S 17: zs), by granting them lands, or a claimon tithes (I S 8: 14-15). When the king died, his mercnurier passed to hisheir: thus the ‘servants’ of Saul became the servants of Ishbaal (2 S 2: 12; 4:a). They were stationed “ear the king at Jerusalem under David (2 S I I : 9, I 3 ;13: 14; M: 7; I K I: 33).

They formed the royal bodyguard.’ We cannot say vlything precise aboutits organization, for it seems to have been rather flexible. Apart from thegeneral term “abaih’, and indications ofracial origin, the soldiers who corn-wsed this bodveuard are referred to by different names, but we do not know‘& &cise reliion which thex “am& bear to each other. Saul’s (and laterDavid’s) personal bodyguard is called, collectively, the mirhma’arh, meaning,litally, ‘those who obey, who amwcr the call’ (I S 23: 14; 2 S 23: 33).David was its leader under Sad, and Benayahu commanded it under David;but Benayabu was also the leader of K’rerhi and the P’lefhi (z S 8 : 18; 20: 23 ;cf. I K I: 38,44). The latter seem to constitute the entire bodyguard at thetime:theyareput~o”gsidethearmyofthepeoplein~S8:16;~o:~3,likethe ‘abadh in 2 S I I : I I, 0” the other hand, the ‘champions’ (gibb6rlm) arcmotioned in 2 S 20: 7 alongside the K’&i and the Pkthi. But thegibb&lmseem to be the same as the K’refhi and the Plerhi (2 S 16: 6 compared with2 S 15: 18, and I K I: 8, IO compared with I K I: 38,44). uld thegibbdrfmdone are mentioned alongside the people’s army in 2 S IO: 7.

Among these ‘champions’ two groups were outstanding for their bravery;the Three, whose leader was Ishbaal (2 S 23: 8-x2), and the Thirty, com-manded by Abishni (z S 23: 18 and 24-39). Since the majority ofthem camefrom Southern Judah, it is probable that they were the bravest of David’scompanions in the early days, and that they were formed into a special com-pany of picked men when he was living at Siqlag. (An Egyptim text men-tio”s a. ‘troop of thirty’ among the immediate attendants of Ramses III.)

These sold&s, or a group of them, are sometimes called ““&I, literally,‘youngsters’, but in the military sense of ‘cadets’. When David fled for bislife. they accompanied him (I ‘S 21: 3,5; 25 : of.) and no one knows preciselywhat distinguished them from the rest ofDavid’s ‘me”’ (I S 23: 13,zo). Saultoo had his cadets (I S 26: 22). The ‘cadets’ of David and Ishbaal, Saul’s so”,faced each other at Gibeon (2 S a: 14), and they are called the ‘abadim ofDavid and Ishbaal in thesamepassage(z S 2: IZ-13).The ‘cadets’ ofz S 16: zseem to be the same as the soldiers of the guard who accompanied David onhis fight, as the mercenaries of 15: 18, and thegibb&im of 16: 6; cf. also 2 S 4:12. Later, we meet the ‘cadets’ of the district commissioners, who were distinct from the national army (I K 20: 14-19). Although they sometimes acted

I : Tm mms OP ISw.~ 211

as squires or armour-bearers (I S 20: zlf., 33 f.; 2 S 18: 13). they were not,apparently, young recruits in contrast to veterans, for when the term is to betake” in a strictly military sense, it means simply professional soldiers (cc alsoNC 4: IO). The word had a military sense in Canaanite, and passed into theEgyptian language, where t~a’arutw means a” army corps, possibly recruitedfrom Canaan.

Lastly, Saul had r&z, ‘runners’ (I S .a~: 17): Doeg the Edomite was prot-ably their commander (21: 8, corrected). They are called ‘abdim and, in thiscontext, figure as me” who carry o”t the king’s orders for revenge (like the““arim in z S .x IZ~. Thev were a oersonal bodveuard, a” escort platoon.~ like.,, . II

the fifty runners who went before Absalom and Adonias when they wereaffecting a royal retinue (2 S IS: I ; I K I : 5). They are mentioned, perhapsfor the same reason, along with the squires (shalirhim) it the story of Jehu(2 K IO: 25). They were responsible, together with the karite mercenaries,for guarding the palace in Jerusalem, which had a room for the ‘runners’ anda gate called the ‘Runners’ Gate’ (I K 14: 27-28; 2 K 11: 4.6, II, 19). Theymust therefore have been numerous enough to be divided into companies, orcenturies.

Saul used his household troops against the Phil&tines (I S 18 : 27.30; cf. 23 :27) and in the pursuit of David ( I S 23 : zsf.), but the professional army didnot really show its capabilities until the reign of David. He used his mer-cenaries for the capture of Jerusalem (2 S 5 : 6) and to defeat the Pbilistines(2 S 5 : 21; 21: IS) and daring feats of bis champions became the subject of astory (2 S 21: IS-U; 23 : 8-23). These professional troops formed a specialcommand, and remained distinct fro”1 the contingents which Israel andJudah furnished in times of emergency. In the list ofDavid’s offI&& there aretwo soldiers: Joab is commander of the army. and Benayahu is commanderof the Kerethites and Pelethites, that is, of the household troops (z S 8: 16,18; 20: 23). The detailed account of the Ammonite War throws light on therelationship benuee” the fwo forces: both the household troops and all Israelare sent into action (2 S II: I), but during the investment of Rabbah of theAmman&s, Israel and Judah camp in huts while the guards sleep in the opencountry (II: II); attacks are launched by the guards (II: 14-17; IX: ~66) andthe contingents of lsrael and Judah are held in reserve until the fmal assault(12: 29). The same tactics are used in the Aramaean wars of Achab: the‘cadets’ of the district commissioners, professional soldiers, are sent off first

to launch the offensive, and the” 1srae1 (i.e. the national army) comes up insupport and gives chase to the enemy ( I K 20: 13-20).

This last text reminds us that the professional army continued in existencelong after the reign of David. We have already referred to the ‘~unncrs’ ofRoboam (I K 14: 27-28) and ofJehu (2 K IO: 25). and to the ‘r”““ers’ andthe &rites under Athaliah (2 K I I: 4). The forts blult by Roboam were

1. CT p. 111-11,.

-

27.2 “I: r4mTAP.Y lNSRTunONS

undoubtedly manned by professional soldiers (2 Ch II: 1x-12). Again. 2 Ch23 : 6f. states that Amasias, king ofJudah. recruited mercenaries in Israel, andthe Annals of Samacherib mention the auxiliaries of Ezechias who desertedduring the siege of TOI B.C. This is the last unquestionable r&axe to thesemercenary troops.

(b) The &m&y. When the Israelites were still consolidating their positionin the Promised Lad, they had to contmd with the war-chxioo of theCmaaites uld of the Philisdna (Jos 17: 16-18; Jg I: 19; 4: ‘3; t S 13: 3;2 S I: 6), for. from about 1300 B.C., &a&try had become the essential, andsometimes the principal, arm in the military forces of the Near East. It wasfiat introduced by the Indc-Europems who helped to build the state ofMitanni in Northe~ Mesopotamia; they were me” skilled in breedinghorses, and in the art of making light but strong twc-wheeled chariots. Thenew weapon was quickly copied by the Hittiter, and war so”” adoptedthroughout Mesopanmia, Egypt and Syria-Palestine. Every little Clnamitestate had its chariots and its charioteers, and they were known by the Indc-Europea” name of nraryannu. The Pbilisdnes uld the other ‘Peoples of theSea’ who lived along the coast of Palestine scan had their charioteers, too,uld the new Aramaeul states which were just coming into being in Syriacould not afford to be without chariots either.

To set up .md to m&&n a chariot corps was an expensive undertaking,uld in the early days the Israelites were poor; hence they were unable toadopt this new md important weapon for some time. After his victory overthe Arvnacvls at Sob& David had the captured chariot horses hamstrung(cfJos1t:~;aSt~:18);hekeptonlyonehundredofrhem(~S8:4).Hetnay have acted in the sa”~e way when he axxd Cvlaanite cities, and inthis way he may have built up a small chariot force for his own use; but ifhedid, the chariot force must have been very tmimportmt compared with bisfoot-soldiers, for it is “ever once mentioned in the accounts of his campaigns.On the other hand, we do find that both Absalom md Ado”& when eachwas plotting for the throne, drove Out i” a. chariot, with rumers going beforethem(zS1~:1;1Kx:3).

Solomon’s great military innovation was the establishment of a strongchatiot force. This force quite overshadowed the mercenary foot-soldiers,who are “ever once mentioned in his reign. They were not disbanded, butthey were relegated to a secondary position, so that the situation was exactlythe reverse of what had obtained in David’s reign. Since Solomon had “ormade any conquests himself, he must have raised this chariot force from themoney in the exchequer. The text of 1 K 10: 28-29 is far from phi”, but itseem that the king bought chariots in Egypt (where they made excellentones) and horses in Ciicia (which had a reputation for stud-farms). As aresult, he had 1,4w chariots uld 12,cca hones, according to I K IO: 26. The“umber of chariots is quite feasible: at the battle of Qarqar, in 835 IX.,

I : Tim *muEs OF ISPABC 223

Achabb, king of Israel, put into the field z,ca chariots, and the king “fDunu-cus, t,xa. The number of horses, however, seems too high: reliefs, paintings,and non-biblical texts inform us that each chariot hzd three horses attached.two in hamess and one in reserve. The “umber IZ,OM) may have originatedin a tradition which estimated that Solomon could put 4,000 chariots into thefield(~Chg:~3;cf.theglossontKj:6).

These troops were quartered in Jerus;,lem, where there was a ‘HorsesGate’(~Kxt:16)uldinthe’Chariottowns’(rKto:26).Thex’T”wnsf”rchariots uld horses’ “I garrison t”vms, ue listed in I K g: 15-19: Hnzor,Megiddo, Gezer, Lower Beth-Horo”, Baalath, Tamar. Fortified by co”-scripts of the national labour forces (I K g: 13). these places formed a defencenetwork which straddled the main roads leading to the heart of the king-dom. ad all lay close to level country where the chariots,could ~llllloeuvre.Of these towns, xt least the first four were formerly royal cities of the Canaan-ites, which had once possessed their own chariot force: Solomon wascontinuing a tradition. Solomon’s prefects organized the supplies of corn andfodder for this force (I K 3: 8). Excavations at Megiddo have shown whatthese ‘chariot towns’ looked like: part of the town was given over to enor-mous stables with a separate stall for each horse. In the middle was an opencourtyard with drinking troughs; the courtyard was used to exercise and totrain the horses. The stables discovered at Megiddo could hold 450 horses.

In Egyptian chariots, there were two riders, one to hold the reins and oneto fight; Hittite chariots had a driver, a combatant and a” armour bearer, butin the Neo-Hittite states the number was reduced to two. I” Assyria, at thetime of the Israelite monarchy, the team had three me”; this number wasr&d to four at sane date between Tiglath-Pileser III and Assurbaipal, butafterwards they reverted to a three-man team. The ‘third’ was called, inAssyrian, rhdshu(rokbu) or tarhlirhu. Israelite chariots also carried three men,the driver (called simply rakkob or ‘charioteer’ in I K 22: 34). the combatantmd the ‘third’ (rhallsh: I Kg: 22; 2 K IO: 25). The king’s armout-bearer orsquire enjoyed a special rank and was rather like an aide-de-xnp.’

When the kingdom was split after the death of Solomon, the principalchariot garrisons (Hazer, Megiddo, Gezer and probably Lower Beth-Horo”)fell into the ha”ds of the Israelites. Judah bad very few chariot troops left,and we do not know whether Roboam posted any in the new tow”s hefortified. Nevertheless, the horses ofJudah fought side by side with those of1srae1 in the war against Moab (2 K 3 : 7). and Joram had chariots which weredefeated by the Edomites (2 K 8: 21). The chariot force of Judah seems t0have been increased in the eighth century, when Isaias says: ‘Its land is full ofhones, and of chariots too numerous to count’ ( IS 2: 7). and curses those whoplace their must in horses and a large chariot force (Is 31: I ; cf. 30: 16; Mi I :13; 3: 9). These armaments came from Egypt, where Judah had once more

224 m: hm.ITAPY INsnTullONS

tumedinquestofanally(Is3I: I- J ) , and I&s seems to bc condemning thisrecourse to armaments as something new. The country did not benefit there-by, for in 701 Sennacherib captured every town in Judah except Jerusalemwithout fighting a single batrle in which chariots were engaged. 1t seems thatchariot troops were never again raised after this time. The only witness is thetext of 2 Ch 35: 24, more detailed and unquestionably more exact than theparallel in 2 K 23 : 30: when Josiar was wounded at Megiddo, they took himout of his chariot and carried him to Jerusalem in his ‘second chariot’. Itshows that the king had two chariots at his disposal, but it does not prove thatthere was a chariot corps.

The greater part of Solomon’s chariotry fell to the kingdom of Israel,where Canaanite traditions still persisted; consequently, mounted troopsretained a greater measure of importance. Under El& they were dividedinto two caps. one ofwhich was commanded by Zimri (I K 16: 9). Accord-ing to the Annals of Shalmaneser III, ~,ca Israelite chariots took part in thebattle of Qarqar, but the reverse suffered in the Aramaean wars weakenedthis branch of the army wry considerably. There were still some chariots atSamaria (2 K 7: ‘3; IO: a), though not very many (cf. 2 K 7: 6), and at themost critical moment in these struggles, Joachaz had only ten chariots left(2 K 1,: 7). The losses were never made good: Sargon of Assyria, whoboasted that he captured 300 chariots at Hamath, gained only 50 by his con-quest of samaria.

About moo B.C . mounted cavalry made its first timid appearance in theNear East, though it had long been used among certain Northern peoples and~a.1 to remain the principal fighting arm of the Scythians. Warriors on horse-back are represented on the bas-reliefs of Tell Halaf at the beginning of theninth century B.C., and sonu elements of cavalry were introduced into theAssyrian a.rtny about the sane time; but troops in chariorr still preponderated.The Egyptian army never had any cavalry except for mounted scouts. Nordid the Israelites; Sennacherib’r envoy made the ironical proposal to Ezechiasthat he would give him z,wo horses if he could fmd horsemen to ride them(2 K 18:23). In the stories of the monarchical period, the termpararhEm, oftentranslated ‘horsemen’ or ‘cavalry’. means either chariot teams or the menwho rode in chariots. Sometimes men did jump on horseback to flee morequickly (I K 20: 20; Is 30: 16; Am 3: IS). Moreover, horsemen could beusedas scouts or despatch riders, as in Egypt (2 K 9: I7f.; cf. Za I : 8-1 I). The des-cription of the war-horse given in Jb 39: 19-25 is inspired by foreign customs,and the horsemen referred to in Ez 23 : 6, IZ (Assyrians), 38: 4 (the army ofGag), Esd 8: 22 and Ne 2: 9 (Persians) are all foreigners. These texts, more-over. date from after the fall of the monarchy. Much later, in the earlyMaccabean wars, the Jews could field only infantry against the powerfulGreek cavalryand elephantmounts (I M I: 17; 6: ~of.; 8: 6; AM ,I: 4; 13:2, IS). The accounts of the defeat at Bethzacharia (I M 6: 29-47) and of

I:TxEmtaEsOPIE)IABL 22sJonathan’s victory over Apollonius (I M IO: 73-83) are particularly sign&_ant. A corps of Jewish cavllry appears for the first time under Simon in136/r35 B.C .. but it was still very small (I M 16: 4. 7). Herod had jo,woinfantrymen in his army. but only 6,wo cavalry.

We have seen that, in all probability, the mercenary and mounted troopsof the kingdom of Judah were not m-formed after the events of 7or xc.:they were too costly to maintain. Instead, the territory secured its freedom,and later defended itself, with an army of conscripts. These are the onlysoldiers mentioned in the accounts of the capture of Jerusalem by Nabuchwdonosor. We hear nothing of mercenaries or chariots, but only of ‘men ofwar’(‘ansh~(hm)mil&mah, in 2 K 2s: 4.19; Jr.18: 4. or ‘os~mi&mah, 2 K 24:16). It is true that officers and theirmenare spoken of(z K 25: zjf.; Jr4o: 7f., ,.and also in the ostraka from L&h), but these soldiers. or ‘men of war’, aremen of Judah who had been called to arms and who would return to theirhomes and the fields after the war (Jr 40: IO).

