Power to the People: Reverse Engineering the Origins of Judaism

Gad Barnea on Yonatan Adler's The Origins of Judaism 

This is a part of our Forum on Yonatan Adler's The Orgins of Judaism: An Archaeological Reappraisal (Yale Univeristy Press, 2022)

Tracing the history of any ancient ethno-religious identity-group is a complex, sensitive, and multifaceted endeavor. The historian of antiquity must deal with diverse data sources in a variety of formats and levels of preservation, master sets of languages that are often long extinct, gain a deep understanding of dynamic and intricate historical contexts encompassing wide geographical areas, engage with the highly cosmopolitan character of much of the various periods under consideration, and grapple with tricky and fleeting definitions of key concepts—the very building blocks that serve as the basis for their research. It can hardly be denied, however, that the historian of ancient Judaism faces unique challenges. Compounding the already intrinsically complex landscape, the scholar of this specific sub-discipline of ancient history must contend with a singular challenge: the long, overpowering, and multilayered shadow cast by one central source in particular—the biblical text—both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, and the manifold traditions and interpretations surrounding it.

Prior to Yonatan Adler’s the Origins of Judaism (standing on the shoulders of a few notable forerunners), practically all scholarship into the early history of Judaism followed a mostly linear approach where they began their inquiry at some point in the Iron or Bronze Age and generally followed the linear course of history, largely seen from the prism of biblical chronology, tracing the evolution of their subject matter to the Hasmonean or early Christian period. This approach treated the biblical text as a generally dependable source of historical reference and was complemented by works from ancient scholars such as Josephus, Philo, etc.—themselves based on the same textual corpora. While it is obvious that, as a witness to the history of Judaism, the Hebrew Bible cannot and should not be ignored, recent research shows decisively that its place in the historian’s toolbox and its position as a primary source must be methodologically, carefully, critically, and constantly (re-)evaluated.

Reevaluating the Hebrew Bible as a Historical Source

Certain portions of the biblical text are undoubtedly related to historical events such as the defeat of the Egyptian-Assyrian coalition forces led by pharaoh Necho II by Nabû-kudurrī-uṣur (Nebuchadnezzar) II in the book of Jeremiah or Sennacherib’s campaign in the Levant in the second book of Kings. These events may have been referenced by the author of a given text while they were taking place or shortly thereafter. But they might just as well have been penned decades and even centuries after the fact if the memory of the event persists. This is often the case with texts that enter the scribal curriculum or popular tradition as appears to have been the case in the battle hymn embedded in Jer 46:3–12—to pick one example. In any case, from a purely scientific point of view, with our current knowledge of the transmission history of the biblical text (incomplete though it may be), no biblical allusion to an historical event can be taken at face value as a first-hand, primary-source, historical document—including passages that present themselves as such—without further corroboration. And even if such an external validation can be found, its details must be evaluated with a copious amount of caution. While a certain biblical passage may have hypothetically started out as a first-hand account, the descriptions of the events that we currently possess cannot be assumed to have remained in a pristine state. To a certain extent, certain termini post quem for some aspects of the biblical text can be derived from its allusions to historical events but here too, one cannot uncritically assume a priori that the text adjoining a certain reference is necessarily contemporaneous with it. The adjacent text may have been originally written by the same author at the same time but—even within the same verse (!)—it may have been composed around an historical anchor which was inserted by a later redactor and may have had an independent transmission history prior to the insertion. All of these options must be cautiously considered. This complexity, which, again, is unique to the study of ancient Judaism, must constantly be contended with and dealt with critically. It is also important to note that even late insertions and redactional activity have their place and significance in historical research, but these need to be considered in their own right using the same caution and parameters of inquiry as any other biblical text.

This level of caution is not to be uniquely applied to the Bible but to other ancient sources such as Herodotus and the Greek or Roman historians as well. Each reference must be meticulously evaluated and compared to additional, preferably first-hand, evidence in order to establish its level of historicity. That being said, the Hebrew Bible has a very different and far more complex profile from the works of the ancient historians. The former is fundamentally an ideological and theological work that underwent extensive editorial and redactional interventions over a long period of time, while the latter, though not entirely devoid of ideological concerns and redactional activity, are primarily concerned with recording historical affairs (or, more precisely, oral traditions about these events). Moreover, while the biblical texts hold a central place in emic identity formation for Jews (and, later, Christians as well), no ethnic identity—emic or etic—has ever been formed by the works of Herodotus, Xenophon, or Diodorus, etc. (although their works also incited opposition and debate even in antiquity). No sectarian battle lines are known to have ever been drawn over what certain terms, turns of phrase, or a given message in their works might actually mean and the hand of no ideologically-driven redactor can be detected as having intervened in their transmission. Finally, arguably the most serious stumbling-block for the historian of ancient Judaism is the fact that—unlike the Greek or Greco-Roman historiographies or even the Homeric corpus—the Bible plays a major conscious and/or deep subconscious role in the cultural, ethnic, and often religious, identity of the scholar. This often subliminal feature is evasive and surreptitious. It is thus exceptionally challenging to overcome and its effects can be detected again and again throughout the history of scholarship, to this day, much to the detriment of the discipline.

