Schart,A. 2012-11-19 Wisdom and the Book of the Twelve

Schart, Aaron: Wisdom and the norms of prophetic critique in the Twelve

Presentation at the SBL Annual Meeting, 19.11.2012 in Chicago

Prof. Schart presented a paper at the SBL Annual Meeting in Chicago. The paper was part of the session of the Book of the Twelve Prophets Section S19-210a on "wisdom and scribal activity in the Twelve". Additional presenters were Prof. Bernd Schippers, Prof. Jutta Krispenz, Prof. James M. Bos, and Prof. Annette Schellenberg (see the photo). Prof. Barry Jones was presiding. The session was well attended and the presentations and the following discussions yielded enough topics that should be pursued in a future session.

Abstract of the paper:

Since Wellhausen it became clear that the critique of the prophets was not based on the legal stipulations contained in the Torah. For example there are only few and disputed allusions to the decalogue in the book of the Twelve. As an alternative, it has been proposed by Hans Walter Wolff and others that norms from the wisdom tradition formed the basis, from which the prophets judged the behavior of their addressees. The paper will try to trace the influence of wisdom within the different stages of the redaction history of the Twelve.

To the full text of the manuscript »more...

On the basis of the discussion in Chicago of the above paper I would like to explain two things:

1. I deliberately defined the term "wisdom" in a very narrow way, designating only the form of wisdom found in the older parts of the Book of Proverbs (chap. 10-25). I am aware that this is a definition which is not in line with the current standard definition. However, my aim was to detect passages with a very sharp wisdom profile that markedly differ from prophetic discourse.
   In the late layers of Proverbs (chap. 1-9) "wisdom" is already identified with "torah" and absorbed by the later. Likewise in late prophetic literature the prophetic "word of YHWH" is considered to be a mere application of torah. In the late phases of tradition history the borders between the concepts have been blurred.
2. In my presentation I have not tried to justify why I think that certain passages are of redactional nature. This is due to lack of time. I have tried not to be original at this point but to present cases that are considered as secondary by many. All the passages that I have choosen, are considered as secondary within their context because of lacking cohesion and coherence, not because they own a wisdom character.

To the handout »more...

• probably the first handout ever with a QR-code that leads to a webpage on the internet.

To the comments on van Leeuwen's redaction-critical analysis of Hos 14:10 »more...