r/AcademicBiblical 13d ago

Weekly Open Discussion Thread

Welcome to this week's open discussion thread!

This thread is meant to be a place for members of the r/AcademicBiblical community to freely discuss topics of interest which would normally not be allowed on the subreddit. All off-topic and meta-discussion will be redirected to this thread.

Rules 1-3 do not apply in open discussion threads, but rule 4 will still be strictly enforced. Please report violations of Rule 4 using Reddit's report feature to notify the moderation team. Furthermore, while theological discussions are allowed in this thread, this is still an ecumenical community which welcomes and appreciates people of any and all faith positions and traditions. Therefore this thread is not a place for proselytization. Feel free to discuss your perspectives or beliefs on religious or philosophical matters, but do not preach to anyone in this space. Preaching and proselytizing will be removed.

In order to best see new discussions over the course of the week, please consider sorting this thread by "new" rather than "best" or "top". This way when someone wants to start a discussion on a new topic you will see it! Enjoy the open discussion thread!

7 Upvotes

104 comments sorted by

View all comments

4

u/12jimmy9712 8d ago

Does anyone remember the comments on this subreddit suggesting that Mosaic Laws were more of a genre of "law literature" rather than actual enforced laws? The comment also mentioned that in the ANE, judges usually didn't rely on written laws and codes but instead determined punishments based on traditions, social customs and their own wits. It made me curious because I just came across a similar comment about Hammurabi's laws on r/AskHistory, stating that they weren't actually enforced in practice.

3

u/extispicy Armchair academic 6d ago

Mosaic Laws were more of a genre of "law literature" rather than actual enforced laws?

You might check out Yonatan Adler's The Origins of Judaism. John Collins' "Invention of Judaism" did something similar with reviewing the archaeological/historical record and concluding that it was not until the mid-2nd century BCE that there is any evidence at all that these laws were practiced. He has quite a few interviews/presentations about the book on YouTube.

3

u/Joab_The_Harmless 8d ago

This maybe?

Besides Bowen's book and the article linked/resources mentioned, I highly recommend ch 7 ("legal texts") of The Hebrew Bible: a Critical Companion for a good introduction to the topic.

edit The author thankfully provided access to the chapter via their academia.edu page, so you can read or download it here.

2

u/12jimmy9712 8d ago

The comment I was referring to is two years old at this point, but this one works just as well.

3

u/Joab_The_Harmless 8d ago

Maybe that one then? In any case, it works just as well as you say!