Given these difficulties, it must be realized that from a critical perspective, the Bible cannot be considered a primary source. Rather, the truly first-hand sources that are available to the historian of ancient Judaism must be privileged. These are the papyri, ostraca, inscriptions, bullae, coins, and other forms of textual and/or pictographic witness which have come to us “as is,” in “fossilized” and unadulterated form. Such sources were created in real time without interference. Significant examples include the Elephantine document archives, the Al-Yahudu tablets, or the Wadi Daliyeh stash, among others. They are not generally ideological or propagandistic. They did not undergo any process of edition and redaction, apart from real time scribal corrections that are usually preserved in the text. In the vast majority of cases, though, these are simple and straight-forward echoes of daily concerns by simple folk living in the moment. These sources, therefore, must be seen as the “master records” for the historian, with the biblical source being used wherever certain touchpoints with the primary sources can convincingly be established.

This sentiment was recently noted by Reinhard Kratz:

We need to stop pretending that we know the answer and treating the literary, biblical sources as if they were equal to or even superior to the archaeological and epigraphic sources just because they offer more information and, unlike the archaeological and epigraphic sources, provide a nice and seemingly compelling historiographical narrative. Rather, we should – as is actually customary in historiography and is also practiced for other comparable regions and ethnic groups (such as Arameans, Phoenicians, Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, etc.) – use the archaeological and epigraphic sources as a starting point for the historical reconstruction of the history of Judaism and Yahwism in Achaemenid times and take the picture that emerges from this as the historical blueprint for everything else. Only in a second step should the literary, biblical sources then be examined to see if anything fits into the picture gained on the basis of the archaeological and epigraphic evidence.        

Such a statement, expressed as recently as last year, expresses the frustration with the skewed prism through which Jewish history has thus far been studied and presents a step forward. 

 

Flipping the Script

Against this background, Yonatan Adler’s approach in The Origins of Judaism presents a fresh methodological paradigm. He systematically engages—in a form of reverse engineering—with the primary sources of the history of Judaism. Starting his investigation with data that can objectively and unambiguously be defined as expressing genuine Judaism according to the parameters he outlined (dietary laws, ritual purity, figural art, tefillin and mezuzot, the synagogue, and “miscellaneous practices”) and working backwards from there. Rather than following the linear course of time, he places the needle for all these features in the first century CE and follows a trail of data going back in time until the trail runs dry—looking at textual and archeological sources with the Bible taking an unprivileged position compared to the primary sources.

This process is well-described in his introduction:

We will begin with a historical period from which we possess a preponderance of evidence demonstrating that these laws were generally known and widely observed among ordinary Judeans. As will be seen throughout the book, the first century CE represents just such a time. The first century CE, then, will serve as our benchmark from which we will proceed backward in time in search of evidence indicating that these laws were widely known about and commonly being observed in earlier times, prior to the first century. Our quest will continue until the trail of evidence ends, once we have reached a point in time when we are no longer able to discover any further evidence. The date of the earliest available evidence will be established as our terminus ante quem—the boundary of time when or before which the particular element of Judaism under examination must have first emerged. If we encounter a pattern wherein the various rules and regulations investigated present the same terminus ante quem (as will be shown to be the case), we may then claim to have established the terminus ante quem for the emergence of Judaism as a whole.

Although most of the features studied by Adler are also documented in the Bible, primacy is given to the extra-biblical textual and archeological data. By taking Judaism as a “lived experience”—as the Jews (broadly defined) actually practiced their Judaism in day-to-day life, Adler can conclude—based on cross-referenced and reliable primary data—that all trails dry up in some point the second century BCE. Much still remains to be uncovered, reexamined, and studied in the effort to better understand the history of Judaism as it was actually lived-out in antiquity. Following a more rigorous bottom-up methodology—such as the one proposed by Adler—should become the norm for this and the following generations of historians. This will also, in turn, produce a clearer and more accurate understanding of the historical realities surrounding ancient Judaism by the general public and, I believe, help the modern audience connect with this complex historical context in a more holistic manner.

Postscript

The Bible is a massively important, rich, and impactful corpus and should always be evaluated seriously, cautiously, and respectfully. Nothing in the preceding text is intended to take anything away from this or to minimize this corpus’ importance. The sole purpose of this brief contribution to the forum is to succintly highlight—from the perspective of the historian—the serious methodological difficulties that still plague the field of ancient Jewish studies and to propose a path forward based on Adler’s important contribution.

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Gad Barnea is a Lecturer and Research Fellow at the Department of Jewish History and Biblical Studies at the University of Haifa, a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, and a Research Fellow at the Bible in Its Traditions (a research programme of the École biblique et Archéologique de Jerusalem). Barnea's main field of research is focused on Yahwism and Judaism in the Iranian "Age of Empires" — specifically on their interactions with ancient Zoroastrianism and its impact on Jewish and early-Christian literary output such as the Bible and related corpora. His scholarship involves extensive epigraphic work, which has led him to publish a number of important ancient documents such as a curse text from the island of Elephantine (featuring a first-hand account of a Yahwistic/Jewish priestess) and a newly reconstructed scroll from Qumran, which records a previously unknown Achaemenid court-tale in Aramaic (Brill, DSSE, in-press 2026). Additional books include Yahwism under the Achaemenid Empire (de Gruyter, 2024) co-edited with Reinhard Kratz, a co-authored book Hosea: the word of the Lord that happened to Hosea (Peeters, 2017), and a forthcoming book on the Yahwistic community at Elephantine.