According to 2 K z.5 : 19 Nabuchodonosor took prisoner a high rankingofficial, a saris,1 ‘set over the men of war’; perhaps he was a commander-in-chief, or a civilian in charge of the administration of the army, i.e. 2minister of national deface. for the supreme command was exercised by theking himself. Among the prisoners there was also a scribe (dphpher), ‘chargedto enlist the people of the country’. This text should be compared with 2 Ch26: I I, where we are told that a register of the army of Ozias was made underthe secretary Yeiel and a rhdpr or clerk* named Maaseyahu.

According to Dt 20: 59 there were several sh&‘rfm, who were responsiblefor recruiting, obviously in different districts. The same text makes provisionfor a certain number of mm who are to be exempted: those who own a newand as yet unoccupied house, or a vineyard which has not yielded its firstharvest, and men who are engaged but have not yet married: according toDt 24: 5, newly-weds had a deferment for one year. The dismissal of thefaint-hearted (Dt zo: 8) is perhaps an addition inspired by Jg 7: 3. (The samerules were applied by Judas Maccabee when he raised the liberation army., M 3 : 56.) Mobilization affected everyone aged 20 or over (2 Ch z.5: 5; cf.Nb I: 3 ; 26: 2). Emohncnt was by family groups, and therefore by localities(2 Ch I~: 14; 25: 5). md a distinction was drawn between the contingentsfrom Judah and those from Benjamin (2 Ch 17: 14-17; 25: 5). The recruitsdid not briig their own arms, as in olden times; they were provided by theking (2 Ch 26: 14).

After enlistment. the men were put under the command of their officers(f&x Dt 20: 9). The latter were normally the heads offamilies 01 clans, the

I, cf. p. 111. I. cc p. IIS.

226 In: Mu.m*rtY MSTmnlONS

rB’shl hn’obSth (z Ch 26: 12). The structure ofthe army and its e&iency in duGeld, however, necessitated a corps of professiollll otTicers permanently in thewtvice of the king: they were part of his ‘abodlm ot iarin (z K 24: 12, 14;Jr 52: IO; cf. 2 Ch 26: II). The king remained, as in the time of Saul andDavid, the supreme head of the army and took an active part in operations(tK22:+9;zK3:9;t4:11;z3:zg:2s:4-s).eventhoughhemight(ag~inlike David) lrwe a general to command his troops (2 Ch 26: II; perhapss K 25: 19).

The units were composed of 1,000, 100, 50 and to men. This organizationdated back to the desert period, according to Ex 18: zt and Dt 1: rj. PerhapsIshbaal, who came with ten men to assassinate God&s just after the fall ofJerusalem, was a leader of a group of ten (Jr 41: I, 2; cf. IS). Leaders of fiftymen are mentioned in the story ofElias (2 K I: 9, II, 13). The commandersof one hundred and of a thousand men are listed in the statistics of 2 ch 23 : 5.and the same organization of the conscript axmy dated back to the period ofDavid, according to t Ch 27: I. The last statement, however, is not whollyarbitrary. for units of one hundred and of D thousand men were already inexistence when the entire people used to take up arms (I S a: 7; 17: 18) andamong the mercenary troops (2 K I I : 4).

Except for these names which indicate numbers, the words used for armyunits are of uncertain meaning. According to 2 Ch ~66: II. the army wasdivided into fdi;d. III other passages the word means a troop of armed men.often brigands (I S 30: Sf.; 2 K 13 : 20, etc.), ot sometimes (and the meaningis closely allied). soldiers sent on a raid into enemy territory (2 K 5 : 2; 6: 23 ;24: z), and thirdly (and this meaning is not very unlike the others), a troop ofmercenari~(2S4:2;2Chaj:9;cf.r3).Theuseofthewordin2Ch26:1Ito denote the formations of the conscript army is quite exceptional. If it is alegitimate use, then it may be noted that the proportion between oficers andsoldiers in a Ch 26: n-13 would give each officer roughly 120 men tocommand: thegdrld or ‘company’ would be roughly equivalent to a hundredmen. The degel seems to have been a higher unit. This word does not mean astandard or ensign, as so many modem dictionaries and translations interpretit, but a division of the army. This is the right meaning in Nb I : p; 2: 2-34;IO: 14-2~; it is also the sense given by the ancient versions, and it is used withthis meaning in the papyri ofElephantine and in the Order of the War fromQumran. The only questionable point is the size of this unit. In the Qumrantext, the dqel comprises about I,OOO men, but in the Elephantine documentsit must be smaller, for there were several ~?gallm in the colony. On theother hand, according to Nb 2 and IO, the men of the twelve tribes formedonly four Sgallfm and even if we do not accept the colossal figures which arecited in Nb 2, each degel must have included several thousand men. Anotherargument in support of this theoty is the use of ‘a thousand’ for mishpaboh.~

1. CT. p. 116.

h,If degel means a ‘division’, there is little evidence left for the existence of

standards or ensigns in the Israelite army. In one text only, Nb 2: 2, the wordI’

‘0th (‘sign, signal, miraculous sign’) may mean the emblem or standardaround which men of the same clan camped; there are good parallels to &iscustom among the Bedouin, but there is no certain evidence for the use of&word in the sense of military ensign except in the Dead Sea Scrolls, where itmay be a translation of the Latin signurn. The nes, often translated ‘banner’.is not really an ensign, but a pole or mast, which was raised on a hill to givethe signal to take up arms or to tally together (Is 5: 26; I I: IO, 12; 13: 2; 18:3;Jr4:6;~0:2;5t:1z,27;cf,Ex17:1~);butapartfromtheserefetencesinthe prophets, the word is never used in texts concerning the army or inaccounts of battles. The same custom exists among rhe Arabs, and only a fewyears ago, when a surveyor named Schumacher was making topographicalsurveys in Galilee, he brought about rhe mobilization &a neighbouringtribe by fixing a sighting picket on the top of a hill. The main argument infavour ofensigns in the army of ancient 1srac1 is that all &Eastern armies hadensigns at the time; but the ensigns of other nations were usually religiousemblems, and this may have been the reason which dissuaded the Israelitesfrom copying them. We may note. however, that at the beginning of themonarchic period, the Ark of the Covenant played a similar role; we shallreturn to this lrter.z

This national army was never called to ~tms except in time of war. Butwhen the mercenaries had fallen in numbers, ot perhaps even ceased to exist,probably a certain number of recruits were kept under arms in peace-time toensure the security of the territory and to garrison the fortresses. Informationhowever, is lacking, and anyone should be wary of using the text of I Ch 27:I-IS. which says that David divided the people into twelve classes of 24,000men, each of which did service for the king for one month of the year. Thefigures quoted are too high, and the names of the commanden of these classesare the names of David’s champions, who had quite a different function. Theinformation certainly does not date back to the reign of David, but. if wesuppress the figures and the names, it may have been tme ofa later epoch. Onthe other hand, the idea may have originated with the Chronicler himself,drawing his inspiration from Solomon’s twelve prefectures, each of whichsupported the king, his household and his troops for a month of each year( I K 5: 7-8).

One recent suggestion is that.& conscript army was an innovation ofJ&as, and that the notes scattered throughout Chronicles, which have beenused in the last few pages, should all be referred to this age. This conclusionis unfounded. 1t is perfectly true that the mercenary troops had lost theirimportance, that they may even have ceased to exist towvds the end of themonarchy, and that the conscript army (alone, it appears) ensured the defence

I, CT p. 159.

228 m: hsIuTARY lNSmuTloNs

of the country during these times. But this same conscript army was alreadyin existence, years before, alongside the mercenary troops. During theAramaean wars, a census was made of the entire ‘people’ as well as of the’ youngsters’or ‘cadets’ (I K 2: 15. cf. 19). The people ofIsrael and the peopleofJudah were involved in the aIIiance between Josaphat and Achab (I K 22:4), and in that between Joram and the king of Judah (2 K 3: 7). Thus thetradition of a people under arms persisted, but the mass response to a difrom a leader inspired by God had given place to mobilization organized bythe royal administration. The first indication of this development can be seenas early as David’s reign: his census (2 S 24: 1-9) had a military purpose andwa equivalent to drawing up a register for conscription, but this step wascondemned as an abandonment of the rules of a holy war, and a profanation[cf. verxs 3 and IO). Putting names on a register was seen as a usurpation of adivine prerogative: Yahweh alone keeps the register of those who are to liveor to die (LX 32: 32-33); a census is a move fraught with danger, againstwhich one must take religious precautions. The new texts from Mari throwlight on passages from the Bible such as this: ‘When you make P census of theIsraelites, each one of them must pay Yahweh the ransom-price of his life, sothat no pkgue may break out against them cm the occasion of the census’(Ex 30: 12). David, by disregarding this right of God’s, brought a plaguedown on the people (2 s 24: m-15). war, however, was becoming a non-religious matter, and the system of conscription forced itself upon rhem inthe end. There is no reason to doubt that military registrations took placeunder Asa (2 Ch 14: 7), Josaphar (2 Ch 17: r4-18), Am&as (2 Ch 23: 5). andO&s (z Ch 26: 11-13); certain details show that the Chronicler has made useof ancient sources. Yet no one will deny that he has introduced into his textfigures which are improbably high.

Cnnmm Two

FORTIFIED CITIES AND SIEGE WARFARE

THE ancient cities of Canaan, each of which was the centre of a tinyState, were encircled by ramparts and defended by towers and forti-fied gates. The Egyptian illustrations of campaigns under the Pharaohs

of the New Empire give a picture of what they looked like,,pd excavationsin Palestine allow us to study the plan of these defaces and the techniquesemployed in their construction. 1t is understandable that these heavily forti-fied towns struck fear into the Israelite invaders (Nb 13: 28), for their mm-parts reached ‘to the sky’ (Dt I: 28); they were ‘strongholds enclosed byhigh walh, protected by gates and bars’ (Dt 3 : 5). After their conquest oroccupation of these towns, the Israelites took care to rebuild the dcfences(though archaeological evidence of this begins only at the reign of Saul) ; theypreserved intact the parts which remained. and repaired them if necessary.where the destruction had been complete, they rebuilt the ramparts in newways, and they applied these new methods in the towns they themselvesfounded. These latter fortifications, replanned or erected by the Israelites, arethe only ones which interest us here.

Every town (‘ir) was normally encircled by a rampart, which distinguishedit from M open village (baser, cf. Lv z.5: 31). But a town which was defen-dcd by solid constructions was called a ‘fortified town’ (‘ir mibpr: cf. Jr34: 7 and many other texts).

The entire population of the ncighbourhood would seek protection behindthese defcnces in times of danger (Jr 4: 5 ; 8 : 14). Lists of strongholds and isc-lared references to them occur in the Old Testament; but though these textsthrow some light on the system of protecting the territory, the informationis incomplete, and applies only to certain periods.

David’s first objective after the capture of Jerusalem was to build a wallaround it (2 S 5 : g) : we should take it to mean that he merely repaired theJebnsite ramparts. The Bible mcntions no similar work outside the capitalduring his reign, but it is quite certain that he secured the defcnces of otherplaces as well, and archaeologists attribute to him the building of theramparu at Tell Bcit-Mirsim and at Beth Shemcsh. Solomon’s chariot

230 In: btn.lT*RY “WcITUnONS

garrisons~ were obviously quartered in fortified towns. and at Megiddo,archaeologists have found a gate and rampart contemporary with the stables.

One passage of Chronicles, which has no parallel in the books of Kings,giveJ a list of fifteen places fortified by Roboam (z Ch II : 610). There is nogood reason for assigning this text to the age of Josias, as some authors havepropdred. It is sound historical information, recording a fact which is relevantin the reign of Roboam: the campaign of the Pharaoh Sheshonq in Palestine(I K 14: 25) had proved that the country needed to reinforce its dcfences. Aline of fortified towns guarded the ridge road running from the southtowards Jerusalem, and dominated the Eastern desert: Jerusalem, Bethlehem,Etham, Teqoa, Bethsur, Hebron, Ziph. From Ziph to the west, the southernfront wu protected by Adomyim, Likish and Gath. Northwards from Gath.the principal passes into the hill-country of Judah were closed on the wcstcmside by: (I) Gath. M a r e s h a h ; (2) Azcqah..Soko, Adullam: (3) Sotcah;(4) Ayyalon. These fortresses WCIS not strung out along the frontiers of thekingdom, but built along mutes where resistance was practicable. and at themost favoumblc strategic points; the list is probably incomplete. for it men-tions only the new ones built by Roboam, without counting the townswhich David and Solomon had fortified and which were still in cxistencc.

The northern front still lay open, for the boundary between the new king-doms of Israel and Judah was at first undecided. Basha of Israel attempted tofortify Ram& about six miles north ofJerusalem. but Asa ofJudah drove himout and brought his own frontier forward to Geba in Benjamin and toMispah, which he equipped for defence (I K 15: 17-22). He restored otherstrongholds in Judah, too, according to I K 15: 23 and 2 Ch 14: j-6. Theywere still in commission under Josaphat, who posted troops in them(2 Ch 17: 2, 19; 19: 5). O&s, in addition to his work at Jerusalem(z Ch 26: 9), built forts in the desert and improved the methods of dcfence(z Ch 26: IO and IS); we shall return to these last texts further on.

Besides rebuilding its chariot force, Judah ‘built many strongholds’( OS 8: 14). in the eighth century2; Sennachedb boasted that he hadbesieged and captured 46 fortified towns in Judah. The biblical account,too, states that Sennachcrib attacked the fortresses in Judah and capturedthem (z K 18: 13). mentioning Lakish and Libnah by name (2 K 18: 17and 19: 8); it was only by a miracle that Jerusalem itself was saved. (A mostinteresting Assyrian bas-relief is extant which dots in fact represent the cap-ture of L&h by Sennacherib.) We do not know to what extent thedestruction caused by the Assyrians was wet made good. The defence workundertaken at Jerusalem by Ezcchias (2 Ch 32: 5; cf. Is 22: 9-11) was con-tinued by Manlsseh (z Ch 33 : 14). and there is no reason to doubt this preciseinformation of the Chtonicler. We know for certain that shortly before the

tinal ruin of the kingdom of Judah, the people placed its trust in strongholds(Jr 5: 17) and that. during the siege of Jerusalem, two cities, Lakish andAzeqah, were still holding out against Nabuchodonosor (Jr 34: 7); these twoplaces are also mentioned in an osuakon found at L&h and written at thevery time.

After their victory the Chaldeans razed to the ground the fortifications ofJerusalem (2 K 25: IO) and ofevery town in Judah (Lm 2: z., 5). and archacc-loeical evidence confirms this. The walls of Terusalem were not rebuilt untilth; time of Nehemias, and those of other to&s, like Gezer and B&u, notuntil the Hellenistic period.

The Bible gives us very little information about the northern kingdom.Jeroboam I fortified Shechem and Penuel in Tramjordan (I K 12: 2s). Wehave already mentioned the abortive enterprise of Basha at Ramah (I K 15:17Q. Under Achab, Jericho was rebuilt and fort&cd with a gate (I K 16: 34).In his letter to the leading men of Samaria (z K IO: 2) Jehu writes that theyhave on their side a ‘strong place’. The Massorctic text is often corrected tothe plural ‘strong places’, but there is no doubt that the singular should beretained; he is referring to Samaria alone. Samaria had powerful defences. asis proved by the long sieges it withstood (I K 20: If.; 2 K 6: 2.4f; 17: 5; 18:9-10). and excavations have confirmed the fact. Outside the Bible, the stele ofMesha speaks of the towns of Ataroth and of Y&s as ‘built’ (i.e. fortified) inMoab by Omri and Achab. The penury of biblica information is due to theJudahire origin of the historical books, and should not mislead us: there is nodoubt that the northern kingdom had a defence system just as elaborate asJudah’s,

As long as the chariot force and the mercenaries existed, these professionalsoldiers provided the garrisons of strongholds, but we do not know how thest&iig was organized. We know only that Josaphat stationed troops in thefortified towns of Judah and that them were at Jerusalem a garrison and anofficers’ corps to form the backbone of the conscript army (cc z Ch 17: 2,Ijb-19). The numbers quoted ate fantastic, but, these apart, the informationmay stem from an ancient source. According to 2 Ch 33: 14. Manassehposted o&err in the fortified towns of Judah; but there is no mention oftroops being sent with them. Thii, however, is after the destruction of themilitary power of Judah by Sennacherib, ad it is possible that in these lastdays of the monarchy the garrisons of the strongholds were reduced to tokenforces: they would employ forced labour (following the very old andextreme example cited in I K I 5 : 21) to keep the defences in good repair,and in times of crisis, they would man them with defenders raised on thespot.

