Readers Reply

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Who Killed Goliath?

Professor Tov in “The Saga of David and Goliath,” BR 02:04, makes a very good case for the existence of two accounts of the saga. The evidence which he cites (duplications, inconsistencies, etc.) is quite compelling that there were two different stories about this event which were conflated in the present Masoretic Text.

Perhaps the more interesting problem which he does not address is why there are two stories about David’s heroic action against Goliath even though 2 Samuel 21:19 clearly states that “Elhanan the son of Jaareoregim, the Bethlehemite, slew Goliath the Gittite, the shaft of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam.”

The King James Version sought to resolve this contradiction by adding the words that Elhanan slew “the brother of” Goliath. But more recent versions make it clear that the MT states that Elhanan slew Goliath.

Certainly this contradiction may be enlightening regarding the development of the David saga as the conflation of two stories. Can we bear the shock that the David and Goliath saga in its separate or conflated forms may be a “bloating of the biography” of David, or, in more dignified words, a part of the process of the glorification of David in later times?

Emanuel Tov replies:

You may well be right that the story of David’s slaying Goliath represents a secondary “bloating of the biography of David,” as you say, but it is hard to decide; the two accounts of David and Elhanan slaying Goliath may represent parallel traditions.

The confusion may perhaps be explained on a textual level. Elhanan’s father is Jaare. David’s father is Jesse. In the script of the Qumran writings Jaare (yod-ayin-resh-yod) would be written with a ligature (or connection) of the ayin and the resh, creating a word that looked almost identical to Jesse (yod, shin, yod).

Incidentally, the reading of the King James Version which you quote is based on 1 Chronicles 20:5, which is parallel to 2 Samuel 21:19. The passage in Chronicles ascribes to Elhanan the slaying of “Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite.” The passage in Chronicles may reflect a harmonization of David’s killing Goliath with Elhanan’s killing Goliath. On the other hand, the story of David and Goliath was not included in Chronicles so that the text of this book would not have contained the contradiction.

The Name of God Concealed in the Book of Esther

Concerning Carey Moore’s article on Esther in the Spring 1987 issue, he is technically correct in stating that “Yahweh, the personal name of the Hebrew God, does not appear in the Book of Esther.” But your readers might be interested in learning of the long and distinguished Masoretic tradition that identifies the consonants of the name YHWH appearing in acrostics no less than four times in the book.

In Esther 1:20 the name YHWH is formed by the initial letters of four successive words when read backwards: Hy’ Wkl Hnsym Ytnw (“It, and all the women will give”).

In Esther 5:4 the name YHWH is formed by the initial letters of four successive words when read forward: Ybw’ Hmlk Whmn Hywm (“And let the king and Haman come today”).

In Esther 5:13 the name YHWH is formed by the final letters of four successive words when read backwards: zH ’ynnW swH 1Y (“This gives no satisfaction to me”).

And in Esther 7:7 the name YHWH is formed by the final letters of four successive words when read forward: kY kltH ’lyW hr‘H (“that his fate had been determined”).

It is of course possible that all of this is purely coincidental and that the acrostics are more apparent than real. On the other hand, as long as a century ago three Masoretic manuscripts of Esther in which the above-mentioned acrostic letters are written in larger characters were known, and it may well be that others have been discovered since. Furthermore, no other acrostics of any other kind appear anywhere else in Esther.

In any case, Moore is again right on target when he writes: “Although the name of God is not explicitly mentioned, it is surely alluded to … MakoÆm, ‘from another quarter or another place,’ is surely an allusion to God.”

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Carey Moore replies:

The crucial (if ultimately unanswerable) question is, of course, whether God intended to conceal himself this way in the Book of Esther, or whether Jewish copyists, embarrassed by the fact that God is nowhere mentioned in the text, ingeniously found the divine name there. While I certainly subscribe to the latter interpretation, I cannot refute the former.

But perhaps I can use the logic of the ancient copyists to try and discredit them. For example, I could point in the text to the mention of the Devil himself (i.e. Hebrew STN “Satan”) in Esther 2:4 ’Sr tyTb b^cyNy (who is good in the eyes of), where the relevant consonant is second from the last in each word; and in Esther 2:3 N^crh-btwlh Twbt mr’h ’l-Swsn (beautiful young virgin to Susa), where the name is spelled backward. Needless to say, I regard my efforts here not as exegetical, but, rather, eisogetical (imposing meaning on the material)!

