TEXTS IN DEUTERONOMY DOCUMENTING THE PLENARY RECEPTION OF REVELATION
3.2 Deut 4:10-12
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intermediation.
815This does not square with PentRed’s program, however, which finds stolid reinforcement in passages such as 5:31 (“… stand here by me, and I will tell you all the commandments”). Indeed, PentRed’s program leaves little room for the notion that the םע receiving the Dec directly from YHWH, that is, sans Mosaic intermediation.
3.1.4.1 The Pentateuch Redaction (PentRed) in Deuteronomy
Introduced in Chapter’s One and Two, the Pentateuch Redaction finds its clearest
delineation in Deuteronomy. According to PentRed the book of Deuteronomy obtains its
essential legitimation not as a result of being revealed directly to the people but rather
through its immediate association with the “divinely legitimated, Mosaic office of legal
instruction.”
816The first four chapters of the book function as Moses’ opening address to
all-Israel on the eve of his death.
817The “speech act of the entire first address ... is
determined by 4:1-40.”
818The Mosaic speech consists of a “composite of many teaching
voices, deriving from the many teachers of the Deuteronomic tradition.”
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Having moved from the wider framework of Deut 4f. to the largely self-contained
pericope 4:1-40, the focus now shifts to three key verses within the latter, namely, vv. 10- 12. Along with Deut 4:1a,
8205a, 14a,
821verse ten
822develops a theory of Mosaic
instruction of the community that expands the theory of revelation in Deut 5.
823In this theory, rather than mediating revelation vouchsafed to him by YHWH, Moses transitions to the office of legal instruction,
824which in the law of Deuteronomy interprets the proclamation of the law at Sinai for the Israelite community.
It comes as little surprise to find an institutional Tendenz asserting itself relative to the direct revelation of the Sinai event. Deuteronomy in fact preserves and furthers this agenda, but moves in the unanticipated (but cf. the preview in Exod 19:9a and the discussion in §§2.3; see also §7.1), conceptual direction of revelatio continua. It does so in association with ongoing, prophetic interpretation of the revelation, which under PentRed’s watch becomes the sole prerogative of the Mosaic office.
825A passage such as Deut 18:18 does not represent the Zadokite-Levite authors of PentRed, who seek to move the prophetic beyond the reach of levitical priest-prophets and their lay constituents. It rather reveals a probably hard-won compromise between the prophetic-leaning School of HexRed led by Levites and their sympathizers among upper tier priests. The passage comes to link up with Jer 30:9, which transfers the motif of the “prophet like Moses” to
820 It should be noted that Deut 4:1a does not specify the speaker, only the addressee, Israel. The same is of course true with 6:4. In both instances we may be seeing a later attribution to Moses the teacher of
commands already disclosed, perhaps on an ad hoc basis, to the people.
821 Schäfer-Lichtenberger adds to this list vv. 4a, 7 because they “betonen zwar die Unmittelbarkeit der Gottbeziehung Israels” (Josua und Salomo, 47). She however does not follow this line of inquiry very far.
This is understandable in view of the monograph’s theses that lead in a different direction. One wonders though where this section of her monograph, which she admits (ibid., 43, n. 131) builds on her “Göttliche und menschliche Autorität,” constitutes a necessary building block in the edifice supporting the central theses of the monograph.
822 Verse 10 does not only promote Mosaic instruction but also the PRR. If it is PentRed, it is not purely so, but likely constitutes a compromise with HexRed for the latter’s support of the PRR.
823 Otto, DPH, 164. Of all these passages, however, v. 10 seems the least likely, since it emphasizes the unmediated reception of torah.
824 Prior to 4:10-14 Moses is one of the people. Only thereafter does YHWH single him out, conferring upon him the task of Torah-instructor who will teach the chukim and mishpatim to Israel (Schäfer-Lichtenberger,
“Göttliche und menschliche Autorität,” 132). On balance, “die Lehre der Torah legitimiert Mose, nicht Mose die Torah” (ibid., 136).
825 Otto (DPH, 193) argues that 18:18 belongs to DtrD. Contra Max Weber, prophetic charisma is not necessarily anti-institutional; see Edward Shils, “Charisma, Order and Status,” American Sociological Review 30 (1965): 199-213.
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the expected Davidides.
826The School of HexRed’ successful insertion of the
“brotherhood” term (םיחא)
827associated with the theme of the prophet (איבנ—also a problematic term for PentRed because of its democratizing tendencies) does not arise from elites. The presumption theme (דיז) in both the law of the levitical priest in Deut 17:12f. and 18:20, 22 links the passages together thematically and, in our opinion, authorially. Conversely, PentRed conjoins theophany with direct revelation of law to Moses and thereby emphasizes the authority of the original revelation by eternally validating those commandments. Furthermore, it promotes the sine qua non nature of their interpretation enshrined in the (proto)canonical book of Deuteronomy. For the School of HexRed, on the other hand, the horizon extends far beyond the Pentateuch, and additional revelation is both possible and necessary. Both circles agree however on the importance of the inculcation of Mosaic law, though with some significant differences in accent and detail.
