Tracing the Threads of Jewish Law: The Sabbath Carrying Prohibition from Jeremiah to the Rabbis (original) (raw)
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The Cambridge Companion to Law in the Hebrew Bible
2024
This Companion offers a comprehensive overview of the history, nature, and legacy of biblical law. Examining the debates that swirl around the nature of biblical law, it explores its historical context, the significance of its rules, and its influence on early Judaism and Christianity. The volume also interrogates key questions: Were the rules intended to function as ancient Israel's statutory law? Is there evidence to indicate that they served a different purpose? What is the relationship between this legal material and other parts of the Hebrew Bible? Most importantly, the book provides an in-depth look at the content of the Torah's laws, with individual essays on substantive, procedural, and ritual law. With contributions from an international team of experts, written specially for this volume, _The Cambridge Companion to Law in the Hebrew Bible_ provides an up-to-date look at scholarship on biblical law and outlines themes and topics for future research.
Both 1 Maccabees and 2 Maccabees portray the Sabbath law as a central point of contention during the struggle over Judean law and tradition in the second century bce (e.g., 1 Macc 1:41-50; 2 Macc 6:4-6). The Hasmonean family in particular is at times highlighted as holding the Sabbath in high regard (2 Macc 5:27). In every available source, there is no question of the commitment to the inherited traditions concerning the Sabbath. However, in two passages, 1 Macc 2:29-41 and 9:43-53, the Hasmoneans are portrayed as acting in a way supported by few extant writings associated with Judean legal tradition: they engage in battle on the Sabbath. First Maccabees presents this as innovation on the part of the Hasmoneans. Josephus, who summarizes these events based upon 1 Maccabees, even recognizes this decision as the basis for normative practice (Ant. 12.272-277). As several scholars (e.g., Bar Kochva, Weiss, Scolnic) have pointed out, this event could hardly have been the first time in Judean history the issue arose. They argue against this reading of the sources. This paper contends that the plain reading of the texts is correct and 1 Maccabees is being used as the basis for legal practice in Josephus’ writings.
Revisiting the Sabbath Laws in 4Q264a and Their Contribution to Early Halakha
This article evaluates the reconstruction of 4Q264a offered by Vered Noam and Elisha Qimron. While those scholars find precedent in this scroll fragment for later rabbinic and Karaitic Sabbath prohibitions regarding playing musical instruments, using fire, and reading Scripture, the current article argues that this reconstruction is anachronistic and has insufficient support in the text. Instead, this article supports previous scholars whose reconstructions of this fragment of Sabbath laws include a rule encouraging singing, a prohibition against using fire for cooking but not for other uses, and a requirement to study Scriptures on the Sabbath.
Sabbath Observance, Sabbath Innovation: The Hasmoneans and Their Legacy as Interpreters of the Law
One of the more enduring legacies of 1Maccabees within the study of the book itself, the Hasmoneans, and more broadly in studies of Halakah, is the apparent claim that Mattathias, patriarch of the Maccabees, initiated the interpretation of the Sabbath ordinance allowing for defensive war on the seventh day. This claim has been investigated by numerous scholars, some trying to prove the impracticability of the ostensible status quo ante, while others try to confirm the traditional reading of the text as historically reliable. This discussion is seemingly interminable, and fraught with difficulties. Discussions of the history of Judean interpretation of this custom necessitate knowledge of availability and status of the texts through which it is transmitted to us that is simply unavailable in sufficient breadth and diversity to make solid conclusions. While it may be possible to prove that a specific text, or more broadly, a given community betrays a willingness to fight on the sabbath, it is often difficult to know whether this decision is based on texts at all, let alone which texts, and whether they were authoritative. Further, even in the cases where this is a possibility, as many would argue for 1Maccabees, we have little way of showing how much diversity of opinion existed on the issue of interpretation among contemporary Judeans. It would seem very likely, that even based only on interpretation of the general place of sabbath among Judeans in various literary texts and papyri, multiple attitudes existed. Because of these difficulties, and others stemming from them, this paper will largely ignore the interesting question of the historicity of Mattathias' decision. Instead, our focus will be on the more narrowly focus issue of whether and how 1Maccabees, and later Josephus, present this as a lasting legal innovation. More succinctly: Why is it that this narrative in 1Maccabees 2 becomes law for at least one reader?