It has been argued from I Ch 2.7: I-IS that the strongholds were held bycontingents of conscripts who served by turns for one month of each yea,but the meaning and value of this text are far from certain (cf. p. 227).

133 m: b!anAF.Y INslTNnoNs

2. Ramparts

Archaeology conuibuter to a better undentanding of the biblical evidenceby revealing the lay-out and the construction of defenccs. We have men-tioned that the ~sraclita refitted some of the old Canaam‘te fort&cations:apart from these. two distinct types ofIsraelite ramparts can bc distinguished,asemated ramparts, and ramparts with redans.

A casemated rampan is a wall along which stand blind rooms, which usedto bc filled with earth or rubble, or which served as stores. The purpw of&se rooms is to widen the rampart, and thereby to saengthen it, whileeconomizing in building by furnishing tbc store-morns necessary for anygarrison town. Splendid examples of this type have been brought to light atTell Be&Minim (the ancient D&ii), and at Beth Shemesh, both dating fromthe reign of David or Solomon; similar ones have been discovered at TellQuileb, near Jaffa (going back to the first Israelite occupation, probably underSolomon), at Hazer and at Gezer (&I from the time of Solomon). This typeof fortification seems to have originated in Asia Minor: there is evidence of itat Boghazkoi and at Mersin in the 14th-13th century B.C ., and, at a slightlylater date, in the fortresses of Senjidi and Cbarchemish. In Palestine, it wasgenerally replaced by the type with redans, but a magnificent specimen ofcasemated rampart is still to be seen at San&a in the palace walls, whichmust have been built by Achab in the ninth century B.C. Another casematedrampart, also from &is period, has recently been uncovered at RamahRachel, just south of Jerusalem.

In building their rampam. Canaam‘te architects were anxious to follow asclosely as possible the escarpment of the hill; consequently. they would oftenfollow a curved line, or break the straight line of the walls; they thus obtaineda series of r&m. This procedure was adopted as a principle in certain Israel-ite fortifications, even when the configuration of the terrain did not demandit. The most obvious reason was to provide a series of salients which wouldgive more effective defence a.gaimt an enemy which had come dose to thewalls. But &se salients were sometimes so unimpressive that they hardlyincreased the range of weapons at all; clearly, the main advantage of the pm-cess was to sncngthen the rampart without incrcving ia thickness: severalangles well knit together and firmly anchored in the soil offered more resist-ance to the rams 01 to the undermining techniqucn used by assailants.Mcgiddo is a very fme example, probably later dun Solomon: the entiretown was m&led by a rampart four yards wide, divided into stretches sixyards long, which arc placed. alternately, half a yard forward and half a yardback. The rampart of Tell en-Nasbeh= Mispah follows the sane design, butit is less regular: it may be dated to the time of Asa, who fortified Mispah(I K 15: 22). There is a similar plan at Tell cd-Duweir=L&ish. Thex wallswith redam were reinforced here and there by towers: there arc a dozen of

E...._l__

2: lxxamBD CmEs *ND SlBGB wmRpm3 233

them at Misph. At Gezer, along a rampart of the tenth or ninth century, &eexterior and interior redans do not correspond, but go in opposite directions,which gives a series of reinforcemena, of wide towers, all along the rampart.These flanking constructions, salients or towers, were called ‘angles’ or‘comen’(pinnoh, 2 Ch 26: 15; So I: 16; 3: 6).

Rampam of this kind could be protected by a glacis, which would put togood use the slope of the hill (as at Mispah), or by a forward wall built somedistance below (asatLakish). This forwardwall is the belspokenofinIsz6: I;Lm 2: 8; Na 3 : 8, in contrast to the EGmah or rampart. The text of 2 S 20:15-16 is eloquent, and needs no correcting: during the siege of Abel Beth-Maaka, they heaped up an embankment on tbc forward wall (heI) and beganruncUing to bring down the rampart (@mah).

We do not know the shape of the top of these walls. On the basis of a findat Megiddo, it has been suggested that they were surmounted by crenelatedbatdemcnts-a view which could claim the support of some Assyrian rcpre-sentatiom; but the connection of the stonework found at Megiddo with therampart is only a hypothesis. The word shemerh could mean ‘crenel’ in Is 34:12; Ps 84: 12, but it can also mean (from its ordinary sense of ‘sun’), roundshields, r&aches, which were fixed on the top of the walls. They are shownon the top of the rampart in the Assyrian bas-relief of the capture of L&h.We may compare with this Ez 27: I I : ‘They hung their shields all around thywalls’, and Ct 4: 4: ‘Thy neck is like the tower of David P thousandshields arc hung around it.’

AU the Israelite fortifications which have so far been uncovered by excava-tions were built in the first half of the monarchical period, between ,100and 900 B.C., and it is difficult to lay down my characteristics for ramparuof the following period. III some towns, e.g. in the two capitals and inthe garrison towns, as long as there were any, the Israelites kept the defacesin good repair, but elsewhere they allowed them to deteriorate. Men werehappy enough with the indifferent protection afforded by the half-ruinedramparts or by the line of houses built over their ruins; the houses would besqueezed against each other, with no windows on the outside. Only a fewstrong points were retained, such as the gates, or a tower or bastion. Themajority of the ‘46 fortified towns’ ofJudah which Sennacherib captured in701 must have been just as feebly defended, and archaeology does not justify(no more than history did) the confidence which the men ofJudah placed intheir ‘countless strong places’ during the eighth century (OS 8: 14; Jr 5: 17).

The gate was fortified in a special way. In Canaanite towns. the gate withtcnailles was a classical type: two or three pairs of pilasters protruding in thebay made narrows (tena&) in the entry. The object ws to strengthen the

234 m: MILlTILRY xrwllnmONS

walls and to establish successive barriers. The Israelites kept this type of gatein service, with ot without mod&cation, at Beth Shemcsh, She&m.Megiddo and Tirsah. and themselves built a few similar ones at the beginningof the monarchical period. Very soon, however, their pilasters began to pro-trude far more than the Canaanite ones had done, and so formed small rcansat the entry where the guards could lodge. Solomon’s gate at Megiddo is awry fine example; it had four pain of pilastcts, though tbis is cxccptional; anidentical plan, from the same period, was adopted at Hazer and Gezer also.(Note that Ezccbiel foresees the same plan being used in the porches of theTemple, cf. Ez 40: 616). The gate of Esyon Geber, also from Solomon’sreign, had three pairs of pilasters, and the first Israelite gate at Tell cd-Duweirperhaps had three as well. In the following period, the gate of Megiddo hadonly two pairs, like that at TcU en-Nasbch and the oldest gate at TcU Beit-Minim. Sometimes, as at TeU en-Nasbeh, in the modified gate at the north-cm Tell cl-Far’ah (= Tirsah), and later at TeU cd-Duwcir, benches were fmedagainst the wall: this at once brings to mind the biblical texts about theElders ‘who sat at the gate’ to give judgemcnt in law suits or to se&municipal affairs. *

As a rule, tbc gate was flanked by towers, either at each side or jutting outin front, and sometimes there was yet anotbct bastion before it with a prc-liminary entry, as at Megiddo. The axis of the gate generally ran at rightangles to the rampart, but at Tell en-Nasbeh it runs parallel, and you enteredthrough a wide detour in the line of fortifications.

Towards the end of the monarchy, another type of gate appears, a gatewith indirect access: it had been foreshadowed in the Solomonian gate atMegidda. A good example of this type of gate has been discovered xt Telled-Duweir: a bastion covered the entry, and you had first to walk along therampart until you entered a courtyard; from here a simple right turn tookyou through the ordinary gate which stood open in the tcwn wall. Furtherdevelopment led to a zigzag gate, one example of which is the last gate ofTell Bcit-Minim; it reappears in far later times in Eastern towns.

1n addition to the dcfcnccs provided by the fortified gates and by thetowers on the rampart, the capital cities had a second surrounding wall andbastions which shut off the royal palace and its outbuildings; it was the acrc-p&s of& town. The clearest example is in Samaria, where a casemated wallRanked by a massive tower surrounds the palace with its arscnah and stores.Jerusalem had the equivalent in the City of David, which was the formercitadel of Sian (2 S 5: 7 and g), Rabbah of the Anmmnites had its acropolis,too, which David stormed after Joab had captured the lower city (2 S tz:26-29). Other towns had at least J citadel built on the highest point, and thecitizens would gather there for their last resistance. Excavations have un-covered sane which date from the Israelite period, but unfortunately they

2: FORIIW CxnBs AND SEGE w*RF*r@ 23s

arc badly damaged. The oldest is at Tell cl-Ful= Gibeah, Saul’s capital; it wasa rectangular building, with a casemated wall and towers at the comers.Others can be recognized at Tell Zakariy&= Azeqah, at Tell el-Hery=Eglon(?), and at Tell Ta’annak=Tanak. The plan is always polygonal, withsmall towers and buttresses to reinforce the walls.

These fortifications inside a town’arc called by the name migdal. The termis usually translated ‘tower’, and iu fact it does denote towers or bastionsraisedonorncartherampartr~~Jr3t:38;~Cht4:6;26:g,t~;3z:s:Ne3:I, II, zs-all late texts. 1n older texts, however, the word migdnf is betterrendered by ‘citadel’ or ‘castlc’, in the sense of the Latin ra~rellwx This ex-plains the story about Abimelck at Tebcs: the town had been captured, but‘inside the town there was a redoubtable migdal where all the men and wumenand the leading figures in the town had taken refuge, et,;: (Jg 9: sof.). Thereis no doubt chat we should interpret the mure ditficult story of the destruc-tion of Shechem, which comes immediately before this (Jg g: 45-49). in thelight of this text: the town had been taken, but the inmates of the aigdol ofShechem took refuge in the crypt oftbe temple of BaaI-berith, where, in theend, they were burned alive; this migdal is the citadel of Shechem, with afortified temple, and it has been cleared by excavations at TcU B&a, the siteofancient Shechcm. It has been suggested, however, that Migdal-She&m isa place-name, and that the place was distinct from Shcchcm. Similar ‘castles’are mentioned at Pcnuel (Jg 8: 9 and 17) and at Yizrcel (z K 9: 17).

The sense ‘castles’ (Latin caste/lo) would also give a good meaning for themigdalh which Ozias and Yatham built in the desert (2 Ch 26: IO; 2 Ch 2,:4). One of there little forts, perhaps even earlier than O&s time, is recogniz-able at Qedeitat near Qadesh; its plan reminds us of the citadels at TellZachatiyah and at Tell el-Ful. Another has recently been identified at KhirbetGhazra, about 20 miles czst of Becrshcba. This provides an explanation ofplace-names composed with migdadal: they would be little places groupedaround a small citadel. (One might compare the French place-names can-pounded with ChSteau, ChStel- or Cartel-.) When the second clement is adivine name, such as Migdal-El or Migdal-Gad, this ‘castle’ would be afortified temple, like that of Baal-betith in Shcchem.

Yotham built mifdhn and lEraniyy~t/r (2 Ch 27: 4). The two words seemto be almost synonymous, the latter being a more modem word (cf. 2 Ch 17:12). For example, in later texts the singular blrah takes the place of migdalwhen the reference is to a citadel inside a town: thus it is used of the citadel ofJerusalem under Nchemias (Ne 2: 8; 7: 2) and the same term is used abroadfor the citadel or for the whole of the fortified town of Susa (Ne I : I ; Dn 8 :2 and frequently in Est) and for the fortress of Ecbatanc (Esd 6: 2 b?rta’, theAtatnaic iorm):

In the palaces at Tirsah and Samaria, there was a more heavily fortifiedpart called the ‘arm& (I K 16: 18; z K 13: 25): it was the keep. In the plural,

236 m: hm.rrARY INSTtnJnoNS

the word means the fortified dwellings in Jerusalem (Jr 17: 27; Lm 2: 7; Ps4~: 4. 14; 122: 7) OI elsewhere (Am 1: 4, 12; 2: +. 5. etc.).

~unputs and bastions gwe towns effective protection against assailantrwhose only long-range weapons were bows and slings. The latter had toresort to stratagems or to resign themselves to the prospect of a siege.

Stratagem is the method which figures in the accounts of the conquest.Josue sent spies to reconnoitre the defaces of Jericho; the spies made con-tact with R&b, and agreed on a sign (Jos 2) : this story is apparently allthat remains of a tradition which explained the capture ofJericho by an act ofmeawn on the part of R&b, a tradition which was eclipsed by the othertradition about the miraculous collapse of its walls. The text about Bethel isclcu: a traitor tells the spies of a passage-way, where the Israelites gain entry(Jg I : ZJ-Z$ At other times they coaxed the defenders out of the town: at Ai,the Israelites pretend to run away, the whole town gives chase, and a con-tingent which Josue has concealed then enters the town and sets it on fire (Jos8: 3-22). It was a classic trick, which was successfully employed on anotheroccasion at Gibe& in rhe war against the Benjamites (Jg 20: 29-41) ; the kingof Israel suspected the Aramaeans of the same trick when they raised the siegeof Samaria (2 K 7: 12). Lastly, a group of determined men could effect anentry by surprise: this, apparently. was how David conquered Jerusalem (2 S5 : 7-8) : Jab climbed up the tunnel which led from the spring to the interiorof the town.

A powerful enemy could dispense with such subterfuges: it could intimid-ate a town into opening its gates or accepting its conditions (cf Dt 20: IO-I I).The inhabitants of Yabesh G&ad would have been prepared to surrender toN&ah the Ammonite if only his demands had not been so cruel (I S I I : If.).When Ben-hadad pitched his camp below the walls of Samaria, Achabaccepted the very first demands he made (I K 20: If.). Sennacherib’s envoytried to bring about the surrender of Jerusalem by describing the power ofthe Assyrians, the futility of resistance and the horrors of a siege (2 K 18 : 17f.).

If the town could nor be captured by stratagem oc surprise, and if negotia-tions failed, then the assailants had to mount a regular siege. They pitchedcamp near the city (z S II : I; I K 16: 15-16, etc.), blocked the roads, occupiedthe watering-places (cf. the late text of Jdt 7: 12, 17-18) and waited untilhunger and thirst got the better of the inhabitants (2 K 6: zsf.; Jdt 7: zof.).The assailants would harry the defenders posted on the walls (2 K 3 : 25). Thebesieged might try to break the grip by making sorties (2 S II: 17; I K 20:IS-X), or, if they thought they were beaten, might try to escape (2 K 3 : 26;25: 4).

If resistance was too stiff, or if the defenders showed signs of weakening,

2: PomtAED CtTlES AND SlEGE wAPP*m 237

the besiegers might hasten a decision by mounting an assault. A mound wouldbe thrown up against the wall to provide a ramp giving access to the town;sappers might try to break through the wall (the operation is described at thesiege of Abel Beth-Maakah under David, 2 S 20: 15-16). The technical termfor this ramp or embankment is solnlob (ct once more 2 K 19: 32, SennacheribatJerusalem: Jr 3~: 24 and 33: 4, the Chaldcans at Jerusalem, and the texts ofEzechiel which will be cited later). Attempts would be made to set ftre to thegates (Jg 9: sz). When the assailants reached the foot of the rampart, theywere exposed to the onslaught of the defenders, who would redouble theirefforts at this critical moment: at Tebes, Abimclek was killed by a mill-stone thrown by a woman og 9: 53). But the defenders. as a rule, had onlythese chance weapons or ordinary arms. True. according to 2 ch 26: 15.O&s ‘built machines designed by engineers, at Jerusalc~ to install them onthe castles and corners to shoot arrows and big stones’. It has often beenthought that this was a kind of artillery, of ballistic machines or catapults; andthose who have refused to allow Oziar the honour ofpossessing machines theAssyriaas themselves did not possess have simply denied the historicalvalueof the text. In fact, this text refers to something quite different: there ‘engines’were simply frames arranged as cotbelling along the curtains of the walls andbastions, so that the archers and slingers could shoot at the foot of the wallwithout exposing themselves to the encmy missiles. It was tk equivalent ofthe hoardings which were used in military architccturc during the MiddleAges. And, in fact, these contrivances do surmount the walls of L&h in theAssyrian bar-r&f of the capture of the city. The Jews never used machines toattack 01 to defend towns before the Maccabean wars, and then they werecopying the Greeks against whom they were fighting (I M 6: zo, >I-52; II:30; 13: 43f.).