3.2.1 Nearness and Distance
The theologically distinctive phrasing of Deut 4:10 opens a window into the perspective of the writer’s circle. Parallels between v. 10 and 29:13 [Eng 14] are strong and suggest negotiation at the textual level. Deut 4:10, for example, contains the elements amad + lifnei YHWH, which occur elsewhere only in Deut 29:13:
826 Otto, DPH, 208.
827 In contrast to the positive use of this term, the levitical authors of Isa 65f (= the servant community, often “my servants” י ַדָבֲע; 65:8b, 9b, 13, 14a; “his servants” וי ָדָבֲע in 65:15; 66:14) apply it pejoratively to their opponents (66:5b …ימש ןעמל םכי ֵד ַנ ְּמ םכיאנשׂ םכיחא ורמא). The hostility is fierce and of a religiously competitive nature. In 66:5 the “brothers” exclude (הדנpi’el) the servant community from worship. Zapff (Jesaja 56–66, 430f; cf. 433f.) emphasizes the servant community’s own criticism of the temple theology and ostensible syncretistic cult of their detractor-brothers. The temple theology of 1 Kgs 8:29 (“that your eyes may be open night and day toward this house, the place of which you said, ‘My name shall be there,’
that you may heed the prayer that your servant prays toward this place”) comes to be modified in Isa 66:2.
Here the poor become the “place” and object that YHWH “sees.” Like Isa 58, this is “wo seine heilvolle Gegenwart erweist” (ibid., 431). The similarity with the Armentheologie of the psalter is conspicuous;
therein the poor are not only a social category but “auch im spirituellen Sinn ausschließliche
Angewiesenheit auf Jahwe zu verstehen” (ibid., 431-32). Cf. also Ps 51:17; the “brokenness of spirit” in 66:2 recalls Ps 57:15b; those who tremble at his word (66:2bβ) are those who recoil from the probable consequences of transgression against YHWH’s commandments; 66:2 constitutes a self-description of the levitical priest-prophet authors of the passage. They differ with their levitical forebears (cf. the School of HexRed) in that they have moved beyond the concern for integration of alien to the desperate preservation of a Yahwism threatended by late Persian, and increasingly Hellenistic influences in the third-century BCE.
They now look more than ever to a purified cult in Jerusalem, though, as the Dead Sea Scrolls indicate, some would find it necessary to retreat to the desert in hopes of spawning autonomous religious renewal.
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הוהי ינפל תדמע (4:10) הוהי ינפל םויה דמע (29:13)
Although only 4:10 explicitly recounts the PRR, the motif of standing before YHWH conceptually links 4:10 and 29:13 [Eng 14] with the phrase “taking one’s stand” of Exod 19:17b discussed in Chapter Two (§2.3.2). The motif of the Moab community taking their stand before YHWH in 29:9-14 [Eng 10-15] may have existed first, being subsequently transferred to Deut 4:10,
828since Deut 4 postdates both ch. 5 and 29.
Whereas the concept of “standing before YHWH” in 29:13 [Eng 14] comes to be intensified in 4:10 with the explicit mention of the PRR, v. 11’s reuse of the verb דמע with רהה תחת takes the motif of the Israelites “drawing nearer” (Sich-Nähern)
829a step further. One finds nothing in this passage indicating fear and trepidation of the םע.
Rather, the scenario (“you approached and stood” ןודמעתו ןוברקתו) resembles the intrepid
“stand” in Exod 19:17. The distinctive expression “taking one’s stand” (בצי hitpa’el) may be the earlier of the two, or the two may be contemporary yet distinctive formulations.
Exodus 19:7b may be relatively independent of the path of 4:10 → 29:14. It could connect just as well to other passages using the same verb form.
830While the notion of the people keeping their distance may have been the earlier one,
831this interpretation is admittedly difficult to prove. As it stands, it seems restrictive and closely tied to the official, condensed presentation of one or two great events at mountains of God to local—both early and ongoing—contexts of revelation.
832In this instance commentators
828 Cf. Otto, Das DPH, 160: “Das in Dtn 29,9-14 rahmende Motiv, die angeredete Moabbundgemeinde stehe vor JHWH, wird in Dtn 4,10 auf den Horebbund übertragen.” Deut 4 broadly expands the demand for obedience opposite “these words of the covenant” in the paranetic transition (paränetischen Überleitung) from the prehistory to the covenant conclusion in Deut 29:8 and aligned in Deut 4:2 with the canon formula and the commandment paranesis (Gebotsparänese) in 4:6 tied to 4:2. םתישׂעו תאזה תירבה ירבד־תא םתרמשו (29:8);םכיהלא הוהי תוצמ־תא רמשל(4:2bα); םתישׂעו םתרמשו (4:6aα).
829 Rose, 5. Mose, 2:495. Rose is inconsistent, however, when he says that v. 11 assumes the people have received mediated instruction from Moses, since he had already emphasized the direct speech of God in v.
10. Only in v. 14 is Moses instructed to teach (ד ֵמַלְּל) Israel additional chukot and mishpatim that they will observe in the promised land.
830 See nn. 682, 1814 and §§2.3.2; 2.3.2.1-2.
831 Krüger, “Zur Interpretation,” 88.
832 In his ground-breaking monograph, Robert R. Wilson, Prophecy and Society in Ancient Israel
(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1980), 31, delimits the contexts in which intermediation is possible. “Intermediaries will exist only in those societies where social conditions require the services of an intermediary....As social conditions become more stable, the need for intermediaries lessens, and their numbers are likely to
decrease” (Prophecy and Society, 31). Wilson highlights major figures who arise in response to crises that in turn prompt divine intervention for a society, whether through word or action. The latter half of the quote