The Book of all Books

1. The Book of all Books Dr. Azila (Tzili) Talit Reisenberger Head of Hebrew University of Cape Town

2. Order of lectures • The Canon • What’s in the Name • The Book as ‘Record/Reflection of life’ • History vs. story • The Word (Language, bias, code… etc)

3. The Name of The Book • Bible – Bibliotheca (bibliothèque) – library • Hebrew Bible (in French? German?) • Old Testament (passé?) • TaNaK (Torah/ Nevi’im/Ketuvim) The Bible

4. Size of ‘The TaNaK/Bible’ 304,901 Hebrew words 23,145 verses

5. Division into books and chapters • The ‘Canon’ includes 39 books (orthodox Jews count it as 24, as they count some books together) • Some books never made it to the ‘Canon’ (redactor’s choice or Apocrypha) • Division into chapters by a monk in the 16th century.

6. Time frame From creation of the world? Primordial Or: the Forefathers and Foremothers From about 2000 BCE To about 333 BCE

7. What is primordial History Genesis chapters 1-11 raison d’être of this section

8. Time-line Abraham, Isaac, Jacob Egypt Moses (Exodus) I I 2000 BCE 400 Years 1500 BCE

9. Time-line Joshua (Conquest) Judges (Saul) David I I +1400 BCE 400 Years 1000 BCE

10. Time-line Solomon (Temple) Split into North and South Kingdom I I 965 BCE+40 Years 928 BCE

11. Time-line Northern Kingdom Southern Kingdom Samaria Jerusalem 10 tribes Judah (+Simon, Levi) Variety of dynasties House of David Assyria Babylon I I 721 BCE586 BCE

12. Interesting fact: How many Tribes of Israel? Answer: 13 10 - Northern Kingdom; 3 – Judaea But Jacob had 12 sons? For Joseph (1) we have 2 tribes: Ephraim and Menashe Why: idiom “12 Tribes of Israel”? as Simeon was swallowed into Judah

13. Time-line Fate of the Hebrews Northern Kingdom disappeared (Samaritans?) Judaea was exiled to Babylon; then falls into Persian hands; In 538 BCE Cyrus permits them to return to the Holy Land and build 2nd Temple.

14. End of the Bible So, time frame of the biblical history: I I_ 2000 BCE 333 BCE

15. Where do we find all this information? T N K T orah N evi’im K etuvim

16. The Torah is the first section, is the holiest section

20. Torah Abraham, Isaac, Jacob Genesis Slavery in Egypt beginning of Exodus Moses’ laws and history from Exodus to death 5 books of Moses Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy 2000 BCE1500 BCE

21. Nevi’im(means: Prophets) 2 sections in the ‘Prophets’: First section (Early Prophets) which is history Second section (Later Prophets) which is ‘prophecy’

22. Early Prophets The History

23. Into the Holy Land and out to Exile • The conquest Joshua • The rulers Judges • Beginning of Kingship Saul and David Samuel 1-2 • Solomon and the split of kingdoms Kings 1-2 • Exiles end of Kings 2

24. Later Prophets • Isaiah • Jeremiah • Ezekiel • 12 Minor: Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zachariah, Malachi

25. Ketuvin Wisdom and historiography: Psalms Proverbs Job 5 “megilot” (scrolls): Song of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther Daniel Ezra and Nehemiah Chronicles 1-2

26. Why should I bore you with the geography of the Bible? • The way to detect if a Bible is “Jewish” or not? • In other words: is it – The Bible • Or is it – The Old Testament • Why should we try to detect? (Bias) • The 5 little scrolls: hold the key for quick answers

27. 5 (Megilot) scrolls • Song of Songs • Ruth • Lamentations • Ecclesiastes • Esther Jewish Order rather than logical order

28. so now, when we know what is the Bible, In the course we will get “closer”… We start tomorrow with the power of words and names: from names of books, people places… etc

29. Thank you. I would like to thank Jutta Schoof for editing these notes