The religious rules for siege warfare are given in Dt 20: I+ZO. When thetown lies in foreign territory, it must first be offered peace terms: if it there-upon opens its gates, the population may be subjected to forced labour, butto nothing else; if it refuses, then it should be invested, its menfolk put to thesword, and everything else, people and property alike, could be taken asspoil of war.

Where the town is a Canaanite town inside the frontiers of the promisedLand, all its inhabitants were to be put to the sword without giving them thechoice of surrender. During the siege of a town, fruit trees were to be leftstanding. but other trees might be felled and used for the siege-works. Thesecommands were not always followed in early times (z K 3 : 19. IS), and whenDeuteronomy was promulgated under Jo&, there was scarcely any occasionto apply them: there were no Canaanites leh to exterminate, and the IS&-ites were no longer likely to besiege foreign towns: they had quite enough todo in defending their own against the Assyrians.

The Assyrians were past masters of siege by encirclement, and their

238 m: Mn.rrARY INSTI*ulmNS

monuments give a vivid picture oftheit methods of attack. The besieged citywas encircled by a mound, ramps were constructed and machines broughtup, These machines were mobile redoubts sheltering archcrs and men whomanccuvrcd a ran, i.e. a long wooden beam with a metal-covered head forbattering the wall. Those inside the city would throw flaming torches andstotxs down on thcsc ma&inn, ot try to immobilize the rams by means ofgrappling hooks. The infantry moved up to the assault behind the machines,and were given covering tire by archers: these xchcts wetc in turn protectedby movable mantelets held by se~yants. Once the rams had opened a breachin the walls. the assailants could enter there: altctnativcly. they would scalethe walls with ladders. The bas-relief of the capture of Lakish shows thesedifferent methods of attack in action, and the Annals of sennachctib state thatthe king captured the towns ofJudah ‘by using earthen ramps. tams taken upto the walls, infantry attack, mines. breaches and tunnels’. The biblical textsprovide the corresponding Hebrew words. The coUective n&r is used forsiege operations as a whole. We have seen that solofah meant a ramp; thisramp could be covered with stones ot wooden logs to enable machines topars (cf. Jr 6: 6). The encircling mound or trench is called dayeq, the mantelctor great siege-shield is the sinnah, and the tams arc called karim. WhenErcchiel is ordered by God to do a mime of the siege ofJerusalem. he takes abrick to represent the city, and then builds around it a trench, makes a rampand sets up mms (Ez 4: 2). In another text the same prophet shows Nabuch+donasot drawing lots to march to Jerusalem ‘to bring rams against its walls,to pile up a ramp, to dig a trench (Ez 21: 27). In his prediction ofthe siege ofTyre (Ez 26: 89)), thcrc are two obscure terms in addition to these others: ‘hewill direct against thy walls the blows of his 4&d (clearly a type of ram),‘and will dismantle thy castles with his !uraL&k’, whcrc the ordinary mean-ing (sword) is out of place: &zrab$d~, in tbii context, must mean either ramswith pointed heads or sappers’ picks (cf. Ex 20: 25, where it means ‘chisel’).

1t was not sufficient for the besieged to lie behind the shelter of a solid ram-part; they had to live there, and the water supply was a problem which hadto be tackled. It was solved, toc~, for Samaria held out for over two yearsagainst the Assyrians in 723-721. and Jerusalem withstood Nabuchodonosorfor a year and a half in 587. Famine eventually raged inside Jerusalem (2 Kz.5: 3). as it did at Samaria during a siege by the Aramacans (2 K 6: 2s); butin neither instance arc we told they were short of water. If such precautionshad not been taken, however, disaster was inevitable: in the story ofJudith,the army of Holofemes had occupied the springs outside the city, and theinhabitants of Beth& wcte fainting from thirst after thirty-four days (Jdt 7:zwzz), though there is no question of a famine.

2: FoRrrPlHD “TtES AND SlBGB WARFARB 239The Canaanites had already faced the problem and had resolved it in

different ways. Here we shall discuss only the hydraulic installations built, otm-used, by the Israelites. Since the towns were built on hills and never had aspring within their walls, there were only three possible solutions, all of whichwets used: (a) a tunnel from inside the town, running under the ramparts toa water-supply outside the town; alternatively, a canal running from awater-supply outside the town which would bring water into the town;(b) deep weUs dug inside the city down to the underground water level:(L) reservoirs and cisterns to collect rain watct.

(0) Water Tunnels. There is archaeological evidence for these at Jerusalemand at Megiddo from the Canaanite petiod onwards, at Gibeon during theIsraelite period, at Etham and at Yibleam at a date which cannot be fixed forcertain. At Jerusalem, there is a tunnel, and a well cut through the rock, downto the spring of Giion. It has been rediscovered by archaeologists and 2 S 5:8 probably refers to this. The text would then mean that Joab climbed up itinto the city; the word ?inn8r, which is used here, can mean this type of canaland, in common usage, the name was extended to similar installations. AtMegiddo, a very rudimentary Canaanite shaft was replaced by a mostelaborate installation, which was modified several times during the period ofthe ~sraclite monarchy: a large rectangular well with flights of steps led into asloping shaft, then into a horizontal tunnel which continued as fat as thethe water pool; when the water-supply was normal, the water flowed to theend of the horizontal tunnel, w&ch lay within the ramparts. The shaftwhich has recently been uncovered at Gibeon followed a sloping line to thespring; it was dug out like a tunnel, except for the central part, which was adeep trench covered by flag-stones. The installations at Etham and at Yibleamhave so far not been explored; that at Etham may be connected with thefortification of the town by Roboam (2 Ch II: 6).

At Jerusalem, the collfiguration of the terrain eventually made a muchmcrc practical system possible. When the old Canaanite shaft had beenabandoned, the Israelites had dug out a canal along the side of the KedronValley, running from the spring of Gihon; this canal, however, lay outsidethe rampart and would have served the enemy rather than the city during asiege. Faced with the threat of an Assyrian attack, Ezechias had a tunnel dugunder the hill of Ophcl; it brought the water from the spring at Gihon to apool in the Tyropocon valley, inside the ramparts. It was a masterly piece ofwork, which still survives as a water supply; an inscription was carved in therock to mark the event, and the stay is told with pride in 2 K 20: 20; 2 Ch32: 30; Si 48: 17.

(b) Elsewhere, attempts were made to reach water-level by digging deepwells inside the town. At Beth Shcmesh a well ten feet in diameter went down67 feet; it was dug out by the Canaanites, and remained in use until the endof the Israelite period. On the crest of Tell cd-Duwcir, a weU protected by a

240 m: MUITARY UwrrILmora

r&cot pxt of the rampart reached water level at a depth of tzo feet; it wasprobably Canaanite to begin with, but it remained in use until the capture ofthe town by Nabuchodonosor. At Gezer, a series of steps over 40 yards longled down to a cave where a spring flowed, still within the ranparts; the workseems to date from the very early part of the second millennium B.C andmay have been in use at the beginning of the Israelite period. At Gibeon. alarge circular well ha recently been discovered: it was reached by a flight ofsteps leading into a sloping shaft which ended in a cave where watet drippedfrom the rock: this well at Gibeon seems to have been in use at the sane timeas the sloping tunnel mentioned above. We do not know how the Israeliteengineers found these deep-water supplies without a considerable amount ofdigging. Perhaps the spring at Gezer originally flowed into the open on theside of the hill At Gibeon, perhaps the first idea was to install P system likethat at Megiddo, but when they came up against the dripping water, theystopped the project; the flow was too small. so they then dug a shafi goingstraight to the source.

(c) Finally, reservoirs and cisterns could be provided inside the city. Progressin the xt of making waterproof coatings allowed the Israelites to build motecisterns as the number of dwelling-houses or public buildings increased. Theexcavations at Tell en-Nasbeh and Samaria have shown that they wereparticularly numerous from the ninth century B.C. onwards. During a siege,these two towns would have had no other water supply at all.

At I&ish, they decided to dig a large ditch in the form of a cube 20 yardssquare and deep; it war to drain off all the water from a particular quarter.and more especially from the plastered esplanades near the governor’s rcsid-cnce; this ambitious project war never fulished. It dates from the last days ofthe monarchy; perhaps it was only begun after the first attack of Nabucho-donosor in 397. when they starred to rebuild the fortifications.

CHAPTER Tman

A R M A M E N T S

E R Y

_ v little is known about the equipment of Israelite soldiers. Thebiblical texts do not describe their wenpons; indeed, the very wordsused for military equipment are far from precise, and their meting

is often uncertain. Archaeology might be expected to help.,but only a fewweapons have been found in the course of excavations. Illustrations fromEgyptian and Mesopotamian monuments are certainly helpful, but one innever be sum that the Israclitcs were always using the same kind of weaponas their enemies.

The main offensive weapon was the breb, which became the symbol ofwar (Is 51: 19; Jr 14: 15; 24: IO; Ez 7: 1s; 33: 6, etc.). The word is ured forboth dagger and sword, since the two weapons have the same shape uld uedistinguished-quite arbitrady-merely by their length. The &m-b of Ehud(Jg 3 : 16, 21-u) WLU obviously a dagger, whatever the precise meaning ofgamed, which gives its length.1 In all military texts, the word may be tram-lad as ‘sword’, but we must remember that it VILE a short sword, about 20inches long, or perhaps a little mote, like the Assyrian sword. Illutmtions inEgyptian monuments portray a long sword, which was used by the Peoplesof the Sea; specimens of this type have been discovered in Greece and in theAegean, but it was never used by the Israelites. The Philistine Goliath. how-ever, may have had one, which was later wrapped up in a cloak and waoquite unique (cf. I S 21: *IO). The sword was carried in a sheath (nadanor fa‘ar. I S 17: 5’; I Ch x: 27; Jr 47: 6; Ez 21: 8-10) attached to the belt(2 S 20: 8).

Goliath also carried ‘between his shoulders’ a &Ed& of brow (I S 17: 6,45). Josue wielded the fame weapon at the battle of Ai (Jot 8: IS-ti), uldJeremias said the invaders from the north would use it (Jr 6: zj= 50: 0). It isusually nanslated ‘javeIin’, but the Order of the War discovered at Qumra~seems to describe the kld8n as a sword one and a half cubits long and fourfmger-breadths wide. It has been suggested that the late text of Qumtan drewits inspiration from the Romaoglodiur, but the meaning would fit the biblicaltexts aho: a type of sword longer and broader than the bereb, and hung from

242 In: MlLITARY INSIITUTIONS

P cross-belt slung ‘between the shoulders’. More probably, however, thek2&n was a scimitar, a harpe, like those shown on monuments and discoveredin excavationo. Certain details of the Order of the Wat seem to refer to pte-e&ely such a weapon. In the biblical texts, the kFd&r seems to be an unusualweapon which (except in Jos 8) is newt found in the hands of an Israelite. Arcecnt writer has suggested that the Philistine name for a scimitar, the harpein Greek, may be preserved in the exptcssion ‘the sons of hrph’ (2 S ZI : 16,18,M, az): the phrase would then denote a corps whose emblem was a scimitar,whereas the Masroretic vocalization and the ancient versions have all taken itto mean ‘sons of Rapha’ (as ifit were a proper name with the article).

The word mm& (pike) is often mentioned, but the weapon is never des-cribed in detail. Originally. it was simply a pointed stave, but at a very earlydate a metal head was fixed on by a pin or socket. It was a weapon for hand-to-hand fighting (ci. Nb 25 : 7-8), It is mentioned in the lists of weapons giveninzchr,:t~;t4:7;~~:~;26:~4;Ne4:1o;Ez39:gandeveninthevcryold Song of Deborah, Jg 5: 8. According to the Order of the War, it wasabout seven or eight cubits long, but in biblical times it -of have beenmuch longer than the height of an average man; this was its length in Egyptand Assyria. In the Order of the War, the socket which held the iron in placeis called the legor: the term is also found, alongside !mlth, in Ps 35: 3, whereit may well stand (pars pro 1010) for the pike itself.

The &mirh, which is usually mentioned in old texts, is not the same as theromab. 1t seems to be a shorter and lighter lance, which could also be thrownlike a javelin (cf. I S 18: II; 20: 33. where there is no need to eotrcet theHebrew text). To balance the weight of the head and to make the throwmore accurate, the lower end was iron-shod; the lance could then be stuck inthe ground (I S 26: 7) and its butt could be used as a weapon (CL perhaps2 S 2: 23). Specimens have been found in excavations. It was Saul’s personalwcapon(cf.oncemorerS19:9;22:6;26:71.;2S1:6).Accordingto2Ch23 : 9, the Temple guards were equipped with it (and z K I I : IO depends, nodoubt, on this reference), but it is never mentioned among lists of weaponsad, in accounts of wats, it is only once mentioned in the hands of an Israelite(2 S 3: 23). On the other hand, an ‘Egyptian’ was armed with it (2 S 23: 21).and Goliath carried one (I S 17: 7; 2 S 21: 19). The wood ofthis giant’s lancewas ‘t&c a weaver’s man&‘. Until recently. this was taken to refer to the sizeof the lance, as if it wcte as big as a yam-beam, that part of a weaving-loomaround which the threads arc wound. A better explanation has recently beenput forward: the mondr is the heddle-bar, the wooden rod which suppotts thehcddle by a series of kinks ot snarls. Goliath’s !mEth also had a leather thong,tolled round the shaft, with a loop at the end; it made it easier to throw, andincreased iu range. This method of throwing war known at a very early datein Greece and in Egypt, but the other peoples of the Neat Eat did not knowof it; the ~rtaelites therefore described this strange weapon by comparing it

3 : ARhmMENTS 243with an instrument they knew well. this explanation confirms the view thatthe bontth was used as a projectile.

The she/& by etymology, is also a projectile, and the meaning dart orjavelin would suit in 2 S 18: 14 (corrected in the light of the Greek; cf. Jl 2:

8) ; but in other texts it bears only the general meaning of a weapon carried inthe hand (2 Ch 23: IO; 32: 5: NC 4: I I, t7).

The bow (qerheth) is one of the most primitive weapons, both for huntingand for war, but in the Near East it passed through an evolution which we cantrace with the help of texts and monuments. To begin with, the bow wassimply a piece of pliable wood held bent by a taut string; the wood was laterreinforced by ligaments; fmally, a bow was invented which was a clcvct com-bination ofwood and horn, and this had a considerably longer range. 1t was asplendid weapon, and eame into widespread use in the middle of the secondmillennium B.C., through the inI%ence of the Hyksos; in fact iibecame thenormal weapon in Egypt. Among the Israelites, however, bows were at firstused only on a small scale in war. 1t was Jonathan’s weapon (I s 20: 20; 2 s I :21). and it remained the weapon of leaden and kings (2 K 9: 24; 13 : IS; PE18: 35; 45: 6). Yet neither Saul’s army nor David’s household guard usedbows; at least, there is no mention of it in the Books of Samuel, though I Ch12: 2 mentions some archers ofBenjamin among the picked troops ofDavid,aud this information should not be lightly disregarded. To keep a balancedview, one should remember that arrow-heads inscribed with the names oftheir ownets and dating from x3-00 8.~. have been discovered inPhoenicia and in Palestine; this proves that there was a class of professionalarchers at the time, as there had been two centuries earlier at ugatit.

The bow probably came into general use in Israel when the chariot forcewasintroduced, forchariot tacticscutouthand-to-hand fighting anddemandedthe me of long-range weapons (I S jr: 3 compared with 2 S I: 6; I K 2,~:32-34; 2 K 9: 24). The infantry would have been provided with bows as aresult of this change, in imitation no doubt of the pattern set by the Assyrianinfantry. In the relief of the capture of L.&h by Sennaehetib. the rampartsare manned by archers. The statistics of Chronicles record archers on thegeneral strength of the army ofJudah only from the time of Ozias (2 Ch 26:14; cf. Ne 4: 7. IO), but the archers of Benjamin had been famous long beforethat (I Ch 8: 4o; 12: 2; z Ch 14: 7; 17: 17). In a whole se&s of texts, thesword and bow symbol& ever/ kind of weapon, and, indeed. war itself(Gn48:~~;J0~24:1~;~K6:~~;0~1:7;~:~o).DavidlselegyonJonarh~was used ‘to instruct the Judahites in the use of the bow’ (2 S I: IS), i.e. fortheir general military training (cf. the same word in Jg 3 : 2 and 2 S 22: 35).

