Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
in Ancient Israel
Hebrew Bible
Proverbs, Job & Qoheleth (or Ecclesiastes)
Song of Songs? [5:4-5]
Psalms?
Old Testament
Proverbs, Job, Qoheleth
Sirach (or Ben Sira or Ecclesiasticus)
Wisdom of Solomon (or Book of Wisdom)
Tobit? (Tob 4:3-21; 12:6-13)
Baruch? (3:9 – 4:4)
Qumran
Proverbs, Job, Qoheleth & Sirach
1 Enoch?
2. A Wisdom Collection?
Common Characteristics:
Absence of any reference to Ancient Israel’s traditions
Promises to the Ancestors, Moses, Sinai, Covenant, the Land, etc.
BUT see Sirach 44-50 and Wisdom 10-19!!
A certain international flavor
“people of the East”
Frequent use of Hokmah /Sophia /Wisdom or other synonyms
or wise person (sage)
and of course its opposite, “fool”
BUT Hokmah his a wide-ranging term, ( see Murphy, NJBC, p.
447).
Persian Period, ca. 583-400 BC , early post-exilic
period
“One of the most productive eras in the history of Israelite
religion” (R. Albertz, 1994).
Multiplicty of “theological currents”
Priestly, Chronistic, wisdom, prophetic and psalm, traditions”
Tripartite Division
ca. 132 BC, see Prologue of the Book of Sirach
Achaemenid Empire (648–330 BC)
Collection of Wisdom corpus in stages
I. Proverbs
Some date back to the time of the monarchy
Influence of Deuteronomy and Jeremiah
II. Job
First half of the 5th century BC (height of Persian empire)
III. Qoheleth
– middle of the 3rd century BC (time of the Lagids/ Ptolemies
Egyptian successors of Alexander the Great)
IV. Ben Sira
Hebrew text written in Jerusalem I ca. 175 B.C.
Preserved in Greek
V. Wisdom of Solomon
Diaspora (Alexandria)
in GREEK
Hellenistic influence
Problematic
Cf. Gerhard von Rad (1901-71)
Old Testament Theology 2 vols (1957, 1960 –German; 1962,
1965 --English)
Historical Credo: Deuteronomy 26:5-9
Wisdom in Israel (1970 German; 1972 English).
Related “theologies”
Creation / Order
Retribution
Problem of God and Evil (Theodicy)