To be sure, there are ways in which “truths” were deliberately hidden by biblical authors, one of the best known being the rabbinic system of Gematria, which explains a word or group of words according to the numerical value of the letters. (Each letter in Hebrew has a numerical value.)

Gematria has been applied to the Book of Esther, especially to Esther 4:14, where Mordechai warns Queen Esther, “For if you keep silence at such a time as this, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place [Hebrew mqwm].” Those who think that “place” is a surrogate or veiled reference to God could use Gematria by pointing out that the sum of total of the squared numerical value of each of the letters in YHWH (i.e., 10² + 5² + 6² + 5² = 186) is also the numerical value of the letters in mqwm, “place.”

In matters such as the above, there are, I believe, two truths ever worth remembering: “Even the Devil can quote Scripture” and “You can do anything with statistics!”

Powerful Antiphonal Music in Genesis

I was happy to see an affirmation of my Genesis 12 lesson at the Graduate Theological Union in the Spring BR (“Abraham Cut Off From His Past and Future By the Awkward Divine Command ‘Go You!’ ”).

I see an exact parallel between the triplicate in Genesis 12:1 and Genesis 22:2. In each case there is a parallel of intensification and a narrowing down. In Genesis 12:1, the text is, “Go you [i] out of your land [or country] and [ii] from your kinsmen and [iii] from your father’s house to a land that I will show you.”

Here one moves from [i] one’s physical landscape (your “land”), to [ii] one’s familial landscape (literally your moledet [Hebrew], next of kin), to [iii] the most intimate “scape,” the one-time constellation of familiar smells, sights, sounds, the kitchen and bedroom of one’s childhood, i.e. your father’s house.

In Genesis 22:2, the text is, “Take [i] your son, [ii] your only son, [iii] whom you love, [iv] even Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah.”

This verse has the same intensification, the same narrowing down—from son, to special son, to beloved son, and finally to the named son—that we saw in Genesis 12:1.

The shocker to the sensitive reader comes in the reversal which follows. At first, we are lulled into thinking that there will be further repetition because “the land that I will show you” (Genesis 12:1) is again parallel to “the land of Moriah”^a (Genesis 22:2).

Then the reader is hit. “I will make you a 049great nation” in Genesis 12:2 is paralleled in Genesis 22:2 with “and offer him up there as a burnt offering.” The promise of Genesis 12:1 is thus completely undone.

You are right. It is certainly powerful antiphonal music.

Neusner, a Gadfly Who Agitates Us to Think

The Spring 1987 issue was, by itself, worth the cost of the annual subscription price. Such superb articles by Carey Moore on Esther, Daniel Harrington on the Jewishness of Jesus and especially Jacob Neusner!

Although controversial, Jacob Neusner is like that eternal gadfly that continually agitates us to think and explore our thoughts. His lucid presentation of the “Parallel Histories of Early Christianity and Judaism” was a pleasure for those of us who are laymen and have an ongoing love affair with the Scriptures.

It is hard to know where to begin criticizing Jacob Neusner’s article “Parallel Histories of Early Christianity and Judaism” and BR’s decision to print it.

In your first issue your editor promised that “Our articles will throw new light on the text, they will take the reader inside the Bible in novel ways.”

Neusner’s aticle is not about the Bible. If your magazine now encompasses comparative religion a name change is in order.

Aramaic, Not Hebrew Inscription

The illustrations for the Neusner article (see “Parallel Histories of Early Christianity and Judaism,” BR 03:01) are wonderful. It’s hardly worth noting, but, since 600 Hebraists from around the country will hound you about it until the next issue and beyond, the Semitic inscription above the crucified Jesus in Chagall’s “White Crucifixion” is Aramaic, not Hebrew.

Another first-rate issue in what has become the front-line resource for lay biblical study on the newsstand or in the library; you continue to fill a great void with excellent resources. Many thanks!

Correction

In Ronald S. Hendel’s article, “When the Sons of God Cavorted with the Daughters of Men,” BR 03:02, the “blurb” printed in blue incorrectly describes the Dead Sea Scroll fragment of Deuteronomy as Aramaic. As the article and the photo caption for this fragment correctly state, the fragment is in Hebrew, not Aramaic. The error was BR’s not the author’s.