In spite ofz S 22: zs= Ps 18: 33 and Jb 20: 24, there was never such a thingas a ‘bronze bow’: the term refers to the metal coverings of certain bows.The bowstring is called yether (Ps II : 2) or drhm (PS ZI : 13); the same wordsate also used for tent-ropes, but this doer not prove that the same material

244 m: MtI.IT*R* INSTIT”TlONS

was used for both purposes. since the Primary meaning of the root is simply‘to stretch’. ~srael’s neighbaun used flax cords or plaited hair for bowstrings;they wcrc also made of catgut 01, tnorc often, from the nerve-strings of ani-mals. The bow was bent only when action was imminent. by resting thelower part of the wood on the ground, and then pressing it down with thefoot: Egyptian illustrations portray the technique, which is called in Hebrew‘steppingonthebow’(dnrakqe~sherh,Is~:~8;~1:t~;Jt46:9;~~:14;Ps7:1,: II: 2, etc.).

Arrows (her) wete made of wood. ot from reed stems, but in Palestine nospecimens have survived from pre-Roman periods. Countless arrow-heads,however. have been preserved. The tips were at first made of bronze, butbronze tips later gave way to iron ones. The shape varied: some were shapedlike spear-heads and were fastened to the shaft by a cord 1s far as a protubet-ante that is sometimes found on the metal head. This was the only type inservice at the beginning of the monarchy, and it never went out of use.Secondly, there were shoner arrows, with a diamond-shaped head, fixed tothe shaft by a pin ot socket; some had a barb at the side, to prevent the attowfrom being pulled out of the wound. At the end of the monarchy, heavyarrows came into use, triangular in shape and designed to pierce armour; atthe same period, three-bladcd arrow-tips were in use, a type which originatedin the north and whose UC became general during the Hellenistic period. Thesame years saw the appcarancc of Rat, barbed atrows. Incendiary arrows wcrcalso known (Ps 7: 14). and one of them has been found at Shcchcm: littleholes were pierced in the blades, and oil-soaked tow was packed into them.The bow was carried in the left hand, the attows in the tight (Ez 39: 3) ot in aquiver (‘arhpoh: Is 22: 6; 49: 2; Jr 5: 16; Ps 127: 5; Jb 39: 23).

~st ofall, the sling (@a’) was a thong with a wide centte (the ‘palm’ ofthesling. I S zs : 29). It was a simple, primitive weapon. used by shepherds (I S17: 40), but it was also a weapon ofwar (2 K 3: 25; 2 Ch 26: 14). The men ofBcnjnmin had cmck slingers who would not miss by a hairsbreadth. with thetight hand or left (Jg 20: 16; cf. I Ch 12: 2). The stones used in the slingswere carefully picked pebbles (I S 17: 40). except when they were speciallyttimmed for the purpose (2 Ch 26: 14). They were rounded to the shape oflarge olives; and some have been unearthed by excavations. During theHellenistic epoch, slingers used lead balls also.

2. Defenrive arms

The most common defensive arm wxs the buckler or shield. It has twonames, magen and +nh, and since these two names occut together inseveral texts, they must denote two different kinds of shields. According toI K IO: 16-17~2 Ch9: IS-r6, the mqen WPE far smaller than the $;nnah. Thisis confirmed by I S 17: 7.41 (the ;inna/r of Goliath was carried by a servant)

3 : AIIMAMBNTS 245

and by Ez 26: 8 (where the same word is wed for a siege mantelet). This nodoubt explains why this type of shield is most often associated with the pike(rom~h)asintChtz:9,z~;~Chtt:rz;~4:7;~~:~.Itm~thavebeenlikethe enormous coveting shield of the Assyrians. The mogrn is mentionedrather with swords and bows (Dt 33: 29: I Ch 5: 18; 2 Ch rq: 7; 17: 17: Ps76: 4). The text of 2 Ch 14: 7 is particularly informative: the men ofJudahhad the ~innah and the pike, while the men of Benjamin had the mngen andthe bow. In our tans, this would represent the difference between heavy andlight infantry. The mogen was round-shaped, like the shields fixed on thewalls in the bas-relief of Lakish (cf. also Ct 4: 4). The Assyrian infantry andcavalry were equipped in the same way. InJb I 5 : 26, there may be a referenceto a boss reinforcing the centre of the shield, corresponding to the handle onthe other side.

For purposes ofparade, there were bronze shields (I K 14: 2;). and shieldsplated with precious metals (I K IO: 1617; cf. 2 S 8: 7). but the shields wedin battle were made of leather, coated with fat (2 S 1: ~1-22; Is 21: 5) andstained red (Na 2: 4). When not in use, they were kept in housing (Is 22: 6).

Shelet is a tare word, very similar in meaning to nragen: the two terms atepanllelinCt4:4,andcf.Ez~7:~~;andin~Ch~3:9nrogenisaglossfortherhelef of 2 K II: IO. This last text refets to 2 S 8: 7= I Ch 18: 7. which in itsturn is similar to I K IO: 17. where rndfegpn is used. It may therefore be trms-lated ‘tondache’, i.e. a small circular shield ot buckler: Jr 51: 11 is the onlytext which seems to raise any difficulty, and it has even led sane people tosuggest the meaning ‘quiver’, but the correct ttanslation of the phrase is‘~reprre the tondaches’ (cf. the sane verb in Za 9: 13).

The helmet was called koba‘ or qoba’ and this inconsistency in pronun&.-don reveals the foreign, non-Semitic &gin of the word and of what itrepresented. Goliath wore a bronze helmet (I S 17: 5). but it is questionablewhether Saul had one for David to tty on (I S 17: 38). It is recorded as part ofthe equipment of foreign troops in Jr 46: 4; Ez 23: 24; 27: IO; 38: 5. and issaid to be part of the equipment which Ozias issued to his troops (z Ch 26:14). This piece of information has been questioned, but the defenden ofL&h are shown with bronze helmets in the Assyrian bas-relief so oftenreferred to. The only question is whether these helmets were of leather otmetal. The crest of a brow..? helmet was found during the excavations atLakish, but there is no doubt that it belonged to an Assyrian soldier; in thesame bar-t&f, some of the assailants ate wearing a helmet with a crest.

The breast-Plate(sirydn or$irySn) was, like the helmet, offoreign origin. It isalmost certain that the Huttiter introduced it into the Neat East during thefit half ofthe second milletmium B.C. It was made of small plates, first ofbronze, later ofiron, ‘scales’ which were sewn on to cloth ot leather. Accord-ing to documents from Nwu, hotses and chatiots, as well as men, wereequipped with them, and this may be the explanation of the ‘iron chariots’ of

__

246 m: MtLrrrlRY tNSTITt_InONS

rheC~terinJost7:t6:Jgt:t9;4:3and13;cf.pethaprNa2:4.Thesebreast-plates wete adopted by the Egypt&m, and later by the Assyrians, andcan bc recognized on their monuments; to begin with, they were worn onlyby charioteers, but eventually the infantry too were issued with them. Someof the assailants of L&h are shown wearing them, but it is impossible tomake out whether they ate made of small metal plates ot of strips of leather.In Israel, the same development took place. In the early days, Goliath wore a‘bteasGplate of scales’ (s&y& qashqashshtm: I S 17: 5) but he was a foreignerand his equipment was quite unusual anyway; we have already mentionedhis sword, unique of its kind, his lance with its leather thong for throwing,and v. 6 says he also ware bronze greaves (literally ‘leg-fronts’). There is noevidence that greaves were known in the East at this period, though theywere used in the Aegean. Saul’s breast-plate is as questionable as his helmet(I S 17: 38). but it would be normal for Achab to wear a breast-plate in hischariot (I K 22: 34). Under Ozias, helmets and breast-plates were issued totroops under matching orders for action (2 Ch 26: 14). and they were issuedto the defenders of Jerusalem under Nchemias (Ne 4: IO). Bronze or ironscales from such breast-plates have been found in Palestinian excavations. TheGreeks and Ranans were familiar with this armour, but they also had coatsof chain-mail: the soldiers of Antiochus Epiphanes wore them (I M 6: 35),and this is how the Septuagint translates the atmour of Goliath.

-

CHAPTER Foun

W A R

1. A short military history of Inael

T

HE first wars in which Israel took part wete wars of conquest, andbiblical tradition shows the people taking possession of the PromisedLand by force of arms and with the help of God. The defeat of Sibon,

king of Heshbon, and of Og, king of Bashan (Nb 21: ZI-fj), and the cam-paign against Midian (Nb 31: I-U) secured a territory for Reuben, Gad andhalf the tribe of Manasseh. The Book of Josue describes the occupation ofPalestine west of the Jordan as a militaty operation in three sweeping actions:first, the people cmss the Jordan and cut their way through m the very heartofthe land (Jos 19); next, a coalition offwe Canaanite kings from the southis overthrown and the whole ofsouthern Palestine occupied (Jos to): fmally,the northern kings are defeated at Metom and their cities fall into the handsof the Israelites (Jos II). It is quite cettain that this is an extremely simplifiedversion of what really happened, that the actions of the tribes wete less con-centrated and fat slower and that they did not all meet with equal success (cf.Jos 13: 13-17; Jg I). It is also true that the Israelites infiltrated in a peacefulmanner wherever they could; but they did meet opposition, which they hadto overcome by force of arms.

The wars in the period of the Judges, and under Saul, were defensive wars.The Israelites first had to withstand the counter-attacks of the Canaanites andof those other peoples out of whose lands they had carved their territory;later they bad to fight against the Pbilistines, who were making inroads fromthe axst. The reign of David, on the other hand, was a period of tecon-quest and, later, of expansion. We ate not fully informed of the texms forDavid’s wars. He declared wat on the Ammonites because they had insultedhis ambassadors (2 S IO: x-j), and on the Atamaeans for going to the help ofthe Ammonites (2 S IO: 6-w; cf. 8: 3.6). We do not know what provokedthe wars against Moab (2 S 8: 2) and Edom (2 S 8: 13). The bravado of theAmmonites and the eagerness with which the Atamaeans went to their aidshow that the neighbouring States were growing anxious about the increas-ing power of Israel. But they also show that they underestimated the abilityof its new leader, and it could well be that their provocation and the Israelitevictories led David m adopt a policy of conquest of which he had neverdreamed.

.-.

248 m: hm.rrARY lNSTrrurIONs

The territory he conquered was badly defended by his successors. TheAmmooites declared themselves independent as soon as David was dead, andSolomon took no action when part ofEdom and Aram broke away from hisempire (I K II: 14-2~); indeed, Solomon did not fight a single war. On thedeath of Achab, the king of Moab revolted, and even a punitive expeditionby the king of Israel, with assistance from the king of Judah and his Edomitevassal, did not bring Moab back to obedience (2 K 3 : 4-27). Shortly nfter-wards, Edom shook off the domination ofJudah, after a disastrous campaignby Jonm (a K 8 : x-n).

After the schism, the artificial frontier between Israel and Judah led to con-&t between the brother-kingdoms under Basha and Asa (I K 15: 16-a),under Joas and Amasias (2 K 14: s-14), and, for the last time, under Achaz andPcqab [the Syro-Ephraimite War: 2 K 16: 5; 2 Ch 28: j-8). And yet bothkingdoms had quite enough to do defending their own territory againstforeign pressure. Roboam avoided a war with the Pharaoh Sheshonq bysurrendering the treasues of the Temple and palace (I K 14: 25-26). but inlater ages, until Josias, Egypt was more often a worthless ally than an enemy.On the Philistine frontier, there was fighting under Joram (z K 8: zt; z Ch21: 16), Otias (2 Chz6: 6), Achaz(z Ch 28: x8), andEzechias (2K 18: 8); butwe have little information about it, except that Judah was sometimes thevictor, sometimes defeated. Judah fought against Edom for tbc possession ofElath (2 K 14: 7 and 22; 16: 6) in order to keep open the trade route to theRed Sea and Arabia.

The kingdom of Israel, too. had a common frontier with the Philistines inthe south-west. Gibbetbon, a Philistine stronghold which constituted a threatto Gezer, was besieged by N&b and by Omti (I K 15: 27; 16: IS). Laterstill, Isaias pictures Israel hemmed in by the Philistines and the Atamaeans,both equally rapacious (Is 9: II). The Aramaeans of Damascus were forgenerations an enemy to be feared. Israel was at war with them for almost thewhole of the ninth century B.C.; sometimes Israel gained the upper hand, butmore often victory went to the Aramacaos. The main prize of these wars wasthe possession of what remained of David’s Ammae+ possessions in Trans-jordan (cf. the battles before Ram& Giead in I K z.2: 3,29; 2 K 8: 28; 9:16) and the districts ofnorthern Galilee (I K 11: 30; cf. 20: 34). Twice theAramaeam laidsiegeto Samaria(~ K 20: of.; 2 K6: z4f.). HazaelofDamascuseven tried to gain complete control of Israel and nearly succeeded (2 K to:32-33; 13: 18; 13: 3, 7). Thesituation was stabilized onderJoas (2 K 13: 25)and Jeroboam II (2 K 14: zs), but only because the power of Damascus hadbeen crushed by the Assyrians.

The Assyrians, however, were a still mope formidable enemy. WhenShalmmcxr II made his appearance in central Syria, a coalition tried to stophim. and in 853 B.C. Achab took part in the battle of Qxqar, in the vllley ofthe Oronta. with wx ahrim and 18,oca infantrymen. The strange thing

4: wbll 249

is that &is expedition, the only really distant one undertaken by an Israelitearmy, is not mentioned in the Bible and is known to us only through conei-form documents. Only twelve years later, in 841, Jehu agreed, withoutmaking any show of resistance, to pay tribute. In the following century, dur-ing the second. great Assyrian thrust under Tiglath-Pileser III, Men&emdeclared himself a vassal in 738 (2 K 15: 19-20) but in 734-732 the king ofAssyria occupied the greater part of the territory of Israel without meetingany serious opposition (2 K 15: 29). The end came in 724. when ShalmaneserV laid siege to Samaria; though its king had been taken prisoner, the city heldout until the beginning of 721.

At the time ofTiglath-Pileset’s attack, the kings of Aram and 1srae1 tried topersuade Achaz ofJudah to join them in their struggle against Assyria; whenAchaz refused, they laid siege to Jerusalem: this was the ‘ Syro-Epkaimite'War. Achaz then appealed for help to Assyria, and Judah boame. without afight, the vassal ofAssyria (2 K 16: s-9; Is 7-8). Ezechias tried to throw offtheyoke, by taking advantage of a general revolt against Assyria. He alliedhim-self with the coastal states and with the still more distant states of Egypt andBabylon. sennacherib’s reply was terrible: in 701, every town in Judah wascaptured, in spite of their resistance (which Assyrian documents record) ; theywere haoded over to the king ofPhilistia, who had remained true to Sennach-crib. Jerusalem alone was saved (2 K 18: 13-19: 37; Is 3637). We do notknow how Ezecbias and his son Manasseh made good these losses, but we doknow that Judah remained a vassal-state of Assyria. When the power ofAssyria had declined, Josias threw &the yoke and freed not only the terri-tory ofJudah but even part of the former territory ofIsrael as well (cf. 2 K 23 :IS-20). At that time the supremacy of Assyria was crumbling everywhere,and perhaps he did not need to resort to force to achieve this wonquest. TheBible, preoccupied with his religious policy only, does not mention anymilitary action in this context. On the other hand, when the Pharaoh Nechaowent to the help of the last king of Assyria, who had been cornered by theBabylonians and Medes, Josias tried to stop him at the pass of Megiddo, in609: he did not want to see Assyria reprieved, or Palestine falling into theclutches ofEgypt. The battle was a short one, and Josias was mortally wow-ded (1 Ch 3 5 : m-z_~; which is more detailed than 2 K .z3 : 2~30). Nechaoannexed Palestine and installed a vassal king, Joiaqim. But the overlordship ofEgypt did not last for long. After the defeat of the Egyptians at charchemishin 603, all Syria-Palestine fell into the hands of the Babylonians. and Judahbecame one of their vassals. Joiaqim tried to break away, and thereby stungNabuchodonosor into reprisals. The pace of events quickened: first siege ofJerusalem in 597, the installation of Sedecias as king, his revolt, second siege(interrupted for a moment as a result ofEgyptian intervention), and the finalruin ofJerusalem in 587 (cf. z K 24: t-25: 21, and scattered references in Jr).The biblical narratives describe only what took place in Jerusalem, but we

WJ m: t.slLrTAR* ,NSIlTwslONS

know that operations went on elsewhere. According to Jr 34: I and 7.L&h and Azeqah were still holding out during the siege of Jerusalem.Excavations at Tell ed-Duweir (Lakish) provide evidence of the destructionof the town s&red during the two Chaldean invasions, and of the rebuild-ing ofthe defaces in the meantime. The osnaka found there give some ideaofthe u&4ty just before the second siege: arranging liaison with Jerusalem,exchange of signals between towns, sending a mission to Egypt.

seen as a whole, the military history of Israel under the monarchy clearlyshows that the era of wars of conquest begins and ends under David. AfterDavid, all the wars were defensive wars, rarely and by way of exception tobring a vassal back to obedience or to keep a trade mnte open, more often toprotect or to establish a frontier; in the end they wete all attempts to resistexpvlsionist policies of the great powers. Even Achab at Qarqar and Josias atMegiddo wanted only to safeguard the integrity of their country.

