jefff@cadovax.UUCP (Jeff Fields) (10/30/84)
[This article was originally posted to net.religion; at Yiri's
suggestion I have posted it to net.religion.jewish as well.]
I have some questions for any and all Bible/Torah/Talmud scholars out
there. It concerns the earliest dates of the written source for the
Old Testament. I learned in Religious Studies that the Pentateuch
(sic?) was passed down from generation to generation orally until
sometime after the reign of King David c. 1000 B.C. The first book of
the OT to ever be written was the First Book of Samuel, at least
according to the religious historians I encountered at school. The
purpose of this book was to legitimatize the monarchy instituted by
King Saul. The transcribing of the oral tradition that make up the
five books of the Pentateuch followed the writing of the First Book of
Samuel.
This is what I learned in school. We all know that a lot of time what
one learns in school is not necessarily (unfortunately) true.
Here are my questions:
1) What is the first book of the bible ever written?
2) When was the earliest source still extant today written?
3) How long were the books that comprize the Pentateuch orally
transmitted before they were transcribed?
Please include source references wherever possible. Please post the
answers to net.religion, or net.religion.jewish.
Thanks in advance, Jeff Fields
--
Your navel is a bowl well rounded
with no lack of wine,
your belly a heap of wheat
surrounded with lilies.
Your two breasts are two fawns
twins of a gazelle.
-"The Song of Songs" 7:3-4yiri@ucf-cs.UUCP (Yirmiyahu BenDavid) (11/01/84)
I think you'll probably receive several responses so I'll keep mine short. Quite a lot of this type of information can be found in the Encyclopedia Judaica under Bible (v. 4:814). It gets reasonably detailed. If your questions are not answered, please let me know and I will try to help further.