More times than not, whether it be movies or novels, sequels are never as good as the original. Even when sequels end up being good, the original still is the one that stands out. The Star Wars prequels weren’t as good as the original trilogy; Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit was a mess compared to Lord of the Rings; Frank Herbert’s Dune series slowly became less impressive with each book. Still, occasionally, there are examples of sequels being just as good as the original.
John Walton’s Lost World series fits the same mold. His most recent book, The Lost World of the Torah, is the sixth in his series: the LW of…Genesis 1, Adam and Eve, Scripture, Israelite Conquest, The Flood, and now The Torah. Some of his Lost World books have been very good, while others have been less so. The Lost World of the Torah definitely fits into the “very good” category. It clearly addresses a number of misconceptions people today have of the Torah and goes about explaining just what the Torah was and how it was perceived in the cultural environment of the ancient Near East.
The book of laid out in a series of propositions, 23 to be exact. I am not going to address all 23. Instead, I’m going to discuss what I feel are the five more important takeaways from the book that any honest student of the Bible or person in the pew would appreciate when it comes to understanding just what the Torah is.
Cultural Rivers
Perhaps the most fundamental point Walton makes is that people in the modern world tend to read the Bible (in this case, the Torah in particular) through the worldview lens of the modern world, and thus fail to read and understand the Bible within its original cultural context. He uses the metaphor of currents in a “cultural river.” In each culture (i.e. river) there are certain currents (i.e. assumptions, values, ways of looking at the world). Each culture has different currents.
In the modern Western world, we value and view our world through things like rights, freedom, capitalism, democracy, and individualism. In the ancient world, though, they had different “currents”: community identity, control of the gods, kingship, divination, centrality of the temple, mediatory roles of images, the role of sacrifice, the spirit world, magic, etc. Therefore, in its original context, the Torah was understood as “flowing in those cultural rivers,” not the modern cultural river of 21st century America.
The reason why the Torah often seems so perplexing to modern readers is simply because we are trying to make sense of it using our modern categories of values and thought. When the biblical scholar alerts the modern reader to those ancient “cultural rivers,” he is simply trying (to use another metaphor) provide the correct lens through which modern readers can see the Torah more clearly.
Unfortunately, though, the reaction of some believers (and atheists alike) are to thumb their noses at biblical scholars with the attitude that essentially says, “I can read the Bible in plain English, thank you very much! Those scholars think their so smart!” To that sentiment, Walton writes, “Scholars have a role in the body of Christ just like everyone else does. One cannot object that it is somehow elitist for scholars to think they have a contribution to make that not just anyone can make” (16). I heartily agree. Someone who scoffs at the valuable insights scholars try to give about the Bible is someone who is not serious about understanding the Bible.
The Torah: Not Modern Codified Law
Now, the most fundamental point Walton makes in his book about the Torah is that it is wrong to read the Torah as if it were modern, codified legislation. As we are all aware, the common assumption made about the Torah by Christians and atheists alike tends to be something like this: It is “God’s Law” that YHWH dictated to Moses on Mount Sinai that dictated the rules that people have to follow in order to lead moral lives. It is assumed that the Torah is, quite literally, legislated morality straight from the mouth of God. And therefore, if you are guilty of breaking God’s moral legislation, you deserve to go to hell.
This is often the uncomfortable assumption many Christians have of the Torah—it’s God’s moral law, but then Christ came, so…do we have to keep the Torah or not? Well, we need to obey this commandment, but that commandment about shellfish? No, not that one. Why? Well, that one just seems weird by our modern standards!
By the same token, this is the very assumption many atheists have of the Torah, and of the Bible as a whole—and that forms the basis for their criticism and rejection of it: How can you call God “loving,” if He commands you to stone anyone who picks up sticks on the Sabbath? God is a monster! Look at this commandment! He is a genocidal dictator! Look at that commandment! According to our modern standards, the Torah is immoral!
In both cases, people today (A) make assumptions and judgments about the Torah based on modern cultural standards, because they (B) have no idea what the Torah is and how it functioned in the original context of the ancient Near Eastern culture. And so, the fundamental fact we first need to get straight is this: the Torah is not some divinely-dictated, codified moral legislation directly from the mouth of God.
So What is the Torah?
To be clear, the Torah is legal material—but it is not modern, codified legislation. As Walton points out, in the modern world, we expect judges to make their decisions based on precedents. Past rulings have to be documented and the judges’ decisions are essentially restrained by those precedents. In our modern world, our legal system is set up precisely to limit the judge’s ability to use his intuition and personal judgment. The judge might have some wiggle room in terms of sentencing, but judgments are largely dictated by and based on previous rulings.
That’s not what the justice system looked like in the ancient Near East. As Walton says, “People in the ancient world, however, did want the judge to apply his intuition about wrongness to the cases he judged and to consider each on its own merits” (31). In the ancient world, judges were expected to exercise their wisdom to make judgment in cases when considering that culture’s own traditions. That is quite a significant difference, for it means that we need to view the legal material in the Torah in a different light. To the point, the legal material in the Torah isn’t prescriptive (i.e. this is codified law that is forced upon you), but rather is descriptive (i.e. these are model rulings and examples that describe what justice looks like in the culture of the ancient Near East).
Walton puts it this way, “The texts do not teach what the law is; they provide a model for right and wrong so that the judges will know it when they see it” (31). And again, “These lists showcase the wisdom of the king to discern what justice will look like. They are not the laws of the land, they are not legislative decrees, and they do not constitute a prescriptive code enforced in society” (33).
Therefore, the upshot is this: The Torah embodies wisdom and instruction—it provides models and examples for rulers and judges to consider as they seek to establish justice and order in society. In fact, the word “Torah” itself, means instruction. As Walton points out, there is no Hebrew word that means “law” in terms of codified legislation.
Conclusion: Thus Far
This basic re-assessment of what the Torah actually is should convince us of one basic thing: the traditional assumption that many people have—namely that the Torah is God’s universal, dictated moral rule book, codified in legislation—needs to be let go. The Torah, first and foremost, is about instructing rulers and judges in the ways of wisdom, so that they will have the wisdom to bring order to society and establish justice within it. It is not codified moral legislation in which God says, “Obey my moral rules or I will send you to hell!” Indeed, as Walton correctly says, “Wise living cannot be legislated. It is a matter of applying principles of wisdom, not of following rules” (44).
And so, recognizing different cultural rivers and seeing the Torah as wisdom and instruction are crucial in considering just what the Torah is within its ancient Near Eastern context. This change in perspective changes quite a lot of things, as we will continue to see in the next few posts.
Good review. I guess I’ll hafta order this.
Pax.
Lee.
thank you so much – but where did you write the references? I could not find it