For several centuries the Jews were subject to foreign masters, but in theend they revolted. The rebeUion broke out under Antiochus Epiphanes, whowanted to lend unity to his empire by imposing Greek culture everywhere;in contrut with all his predecessors, he refused to allow the Jews to liveaccording to their own law. The War of Independence under the Maccabeeswas therefore a religious war, and we shall have to consider it later under thisaspect.1 Here we are concerned only with its peculiar military characteristics.To begin with, it was conducted as guerilla warfare, with small groupsharassing the Seleucid garrisons and the reinforcements sent to them, butJudas Maccabee very soon appealed to all the people of Israel and organizedthe army on the old traditional lines ( I M 3: 55-56). It was a war of mobileforces, with operations extending, sometimes at one and the same time, fromsouth of Hebron to Galilee, and from the Mediterranean coast to Transjot-dan. The strongholds which held out were soon reduced, thanks to the newtechniques of investment which the Jews learnt from their enemies. Religiousfreedom was once more achieved (I M 6: 5744, but Judas knew it wouldnever be secure unless the nation became independent, and he went on withthe fight. Under his brother Simon, the Jews fmaUy achieved nationalindependence, and ‘the yoke of the nations was lihed off Israel’ (I M 13 : 41).

We said above that, before the time of David, war was conducted by thepeople’s taking up artns.~ Our present task is to see (as far as the documentswill allow us) what strategy and tactics were followed by the organized army

I_.

of monarchical times.I There was no declaration of war. The neatest approach to one is the chal-

I

Iage flung down by Amasias of Judah to Joas of Israel: ‘Come and let us

I. CT p. 261. I. CC pp. zrs-2,s.

4: WAR 251

test our strength!’ (2 K 14: 8), but it is unusual. The customs of those ageswere different from ours: only when a commander had pitched his camp inenemy country and shown his power would he lay down conditions, therefusal ofwhich would unleash hostilities (I S II: If.; I K 20: If,; cf. Dt 20:xc-12)‘; but the war had already begun.

The accounts of wars provide no details about mobilization. They merelystate that the king ‘collected’ the army or the people (I K 20: I; 2 K 6: .z,+),that he ‘made a census’ of them or ‘reviewed’ them (I K 20: 27; 2 K 3: 6).This was simple enough with the professional army. but not so easy with theconscripts. In the days when the whole people took up arms, they used tosend round messengers or to blow a trumpet.~ In the next period certaintexts presume that a trumpet was blown and a signal (the nex3) set up. In Jr 51:27, the mobilization of the nations against Babylon is d@bed thus:

Raise a signal throughout the wodd,blow the trumpet among the nations!Consecrate nations against her,Gather kingdoms against her.Appoint a recruiting sergeant against her!

Most of Israel’s wars, however, were defensive, not aggressive, and sowhen the prophets speak of the trumpet-sound or the setting up of a signal,they are predicting an invasion, and warning their countrymen of imminentdanger: it is an alarm signal in the strict scnsc, a call to arms or to tlight (Jr 4:s-6; 6: I; OS 5: 8; Am 3: 6; cf. Jl 2: I). In the quotation from Jr 31: 27‘recruiting sergeant is a translation of the word !ipsar, which is simply aHebrew naturalization of the Akkadian (upsharm, meaning ‘scribe’. In thistext it refers to the official in charge of conscription, usually called in Hebrewthe dpher, ‘the secretary who enlists the people of the country (2 K 35: 19)or the sho^!er, the ‘clerk’ who, according to Dt 20: 5-8, gave public notice ofexemptions from service.4

According to 2 S II: I and its parallel (I Ch 20: I), ‘the time when kingsbegin their campaigns’ is ‘the turn of the year’, that is, spring.5 In fact,almost all the Assyrian campaigns whose dates are known with precisionbegan between April and June; in the NewBabylonian period, the datesstretch on to autwnn and sometimes even into the winter, according to theneeds of the operations. It was natural enough to choose the beginning of thegood weather, whenever possible, for the roads were then in good condition;hence there were no complications over transport or camping. Supplies, too,were easily arranged, for the army would arrive in enemy territory just afterthe cereal harvests. AU this, of course, is true of a professional army. but itmust have been much harder to mobilize peasants just at the heaviest periodof work in the fields, from the harvest to seed-time.

1. Ct p. 116. 1. a p. 2,s. 1. cf. p. ‘73. I. Cf p. “‘I. I. CT p. ‘90.

XT= m: MmTAttY nwrmnmtis

We have little information on strategy. The Hittita and the Canaanites. itszems, generally tried to draw the enemy far away from his bases and to cometo grips near a strong position where their charioa could launch a surpriseattack; the bulk of the army was held in reserve to exploit the success or toretreat ingoodorder. ThiswashowdrebattlesofMegiddo (againstThutmosesIII) and of Qadcsh (against Rarnses II) developed. Perhaps Josixs was tryingto put &is old strategy into practice when he allowed Nechao to advance asfat as Megiddo; when the first attack, led by the king in person, was repulsed,the rsraelitc army withdrew (2 K 23: ZG-~O; 2 Ch 35 ~0-24).

z S II : II tells us that during David’s war against the Ammonites, thett.aiotu.l army was baxn&kBth with the Ark, while the professional army wasacamped before Rabbah. According to I K 30: 12, 16, Ben-h&d uld thekings allied with him got drunk barsukkBth while the envoys were negodat-ing with A&b in Samaria and the young cadets making their successfulsortie. The usual tratularion is ‘in the huts’, i.e. in the camp pitched beforeRabbah or Samaria. One writer has recently suggested the translation ‘atS&ah’, ott the supposition that Ben-h&d or David had established a‘strategic advanced base’ in the Jordan valley, where the bulk of the armywas held in reserve. 1r is an interesting hypothesis, but it seems unlikely thatthese old stories reflect such a modern concept of strategy. The text ofT K 20: I, n-13, 20 takes it for granted that Ben-hadad and his army arecamped very neaz Samatia. And the immediate context of 2 S XI: II favounthe ordinary translation: Uriah refuses to go home as long as the Ark and thepeople are living in huts, and while his comrades in the household guard arecamping in the open air.

The war against Moab (2 X 3: 4-27) gives a foe example of an indirectattack: the king of 1nae1, instead of attacking Mesha on their commonfrontier north of the Anton, penuader the king of Judah to make an alliancewith him. Then by a long turning movement across Judah and Edom, heinvades the territory of Moab from the south and marches on to the capital,systematically destroying everything in his path. David had used the samestrategy against the Philistines, though on a smaller scale (z S 5 : 23).

Our information about combat tactics is equally incomplete. Clearly, tac-tics would vary with the arms and the troops employed: it depended onwhether chariots were used or not, whether the professional troops wereengaged alone, or the conscripts alone, or both together. If both were usedtogether. the professional soldiers fought in the front line and led the aaack,while the conscripts were held as uncommitted reserves: these tactics wereemployed in the Ammonite war under David and in the Aramaean warsunder Achab.’ IZI mobile warfare, or when a surprise attack was to be madecm a camp, the commander divided his force into three xwault corps (Jg 7: 16;9:43;1St1:1~;~St8:~;cf.thePhilirtinesalsointS13:t7).Altematively,

I. Cf. p. **I.

4: WAR 253instead of this encircling manrruvre, a detachment might be despatched toattack the enemy from the rear (2 ch I, : 13-15). If a good general were thusattacked from behind, he would continue to fight on both fronts while keep-ing his two combat forces in close liaison to give each other support (2 S IO:S-11).

The baggage was left with guards or reserves behind the fighting line or atthe departure point (I S 17: 22; 25: 13; 30: 24; cf. w. 9-m). According tothe Hebrew text of I K 20: 27 (missing in the Greek and often suppressed bycritics), the army was equipped with supplies before its departure; thesupplies were taken from depots (mirk’no^th), which arc mentioned alongsidechariot garrisons under Solomon (I K 9: 19) and alongside citadels underJosaphat (z Ch 17: 12). We do not know how the army in the fteld receivedits supplies. David, as a young boy, brought parched corn and loaves to hisbrothers at the battle front (I S 17: t7), but as a rule the tkoopr bad to live offthe land as they went. Sometimes the inhabitants would bring victuals (2 S16: rt; 17: 27-29; 19: 33). and sometimes the army would requisition them(Jg 8: 4c; I S 23: 7-18). An Egyptian papyrus gives a vivid description oftltesc same methods, which the Egyptian army used in Canaan; but it wouldbe rash to use this text, combined with I S 23 : 18, to estimate the daily rationofan Israelite soldier.

Liaison was maintained by orderlies, on foot (Jg 9: 31; 2 S II: 19; 18: 19)or mounted (2 K 9: I$.). But tlxy also used signals: the maderh was a ftrekindled on a height, whose smoke or light could be seen far away and whichgave a signal agreed on beforehand (Jg 20: 38) or a simple warning (Jr 6: I).An ostrakon found at Lakish is most explicit: ‘We are watching the signals(ms’t) of L&h according to my Lord’s orders, for we cannot see Azeqah’:there must have been a code, then, to interpret these signals. In the traditionabout the Exodus and the stay in the desert, the cloud of light which revealedthe presence of Yahweh gave the people the signals for marching and camp-ing, and they are represented as an army in the iield (Ex 13 : m-s; Nb 9: I_+23). ‘They camped on ~ahweh’s orders and struck camp on Yalweh’sorders’ (Nb 9: x~,23).

Trumpets were also used for signalling. Immediately after the passageabout the cloud of light, Nb IO: I-IO mentions the two silver trumpets(!+q’r_rah), which were used to call the assembly together and to accompanyworship; but they were also used to give the order to break camp, and theywere to be used for departure for battle. They were in fact carried by thepriest Phinchas when Israel opened its campaign against Midian (Nb 3 I : 6).Similarly, according to 2 Ch 13: II-IS, the priests sounded the trumpet inthe war between Abiyyab and Jeroboam. In OS 5: 8, the trumpet stands in aparallel with the horn (&par, strictly, a ram’s horn); in another ancient text,the sh+tr alone is mentioned, playing tlte part which the late passages jutcited ascribe to the nutnpet. The horn was a signal for mobilization or

Itallying (Jg 3: 27; 6: 34; I S 13: 3; 2. S 20: I). Not to hear the sound of the

I

horn is a synonym for being threatened with war no longer (or 42: 14). Butthe horn was also used to order the cessation of hostilities (2 S 18: 16: 20: a).

When the battle was about to commence. the &par gave the signal toshout the battle-cry (Jos 6: sf.; Jg 7: t6f.); the ~a~o~r~mh also is said to be usedforthis(Nb to: 9; 2 Ch 13: 1x5). This batde-cry(r’n;‘ah: cf also thecorrc+pondingnounandvetbintS~7:zo,s~;Jr4:~g;zo:16;49:~;~2~1:+7;OS 5: 8; Am I: 14; 2: 2) was originally a savage shout meant to inspire thetanks and to strike feat into the enemy. But it was also a religious c’y, closelybound up with the rdle of the Ark in fighting (cf. I S 4: sf. 1) ; it then becameput ofthe ritual surrounding the Ark (2 S 6: IS), and fmally parsed into the

!Temple liturgy (Lv 23: 24; Nb 29: I) and cettain Psalms.

There is ‘a time for war and a time for pace’ (Qo 3: 8). The wordh&n,, peace, used in a political sense, means not only the absence of war, ina purely negative sense, but includes the idea of friendly relations betweentwo peoples, just as, in other contexts, it means friendly relations between~oindividuals~g4:t7;~S7:~4;1K~:4,266;2~:4~:cf.Gn34:~1;tCh12: 18). These relations would be guaranteed by a pact ot treaty (b’rlrh: I K5: 26), and breaking the tteaty is the equivalent of going to war (I K 15:IP_20; cf. Is 33: 7-8).

Conversely, war ends by the establishment of peace, and this peace is thefruit of via0 ry, to mum ‘in peace’ from a campaign is a synonym for *toretumvictorious’(Jg 8:9; 2 S r9:25,3r; I Kzz:z7-28; Jr43: tz).Thepeaccwas sealed by the conclusion, ot the renewal of a treaty. For example, whet>Ben-h&d had been defeated at Apheq, he rued for peace, offering to returnto Achab the Israelite tow- occupied by his forces, and to allow the Israelitesto open bazaars at Damascus like those the Atamaeans had at Samatia: Achabthen signed a treaty with him (I K 20: 34). Ben-hadad had first sent mcssen-gets (I K 20: 32) ; they are the ‘messengets ofpeacc’ (IS 33 : 7). The victor toocould propose peace (Jg 21: 13). These offers of, or requests for, peace couldbe made even before the ~omnwncem~nt of hostilities, if the superiorpowerof one party made the issue virtually cettin: thus the Gibeonitcs sought tomake a treaty with Josue, and the latter granted them peace and a treaty (Jos9: 6, IS). The inhabitants of Yabcsh asked N&ash for a treaty when hepitched camp before their town (I S I I : I) ; and Deuteronomy lays down thatpeace terms must be offered to z. foreign city before it is attacked (Dt 30: to).

In these three instances, the weaker party, if it accepted the peace-terms,was reduced to slavery. The outcome of a victorious war was always con-quest by one side and vassaldom for the other: e.g. David against Aram,

I. CT *. 159.

4: WAR 255

Edom, Moab and Ammo”, ot the Assyrians against Israel, ot Sennachctib,Nechao and Nabuchodonosot against Judah. In their accounts of these wars.the historical books of the Bible never mention a treaty imposed by the vic-tor, but Er 17: 13-21 states it dearly of Seder&s: Nabuchodonosor had madea treaty (&rh) with him, which Sedecias had confirmed with an imprecatoryoath; later, Sededas had broken the treaty, and his oath (cf. ?. K 24: 17, zob).Similarly, OS tz: 2: ‘They have made a b’rirh with Assyria, but they ate tak-ing oil to Egypt’, refers to the policy of the last king of Samaria, a vassal ofShahnanescr, who turned to Egypt for help (cf. 2 K 17: 3-4). Lady, Is 33: 8:‘They broke the b’rirh’, tefen, according to some exegetes, to the pactbetween Sennachetib and Ezechias. Such treaties existed even when victorywas not overwhelming, e.g. tborc between Hirtite and Assyrian kings andtheir vassals in Syria, copies of which have survived. ThZ‘obligations ofadefeated enemy who accepted vassaldom had to be fixed, and among these~1s the tribute he had to pay. The urual term for tribute is n&&ah, a ‘present’,but dte amount was fixed by the suzerain (z K 18: 14: 23: 33; 2 Ch 27: 5).and withholding payment was equivalent to revolt (2 K 3: 4-5; 17: 4).

The laws of war were crude. The Annals of the kings of Assyria have aconstant refrain of towns destroyed, dirnantled or burnt, levelled as if by ahurricane, or reduced to a heap of rubble. It was the usual custom also inbiblical wars, from a period of the Judges to the time of the Maccabees; itmade no difference whether the Israelites u.ere attacking other towns otIsraelite towns were being captured by invaders (Jg 9: 45; 20: 48; 2 S 17: 13;~Kzo: 10;2K3:25;8: rz;zs:!?to; tMs:35; 11:48; 16: ~o).At dxvetyleast, the fortifications were dismantled (2 K 14: 13).

