Eight Lessons Learned from “The Jewish People and their Sacred Scriptures in the Christian Bible”

Folks, in this installment of this cycle of blog posts dedicated to Jewish themes, I want to share with you a few key points I gathered from the Pontifical Biblical Commission’s (PBC) The Jewish People and their Sacred Scriptures in the Christian Bible. This is an excellent document and I’ve only read up to a bit over a quarter of it, and yet I found these points worth learning from the beginning:

· The New Testament recognizes the authority of the Sacred Scriptures of the Jewish people. The New Testament writings were never presented as something entirely new. On the contrary, they attest their rootedness in the long religious experience of the people of Israel, an experience recorded in diverse forms in the sacred books which comprise the Jewish Scriptures. The New Testament recognizes their divine authority. This recognition manifests itself in different ways, with different degrees of explicitness.

· In many religions there exists a tension between Scripture and Tradition. This is true of Oriental Religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, etc.) and Islam. The written texts can never express the Tradition in an exhaustive manner. They have to be completed by additions and interpretations which are eventually written down but are subject to certain limitations. This phenomenon can be seen in Christianity as well as in Judaism, with developments that are partly similar and partly different. A common trait is that both share a significant part of the same canon of Scripture.

· Tradition completes Scripture. Christianity has in common with Judaism the conviction that God's revelation cannot be expressed in its entirety in written texts. This is clear from the ending of the Fourth Gospel where it is stated that the whole world would be unable to contain the books that could be written recounting the actions of Jesus (Jn 21:25). On the other hand, a vibrant tradition is indispensable to make Scripture come alive and maintain its relevance.

· The limits of the additional contribution of Tradition. To what extent can there be in the Christian Church a tradition that is a material addition to the word of Scripture? This question has long been debated in the history of theology. The Second Vatican Council appears to have left the matter open, but at least declined to speak of “two sources of revelation”, which would be Scripture and Tradition; it affirmed instead that “Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture constitute a unique sacred deposit of the Word of God which is entrusted to the Church” (Dei Verbum 10). It likewise rejected the idea of a tradition completely independent of Scripture. On one point at least, the Council mentions an additional contribution made by Tradition, one of great importance: Tradition “enabled the Church to recognise the full canon of the Sacred Books” (DV 8). Here, the extent to which Scripture and Tradition are inseparable can be seen.

· Jewish Methods of Exegesis. The earliest rabbinic attestation of exegetical method based on Old Testament texts, is a series of seven “rules” traditionally attributed to Rabbi Hillel (d. 10 A.D.). Irrespective of whether this attribution is well founded or not, these seven middoth certainly represent a codification of contemporary methods of argument from Scripture, in particular for deducing rules of conduct. Another method of using Scripture can be seen in first century historical writings, particularly Josephus, but it had already been employed in the Old Testament itself. It consists of using biblical terms to describe events in order to illuminate their meaning. Thus, the return from the Babylonian Exile is described in terms that evoke the liberation from Egyptian oppression at the time of the Exodus (Is 43:16- 21). The final restoration of Zion is represented as a new Eden.24 At Qumran, a similar technique was widely used.

· Rabbinic Methods in the New Testament. Traditional Jewish methods of scriptural argumentation for the purpose of establishing rules of conduct — methods later codified by the rabbis — are frequently used in the words of Jesus transmitted in the Gospels and in the Epistles. Those occurring most often are the first two middoth (“rules”) of Hillel, qal wahomer and gezerah shawah.These correspond more or less to arguments a fortiori and by analogy respectively. A particular trait is that the argument often revolves around the meaning of a single word. This meaning is established by its occurrence in a certain context and is then applied, often in a very artificial manner, to another context. This technique has a strong resemblance to rabbinic midrash, with one characteristic difference: in the rabbinic midrash, there is a citation of differing opinions from various authorities in such a way that it becomes a technique of argumentation, while in the New Testament the authority of Jesus is decisive.

· It would be wrong to consider the prophecies of the Old Testament as some kind of photographic anticipations of future events. All the texts, including those which later were read as messianic prophecies, already had an immediate import and meaning for their contemporaries before attaining a fuller meaning for future hearers. The messiahship of Jesus has a meaning that is new and original. The original task of the prophet was to help his contemporaries understand the events and the times they lived in from God's viewpoint. Accordingly, excessive insistence, characteristic of a certain apologetic, on the probative value attributable to the fulfillment of prophecy must be discarded. This insistence has contributed to harsh judgments by Christians of Jews and their reading of the Old Testament: the more reference to Christ is found in Old Testament texts, the more the incredulity of the Jews is considered inexcusable and obstinate.