Yet war had to bring profit to somconc. Before being burnt, conqueredtowns were pillaged (2 S 8: 8: 12: 30; 2 K 14: 14; 2s: t3f.; I M 5: 28, 35,etc.); a camp abandoned by the cnemy would be pillaged (z K 7: 16; I M 4:23); flocks were carried offas booty (I S 14: 32; 27: 9; 30: 20); even the deadwere stripped of everything worth while on the very field of battle (I S 31:8) ; the victors took away everything they could carry (2 Ch 20: 2s; cf. Dt 20:14). The appetite for plunder and for the joy it brought (I S 30: 16) was a spurto the cotnbatams (2 K 3: 23). but there was a danger that the soldiers mighttake to plundering instead of exploiting their victory (I S 14: 24; I M 4: t7-18). Few pleasures were accounted comparable to that of sharing in thedistribution of booty (Is 9: 2; Ps ttg: 162). This was how the fighting menmade themselves rich, for they had no other way: Yahweh promisedNabuchodonorot the riches ofEgypt as wages for his army (Ez 29: 19).

The story of I K 20: 39-40 could mean that every man had a right to whathe himself&d hands on: a man had captured a ptisoner whom he had left acomrade to guard: if the latter let him escape. he had either to take his placeot to pay a large fme (cf. Jor 7: 21; 2 K 7: 8, though in these two texts, fordifferent reasons, such behaviout is frowned on). From very ancient times, the

..__..__ .._........ .._... .._ .

2S6 111: MILIT‘WY *NSTrTUTr”NS

custom was to collect and then to share our the boory (Jg 5: jo; cf. Is 9: 2;Pr r6: 19). A law is ascribed to Mores according to which the booty had tobe divided equally, one half for the fighting men and the other half for therest of the community, after both parts had been subjected to a tax for theLcvites (Nb jr: 2.6-47). David introduced the rule that the men left behindto guard the baggage should share the spoil along with the fighting men(I S 30: 24-25). In the early wars of Israel, the leader had a special portionwhich his men left him of their own free will (Jg 8: 24-25; perhapsI S 30: 20). Later on the king reserved the most valuable articlcs for himselfor for the treasury of the sanctuary (2 S 8: 7-8, II; 12: JO). In a confederatearmy, the allies had a right to share the booty (cf. Gn 14: 24). the amount ofwhich was probably agreed upon beforehand, as it was among other ancientpeoples.

People, as well as things, fell into the hands of the victor. The historicalbooks of the Bible record instances of barbarous treatment meted out todefeated enemies: under Josue, five Canaanite kings were trampled undcr-foot and put to death (Jos to: 24-26); Ado+Sedeq had his thumbs and bigroes cur off (Jg I : 6); under Gideon, the Midianite leaders were beheaded(Jg 7: 25). When David went raiding in the Negeb, he killed every singleman and woman (I S 27: 9, I I); he massacred all the Am&kiter who fell intohis hands (I S 30: 17). and put to death two-thirds of the population ofMoab(2 S 8: 2). Am&s executed ro.000 Edonlite prisoners of war (z Ch 25: rz),and the law ofDt 20: u-r3 lays down that if a city refuses to surrender, everymale in it shall be put to death. But these instances are exceptional, and thelaw of Dt was purely theoretical.1 Apart from the !,emn in a holy war whichinvolved all living beings,1 the massacre of prisoners was never a general rule,nor were the ro~ru~es of whic!r Assyrian rats and monuments offer only toomany examplcr. Even Gideon. in his day, would have spared Zebah andSalmunna if he had nor been bound by the law of blood-vengeance (Jg 8:18-21), and the kings of Israel had a reputation for mercy (I K 20: 31): theydid not kill their prisoners of war (2 K 6: zz-which need nor be corrected).

The reasons for this conduct were nor purely humanitarian The last twotexts do nor clearly stare that this was the motive, and Dr 20: 19 seems toexclude the idea, when it says that txes should be spared because they are normen. Self-interest would counsel moderation, for both the community andthe individual stood to gain by keeping enemy prisoners alive. They wouldpay tribute, could be used for forced labour. or as public slaves, or as Templeslaves; they could even be sold as slaves to private individuals. We said abovethat in Israel, as among other ancient peoples, war was one of the sources ofthe slave-supply,3 and that, in all probability, prisoners ofwar became publicslaver in the service of the king or the sanctuary.4

4: WAR 257

The short story in I K 20: 39 stares that the soldier really meant to keep theprisoner as his own slave. According to J14: 3, the nations drew lots for thepeople of Yahweh and sold the boys and girls. We are better informed aboutwomen cxprored in war. The soldiers of Sisera, if they had won the battle,could have had ‘a young girl, or two young girls, for each warrior’ (Jg 5: 30).AccordingtoNb )I: r8.27afrerthecampaignaglinstMidianthewomenwhowere virgins were divided between the fighting men and the rest of thepeople. The law of Dt 21: to-14 authorizes art Israelite to marry a womancaptured in war,’ but she thereby ceases to be a slave. ‘purr off her captive’srobes’ and (though she may be divorced) may never be sold. This presumesthat if a female prisoner is not taken to wife by her master, she remains aSl;lvc.

Lastly, political reasons led first the Assyrians and the&e Babylonians tosubstitute deportation for enslavement. and whole popolarionr were de-ported, as they had previously been enslaved. The Israelites never had anopportunity to copy this practice, but they suffered from it: the inhabirarrrsof the northern kingdom were deported en max afret the conquests ofTiglarh-P&sat (2 K 15 : 29) and after the fall of Samaria (2 K 17: 6). Part of thepopulation ofJudah was deported after each of the two sieges ofJerosaem byNabuchodonosor (2 K 24: x4f.; 25: ,I; Jr 52: 27-30). At the beginning ofrhcExile, their lot was an unenviable one, but at least they were nor slaves.

I. cf. p. 81.

C,U.PIER FIVE

T HE HOLY WAR

MONG all the peoples of antiquity, war was linked with religion.A It was begun at the command of the gods, OI at least with theirapproval, manifested by omens; it was accompanied by sacritices,

and conducted with the help oftbe gods who ensured victory. for which theywere thanked by an offering of part of the booty. In antiquity, then, everywar wzu a holy war, in a broad sense. More strictly. the Greeks gave the nameof ‘holy wars’ (irpol v&~I) to those which the amphictyony of Delphiconducted against any of its members who had violated the sacred rights ofApollo. More strictly still, the holy war of Islam, the jihud, is the dutyincumbent upon every Moslem to spread his faith by force ofarms.

This last notion of a holy war is utterly foreign to Israel. It is incompatiblewith the idea of Yahwism as the particular religion and the peculiar posses-sion of the chosen people. But, precisely because of this essential relationbetween the people and its God, all the institutions of Israel were investedwith a sacred character, war just as much as kingship or legislation. This doesnot mean that every war was a religious wu--a concept which does notappear until very late, under the Maccabea: Israel did not fight for its faith.but for its existence. This means that war is a sacred action, with its own par-ticular ideology and rites; this ideology, these rites, give it a specific characterof its own, and single it out among the other wars of antiquity, where thereligious aspect was something accessory. such was the primitive concept ofwar in krael but (as with kingship), this sawal character faded into the back-ground and war became a ‘profane’ thing. Nevertheless, it did retain areligious character for a long time; the old ideal survived, sometimes modi-fied, sometimes taking on a new lease of life in particular surroundi~~gs or atparticular times. We shall attempt to trace the evolution of this process.

I. The ronr~pr of the holy war, and its &es

when the people took up arms they were called the people of Yahweh orthe people of God (Jg 5: 13; 20: z.), the troops of God (I S 17: 26), or thearmies ofYalwch(Ex 12: 41; cf. 7: 4). The combatants had to be in a state ofritual cleanliness, ix. ‘made holy’ (Jos 3: 5; cf. Jr 6: 4; ~2: 7; J14: 9). Theywerebound to remaincontinent (I S 21: 6; 2 S II: II). and this obligation of

cleanlin~ extended to the amp, which had to be kept ‘holy’ ifYahweh -to encamp with his troop (Dt 23: I&IS).

The reason is that the wars ofIsrael were the wars of Yahweh (I S 18: I,;25: 28). and the national epic was sung of in the ‘Book of the Wm ,,fYahweh’ (Nb 21: 14, a book no longer extant. The enemies of 1srxl weretheencmiesofYahweh(Jg 5: 31; IS 30: 26; d.Ex 17: 16).Beforemar&gout to bat& a sacrifice was offered to Yahweh (I S ,: 9; 13: 9. 12); mostimportant ofall. Yahweh was consulted (Jg M: 23,~s: I S 14: 37; 23: t. 4)by means of the ephod and sacred lots (I S z.3: 9C; 30: 7f.) and he decidedwhen to go to war. He him&marched in the van of the army (Jg 4: 14;2 S 5: 24; 6. Df M: 4).

The visible sign of this presence of Yahweh was the Ark. Tradition toldhow it had been with the people during their many wanderings in the desert.wanderings which are represented as the marches ofan army on the move, andNb IO: 35-36 has presenred some ancient battle-cries. When the Ark wasleaving, they shouted: ‘Arise, Yahweh, andlet thy enemies be scattered .‘,and when it came to rest: ‘Return, Yahweh, to the countless thousands ofIsrael.’ It had led the Israelites across the Jordan, when they themselves hadbeen ‘sanctified’ for the war of conquest (Jos 3: 6). and had been carried insolemn procession around the walls ofJericho 00s 6: 6f.). Even under David,the Ark was in the camp with all Israel in front of Rahbath Amman (2 S I I :II). The history of the battle ofApheq is particularly inauctive (I S 4). Thesuccess of the Pbilistines is attributed to the absence of the Ark; so it isbrought from Shiloh and the Philistines deduce that ‘God has come into thecamp’. This time, however, the Ark does not bring victory; worse. it isitself captured by the enemy, and this capture is felt as an inexplicabledisaster, more painful than the massacre of the army itself.

When the Ark arrived at Apheq, the Israelites had raised the battle-cry, thet’n?‘ah (I S 4: sf.). which was the signal for battle,1 but tbis cry was also partof the ritual surrounding the Ark (2 S 6: 13) and was a religious cry. It is notquite so certain that the title Yahweh Sabaoth should be connected with theArk and its r6le as a palladium in the wars of Israel, though the assertion isof&n made. This title seems to stem originally from the sanctuary of Shiloh,zhut not strictly with reference to the Ark which was kept there; besides. it isnot certain that Yhwh Sba’bth means ‘Yahweh of the armies’ (of ~smel), orthat the title had any connection whatever with the military instimtions ofIsrael or with their religious arpcct.

The combatants in a holy war left home with the certainty of victory, for‘Y~wehhad’already’givmtheenemyintotheirhands’~os6:~;8:t,~8;Jg3:28;4:7;7:9,IS;IS23:4;24:5,erc.).Fai~wwaJulindispensablecon-dition: they bad to have faith and to be without fear (Jos 8: I; I O: 8.25).Those who were afraid did not have the necessary religious dispositions and

1. CC p. 2% 1. cf. p. ,.a,.

260 m: MtLIT*tlY ,NSTu”TIONS

were to be sent away (Jg 7: 3 ; cf. Dt 20: 8, where the dismirral ofsuch men isexplained by a psychological reason, which was not the original reason forthe custom).

During battle, it was Yahweh who fought far Israel (Jos 10: 14. 42; Jg XI:35). He called into service the elements ofnature 00s IO: II; 24: 7; Jg 5: z.0:I S 7: I O) and threw the enemy into confusion (Jg 4: 15; 7: 22; I S 7: IO;14: 20). striking a&divine terror’ into them (1 s 14: IS).

But victory war neither the last act of the holy war nor its culmination.This occurs in the Eerem, the anathema carried out on the vanquished enemyand his go& The meaning of the root and the usage of the cognate verbshow that the word !wem denotes the fact of ‘separating’ something, oftaking it out of profane use and reserving it for a sacred use; alternatively, itmay stand for the thing which is ‘separated’ in this way, forbidden to manand consecretated to God. The term found its way into the general vocabu-lary of worship (Nb 16: 14; Lv 27: 21, 28; Ez 44: 29), but originally itbelonged to the ritual of the holy war: it meant leaving to Gad the fruits ofVictory. The precise farm of this varies in different texts. As a general rule,the herem originates from an order of Yahweh (Dt 7: 2; 20: 17; Jos 6: 2;I S 15: 3); by way of exception, it may be the result of a vow by the people(Nb 21: 2). In theory, it admits of no exception whatsoever: at Jericho, allliving things, men and beasts. had to be put to death, the town and all itsmovables were burnt, the metal objects consecrated to Yahweh (Jos 6: I&24). Akan, by transgressing the Eerem, brought down a curse upon the people;hc was therefore punished and the goods he had stolen were destroyed (Jos 7).In Saul’s war against the Amalekites (I S IS), too, the anathema was to admitof no exception and Saul was condemned for not having interpreted itstrictly. The destruction of c&c objects in the towns of Canaan is explicitlyprescribed in DC 7: 5.25. The &rem was to be applied with the utmost rigouragainst any Israelite town which had denied Yahweh (Dt 13: 13-18). Else-where, however, the &vn was more or less restricted: it applied to all humanbeings, but the cattle and movable goods could be kept as booty (Dt 2:34-35; 3: 6-7 and probably 20: 16; Jos 8: &27; II:I~ and probably IO: zSf.);sometimes women who were virgins might be excepted (Nb 31: r4-18; Jga: II. though in these two references a special reason is given). When aforeign town was captured, only the male population was put to death (Dt20: 14. but here the word Ferem is not found and the text does not refer to aholy war, in contrast with the reference to towns in the Holy Land, Df 20:&7).

It is hard to say ro what extent these prescriptions were in fact applied.1t is remarkable that tbw should bc laid down in Deuteronomy, publishedat a period when the holy war was little nxxe than a memory, and that theconcrete examples should be found in tl,e Book of Josue, the final redactionof which ir equally late. On the o&r hand, neither the ward nor the custom

5 : THE HOLY W*R 261

is found in the stories of the Judges, who really did conduct holy wars. yetthere is no doubt that bath the notion and the practice of the hem are ofgreat antiquity. They are found in the old story of the war of the tribaagainst Benjamin (Jg 21: II), and in the prophetical tradition about S&swar against the Am&kites (I S IS). In addition, we have one parallel fromoutside theBible: Mesha, king ofMoab in the ninth century~.c., boasts inhisinscription that he had massacred the entire Israelite population of Nebo,which he had vowed to anathema (verb: Fnn) in honour of his god Ashtar-Kemosh.

What we have just said about the herem applier also, in a more general way,to the whole picture of the holy war sketched out in the preceding paragraph.The features which go to its making are borrowed from vati& books, andamong all the accounts of the early wars &&I, there is not one where all theseveral elements are found. Yet the way in which some of the stories aregrouped, the recurrence of the same form&, and the common spirit whichpervades these texts all stamp these ..vars as genuine holy wars. Let us take afew examples.

The character is clearly seen in the war of Deborah and Baraq againstSisera, both in the prose account (Jg 4) and in the Song of Deborah (Jg 5).Yahweh gave Baraq the order to march and promised to deliver Sisera intohis hands (4: 67) ; even before the fighting starts. Yahweh has already handedover Sisera, is marching ahead of Baraq, striking panic into the enemy, sothat notaman will escape (4: 14-16). The poem sings the praises ofthosewhofreely answered the call, i.e. of those who had faith in their victory (5: 2,9):the fighting men were, then, God’s champions (5: S), the people of Yahweh(5: 13) come to Yahweh’s aid (5 : 23). It was Yahweh himselfwho went for-ward in the earthquake and in the rending of the skies (5 : 4); the stars them-selves fought on his side (5 : 20) and the enemies of Yahweh were annihilated(5: , I). Both the prose account and the song are close enough to the events tohave given us a faithful version of what the participants thought of this war:for them, it was a sacred action.

We discussed above1 the strategy of Gideon against the M&mites, but thatexamination did not take into account the religious element, which is anessential factor in Jg 6-S. Gideon had received the spirit of Yahweh (6: 34).who had intervened twice to assure him of success (6: 3640; 7: 99. ItwasYahweh who delivered Midian into the hands ofIsrael (7: 2, 7, I~-IS; 8: 3.7). It was Yahweh and not Israel who emerged victorious (7: 2); the timid,who had no faith to support them, had been sent away (7: 3), and the armyitself had then been reduced to a tiny group, in order to make the divineintervention even more striking (7: 7). The bat&-cry (t’rdah) was: ‘The

262 nr : MlLlTARY INSnTmONS

sword for Yahweh and for Gideon!’ (7: 20). Yahweh threw the enemy campinto confusion (7: 21). This too was a war of Yahweh.

The wan against the Philistines will provide a last example. Jonathan andhis amour-bearer went unescorted to attack the Philistine post at Mikmas.for Yahweh would give them victory, whether they were many or few(I S 14: 61.); a sign assures Jonathan that Yahweh had delivered the enemyinto his hands (14: 10. 12); the earth quaked, and a panic sent by God fellupon the camp (14: IS). Saul consulted the oracles (14: IS), and the panicamong the Philistines increased until they took to flight: ‘that day, Yahwehgave the victory to Israel’ (14: 16-23). A fast had been ordered for allcombatants.

During the period of the Judges and under the reign of Saul, the Israelitesfought only defensive wars, and it has recently been suggested that the holywars oflsrael were always defensive wars. But the conquest of the PromisedLand is certainly described ar a holy war, as the holy war, in the Book ofJosue, and whatever the date of its redaction or the part to be attributed to itsredactors. they certainly did not invent this tradition. It is represented also bythe quite independent account in Jg I : Judah and Simeon undertake the con-quest of their territory after consulting Yahweh, who gives them the land(Jg I: t-2,4). In addition, WC must admit that arms played at least some partin the setdement in Canaan, and that this conquest created a climate ofopinion particularly favourable to the idea of the holy war: then above allYahweh the Warrior (Ex 15: 3), the Master of War (I S 17: 47). had to fightfor his people.

This is the principal fact: it was Yahweh who fought for Israel, not Israelwhich fought for its God. The holy war, in Israel, was not a war of religion.According to the ancient texts, the wars in the time ofJosue and the Judgeswere not undertaken in order to spread belief in Yahweh, as the jihad isundertaken to spread the Moslem faith: nor was their object to defend a faithagainst a foreign religion. It is worthy of note that, in the Book ofJosuc. theaccounts of the conquest do not contain a single allusion to the gods or theworship of Canaanites. Similarly, in the Book ofJudges, Israel is not fighting(directly) for its religious freedom, but for its existence as a people. The SongofDeborah contrast Yahweh and his champions with Siscta and his chariots,but not with Siscra and his gods; Gideon destroys an altar to Baal, but theepijode has no connection whatever with his holy war against the Midian-ites. Religious preoccupations appear only in texts which ate of late redac-tion, in the prescriptions of Deuteronomy on the herem (Dt 7: z-5, 25; 20:17-IS), in the Deuteronomic framework of the Book of Judges (Jg 2: z-3),and in the still later redaction of the war of Moses against Midian (Nb 23 :17-18; 31: 15-16). But everything we have so far said shows that, even ifthese holy wars were not wars of religion, they were asentially religious: inthese wars, Yahweh wxs fighting for the life of his people, and the people

5 : THE HOLY WAR 263associated themselves with this action by an act of faith and by conformingto a definite ritual.

One could say that this strictly sacred character of war disappeared withthe advent of the monarchy and the establishment of a professional army. Itis no longer Yahweh who marches ahead of his people to fight the Wars ofYahweh, but the king who leads his people out and fights its wars (I S 8: 20).The combatants ate no longer warriors who volunteer to fight, but prwfcssionals in the pay of the king, or consctipts recruited by his &i&b. Tltitransformation was obviously going to precipitate a crisis: the ground wasprepared for it under Saul, who transgressed the ritual laid down for a holywar (I S IS). and it happened under David, who engaged a large number offoreign mercenaries, and ordered a census ofthe people formilitary purposes(2 S 24: I+). War became, ofnecessity, the state’s concern: it was ‘profaned’.

To begin with, however, certain rites of the holy war were retained. 1n theAmmonite war, the Ark accompanied the troops, and Uriah (a Hittite mer-cenary!) kept strict continence (2 S II: II). David ‘consecrated’ to Yahwehthe silver and gold of his conquest (z S 8: II). But these rites became acces-sory things, mere trappings, and even if the saying ‘Yahweh gives the victory’(2 S 8 : 6.14) was still heard. it war certainly David who secured it by humanmeans and who received the glory which ensued (2 S 12: 28).

Yahweh was no longer consulted, by drawing lots, about the opportune-ness of war or about the manner in which it should be waged, but prophetsdid intervene with the king (I K 20: 13-14. 22, 28); sometimes the kingwould even ask them for an oracle (I K 22: 3-12). Eliseus accompanied thekings of Israel and of Judah in their expedition against Moab and passed onto them the word of Yahweh (2 K 3: 11-19; cf. also 2 K 13: 1st). Theseprophets still used the time-hottoured vocabulary of the holy war: YahwehwoulddelivertheencmyintothehandsofIsracl(tK~o:13,~8;2~:6,~~;2 K 3 : IS), but whereas in olden times it had been the leader in war who wasinspired by God, the prophets were no longer anything more than thereligious audlivics of the king. In the &st prophet&J school the idea ofthe holy war lived on, but precisely because the wars were no longer holy, theprophets often stood opposed to the king. In opposition to a false prophetwho foretells that Yahweh will deliver Ramoth of Gilead into the hands ofAchab, a true prophet predicts disaster (I K 22: I$-28), and Eliseus refused toconsult Yahweh on behalf of the king of Israel, who is nevertheless leader ofan expedition against Moab (2 K 3: 13-14).

1” the following century, ~saias stood out as the defender of the ancient con-cept of the holy war, against those who would appeal to political motives.When Aram and Ephraim launched their attack on Judah, he foretolddisaster forthem; ifonly Achaz would have faith in Yahweh (Is 7: 4-9). and

264 11,: MlLlThRY INST,TUTIclNS

when Sennachctib was threatening Jerusalem. I&s assured the peoplethat God would save the city (37: 33-35). He condemned military ptepara-tions (22: 9-n) and the seeking ofhelp from abroad (31: I-~), for ‘YahwehSabaoth would come down to tight on mount Sion and on its bill’ (31: 4).Against Assur, Yahweh would come from afar ‘in the heat of his anger, inthe heart of a consuming fire. in a stotm of rain and hail’ (30: 27-30). AgainstEgypt, he would come on a cloud, and the Egyptians would lose heart andmm against one another (19: I-Z). Characteristics of the holy war tecur in&se passages: there is a certitude of victory, faith in Yahweh, a warrioraction on the part of God, who unleasher the elements and strikes hisenemies with terror: we can still hear an echo of the Song of Deborah, of theconquest stories and of the period of the Judges. I&s and other prophetsprobably borrowed their concept of the ‘day of Yahweh from this ancientideology; it would be a day when Yahweh would come for a victoriousbattle. But these new ‘wars of Yahweh’ take place only in the visions of theptophets and ate no longer the wats of Israel: the latter have become utterlyprofane. Isa& tells his contemporaries: you counted on human means ‘butyou have not looked at their Author nor seen him who made all things longago ’ (a : I I), or : ’ Salvation lay in convenion and calm, your power lay inperfect confidence. and you did not want them’ (30: IS).

What is even mote remarkable is that the rules of the holy war should havereceived their clearest and most complete expression at the end of the mowachy in the redaction of Deuteronomy. The book contains many veryancient elements, and this justifies the UEC made of it above to describe thepractices of the holy war. But out pattialar interest at present is to study thenew spirit which minutes these laws, and which dominates the speeches atthe beginning and end of the book. The entire history of Israel is presented asa holy war. And the past is a pledge against the future: ‘Yahweh your God,who marches in front ofyou, will fight for you, just as you have seen him doin Egypt’ (Dt I: 30). Again, ‘Remember what Yahweh your God did toPharaoh and to all Egypt. so Yahweh your God will deal with all thepeoples you are &id to face’ (7: 18-19). ‘It is not the uprightness of yourbehwiout nor the tightness of your heart which will win you possession oftheir country; it is because of their perversity that Yahweh yout God willdispossess these nations to your advantage’ (9: 5). ‘No one will hold hisground before you; Yahweh your Gad will make you feared and formidablethroughout the length of the land your feet shall tread’ (II: 25). ‘Be strongand hold fast, do not bc afraid, for it is Yahweh your God who is marchingwith you’ (31: 6). And the book closes with the Blessings of Moses, an oldsong breathing a warlike spirit, which ends (Dt 33: 29):

Happy att thou, 0 Israel-who is like th&?People victorious through Yahweh.

J : m HOLY WAR

whose shield is thy help,whose sword ir thy victory.Thy mcaiu will stoop low to wotst tbcc,but thou shalt ttamplc on their backs.

When Deuteronomy was edited, under J&s. the age of conquesta andmilitary triumphs was long past, and there was no longer any occasion toapply its prescriptions about the siege of foreign towns (Dt 20: m-m) or theexecution of an anathema (Dt a: 34-35; 3: 67; 7: 2, 5). Yet this new r&c-don on the idea of the holy wx. though transformed by the progress intheology, does fit in with a concrete historical situation. Under Josias, therevival of the national spirit and the overthmw of the Assyrian yoke gavenew and lively hope to the people, and it is by no means impossible thatthese texts ofDeuteronomy inspired the king when he tried to halt the marchof Necbao (z K 23 : 29: 2 Ch 3 3 : zof.). But it was only a t&ment~ry blaze,which the disaster ofMegiddo quenched utterly. Jeremias lived through theseevents, and he has no place for the holy wat in his preaching: the contrastwith Is&s is striking. The last wxs of Judah and tbc desperate resistanceagainst the Chaldeans. recorded in the books ofJeremiv and Kings, had noreligious character. The teason wxs that Yahweh had deserted the camp ofIsrael, and decided, in anger, to chastise his people (2 K 23: 27; 24: 3,x,); heeven fought against them (Jr 21: 5) and issued orders to the Chaldeam ‘toattack, to capture and bum Jerwalem’(Jr 34: x.). It is impossible to imagineanything mote opposed to the ancient ideology of the holy war.

During the Jewish period, in the books of Maccabees, we meet once motesome of the cbaractetistics of the holy war. Judas and his brothers conduct‘the fight of Israel’ (I M 3 : 2). The raising of the liberation army recalls manyancient memories (I M 3 : 4&60) : the asxmbly met 2.1 Mispah, as it had oncedone for the holy war against Benjamin (Jg 20: I) ; they fasted, and sought toknow the will of God by opening the book of the law, since there was nolonger any ephodotprophet; theysoundedthettumpet, shouted the batde-cty(ct Nb IO: 9 and the r&h), and mobilized the army according to the rulesset down in Dt 20: s-8. Before the battle of Emmaus. Judas exhorted th;peopIe not to fear and to call upon God: ‘All the nations shall acknowledgethat there is someone who saves Istxl’ (I M 4: E-II ; cf. I S 17: 46), and afterthe victory they blessed God for the ‘gtcat salvation’ he had wrought in 1sta.4(I M 4: 24-25; cf. I S 14: 45). Judas overthrew altars it, Philistine tetritoty,burnt their idols and sacked the tmws (I M 5: 68; 6. Dt 7: 5.25). In thesecond book, the echo of ancient texts rings fainter, but the same ideas atefound: they prepare for battle by prayer and fasting (2 M 13: IO-I& andIudas’ whoa&m to the troops mm: ‘The enemy trusti his arms and his

266 “I: mm*RY INSllTtnlDNS

boldness, but WC--WC have placed our trust in God, muter of all things’ (2M8:18).‘HelpfromGod’(~M8:~3)or’VictoryfromGod’(~M~3:1~)are the passwords. Judv arks the Lord ‘to send a good angel before us to sowfear and fright’ among the enemy (2 M 15: 23).

But in spite of these resemblances, the spirit is no longer that of the holywar. The Maccabeer and their men are not inspired by God; God did notorder rhe war and he does not intervene directly in it. The most one dare askis that he should send an angel (2 M 15: 23), and God answers this prayerwhen an armed rider appears on the road to Bethsur (2 M I I : 6-a). But thisheavenly envoy plays only a symbolic part: this fight, like all the others, isundertaken and won by merely human means. 1t is significant that the allu-sions to the help Gad gave his people in ancient times refer to the crossing ofthe Red Sea (I M 4: 9), and to the deliverance ofJerusalem Gem Sennacherib(I M 7: 40-e; z M 8: 19; IS: a), but never to the holy wars ofthe conquestand the period of the Judges.

All this prevents us from taking the Maccabean war as ?. holy war. But it isa war of religion. Mattathias calb upon ‘everyone who is zealous for the lawad who observes the Covenant’ to follow him (I M 2: 27); Judas fights forthe people and the holy place (I M 3 : 43.59). for ‘the town, religion and theTemple’ (z M 15: 17). The combatants fight for religious freedom, not onlyagainst foreign master who proscribe the observance of the law, but alsoagainst their perjured brethren ‘who abandon the holy Covenant’ (Dn II:30), and ‘who have abandoned the law’ (I M IO: 14; cf. I : 52). The rebellionbegan when Mattathias CUT the throat of a Jew who had agreed to offersacrifice on the altar at Modin (I M 2: 24). Always and everywhere, theMxcabeer vow to fight against the ‘wicked’, the ‘miscreants’, the ‘sinners’(I M 2: 44, 48; 3: g-5; 6: 21; 7: 23-24). who were allying themselves wxhplgans(tM3:t~;4:2;7:5:9:25;II:2x-2s).Itw1Saw~afreligionwhichset the ftithful Jews fighting against their fellow-Jews who had rallied to thecause of HeUenism and against their foreign protectors. It was inevitable thatboth sides should soon introduce into it political interesti, as happened in theFrench wars of religion during the sixteenth century, and in Holland duringthe seventeenth camxy.

An astonishing document has recently been found which shows that theideas of the holy war gained a new lease of life among a group of Jews: it isthe ‘Order of the War’ found in the caves of Qumran. The book dates, in allprobabiicy, from the first century B.C., and gives rules for the war which willtake place at the end of time between the ‘Sons of Light’ and the ‘Sons ofDarkness’, i.e. between the faithful Jews, those of the Qumran community.cm &e one hand, and all the pagan nations on the other. One can, of course.point to external similarities with the Books of Maccabecr, but in the Qumran

J : THE HOLY WAR 267writing the struggle is evidently regarded as a holy war. it is worthy of notethat of the five explicit citations of the Old Testament, three refer to fexfiused above (Nb IO: 9; Dt 7: ~1-22; 20: 2-s), and there are in addition may

expressions which recall the ancient ideology. This ‘war’, like the holy warof bygone ages, had its own rites; it even turns into a ceremony in whichpriests and Levites have an essential part to play. The army is ‘the people ofGod’, and the soldiers ore volunteers called to fight the battles of God. tnbattle the standards are inscribed ‘Right hand of God’, ‘God’s moment’,‘&d’s sbughter’, and God himself, who is called ‘The Hero of the Fight’,marches along with his faithful, accompanied by the army of angels. It is theHand of God which is raised against B&a! and his empire. Victory it certain:there may be mmncnts of distress, but the enemies of God and Israel willf&y be annihilated, and the eternal reign ofLight will begin.

The vision is not of a religious conquest of rhe world, of a conversionimposed by force of arms; there is nothing resembling the Moslem jihad. Theworld is zt the moment divided between Light and Darkness, between Goodand Evil, and order can only be established by Ihe total destruction of theforces of Dvkncss and of Evil, by the total victory of God and the Sons ofLight. Against the b&ground of this dualist thought. the old notion of theholy war takes on a particularly violent character, expands to cosmic dimen-sions, and yet is referred to the end of the present era of time: it is an apocalypticwar.h this curious text, visionary drexns are mingled with practical arrange-

ments that could be taken straight from a Roman military text-book; yet theauthors of the work were apparently convinced that this war was certainlycoming, and were waiting for it. The text was copied time and time again,and fragments of many copies have been found. 1n its pages. the readers couldfeed their hatred for the Sons of B&l, whom they recognized in the paganoccupants of the Holy Land. possibly it was inspired by the fanaticism ofthose Zealots who took part in the revolts against the Roman% and who mayhave thought that the time was come for the final struggle between the Sonsof Darkness and the Sons of Light.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

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