· Contribution of Jewish reading of the Bible. The horror in the wake of the extermination of the Jews (the Shoah) during the Second World War has led all the Churches to rethink their relationship with Judaism and, as a result, to reconsider their interpretation of the Jewish Bible, the Old Testament. It may be asked whether Christians should be blamed for having monopolized the Jewish Bible and reading there what no Jew has found. Should not Christians henceforth read the Bible as Jews do, in order to show proper respect for its Jewish origins? In answer to the last question, a negative response must be given for hermeneutical reasons. For to read the Bible as Judaism does necessarily involves an implicit acceptance of all its presuppositions, that is, the full acceptance of what Judaism is, in particular, the authority of its writings and rabbinic traditions, which exclude faith in Jesus as Messiah and Son of God. As regards the first question, the situation is different, for Christians can and ought to admit that the Jewish reading of the Bible is a possible one, in continuity with the Jewish Sacred Scriptures from the Second Temple period, a reading analogous to the Christian reading which developed in parallel fashion. Both readings are bound up with the vision of their respective faiths, of which the readings are the result and expression. Consequently, both are irreducible. On the practical level of exegesis, Christians can, nonetheless, learn much from Jewish exegesis practiced for more than two thousand years, and, in fact, they have learned much in the course of history. For their part, it is to be hoped that Jews themselves can derive profit from Christian exegetical research.

Brief Discussion

I want to single out three statements from above for additional reflection:

It would be wrong to consider the prophecies of the Old Testament as some kind of photographic anticipations of future events.

The notion of “photographic anticipation” is popular among many Christians across denominational barriers, and not only among Evangelicals fascinated by end-time prophecy. We Catholics are not strangers to this temptation, which is shared by some of our faithful who give great importance to various private revelations and who debate the number, contents, and accuracy of various “secrets” granted to – in the best of cases – to privileged souls primarily for their own edification.

…Excessive insistence, characteristic of a certain apologetic, on the probative value attributable to the fulfillment of prophecy must be discarded. This insistence has contributed to harsh judgments by Christians of Jews and their reading of the Old Testament: the more reference to Christ is found in Old Testament texts, the more the incredulity of the Jews is considered inexcusable and obstinate.

Now, I must confess that I disagree with the PBC’s outright dismissal of the “probative value” of fulfilled Old Testament prophecy. Many Father and Doctors of the Church – roughly, our “rabbis” - defended this “probative value” in regards to Jesus because the read it in the New Testament itself. If we recognize, as we will below, that post-Second Temple, rabbinical Judaism and Christianity developed in parallel tracks while sharing a common origin, there’s no reason to discard the “probative value” of fulfilled prophecy in Jesus, while admitting – though respectfully disagreeing with - the possibility and the internal coherence of the alternative Jewish reading of their own Old Testament prophecy.

… Christians can and ought to admit that the Jewish reading of the Bible is a possible one, in continuity with the Jewish Sacred Scriptures from the Second Temple period, a reading analogous to the Christian reading which developed in parallel fashion. Both readings are bound up with the vision of their respective faiths, of which the readings are the result and expression. Consequently, both are irreducible.

In other words, the post-biblical, post-Second Temple, rabbinical Jewish reading of the Bible, and the Christian reading of the Bible share a single point of origin, yet diverged into parallel, independent lines of development. One cannot reduce the Christian reading of Scripture into the post-biblical Jewish one or vice versa. The forced harmonization of rabbinical Jewish and Christian readings of the Bible may be popular today in Evangelical circles, particularly in the so-called “Messianic Jewish” movement, but this view is not consonant with biblical exegesis as understood in the Catholic Church.

Ultimately, faith in Jesus derives not from the beauty, coherence, and eloquence of a given set of arguments, nor is it found in a contrived, artificial harmony between Christianity and rabbinical Judaism, but it is the consequence of a living encounter in word and in sacrament with a living person, Jesus Christ, who makes the written Word intelligible to those He meets through his Spirit.

Despite the divergence of rabbinical Judaism from Christianity, the PBC writers assert that Christians can, nonetheless, learn much from Jewish exegesis practiced for more than two thousand years, and, in fact, they have learned much in the course of history. I agree and admit that a lot of the rabbinical literature that I’ve been able to read resonates, not because I interpret it in Christian terms, but because Judaism’s and Christianity's common origin in the same  Holy Scriptures makes rabbinical Judaism more intelligible to me as a Christian than any other religion on Earth, on its own terms.

Even the Jewish emphasis on the minute observance of the Law – now mostly embraced by Orthodox and some Conservative Jews – teaches me something about the freedom Jesus obtained for us and the miracle, if we choose to call it that way, of his extension of Israel’s election to the rest of us. I see this as providential and as an opportunity to build even more bridges of understanding between Christians and Jews.

I hope you keep this discussion in mind because it will become handy in the next installment of this cycle of posts, I will briefly discuss, compare, and contrast the Jewish and Catholic views on prayer, and attempt to answer the question: can a Christian pray like a Jew? Until then, shalom and pax et bonum.