ahem....
there's no need for you to try and patronise me or quote big chunks at me - references will do fine; i have the texts at hand. i know all about the documentary hypothesis, wellhausen et al. (and the unbound bible, which is a great site and one i use all the time) they certainly don't need *my* help. the opinions i am referring to are those held by many of the people coming at it from a *traditional* jewish perspective, in which Torah (as opposed to the OT) was given at sinai and remains unchanged to this day as far as we are concerned.
i am simply pointing out that these are not opinions you are likely to have access to unless you live in the traditionally observant jewish community, as i do. the DH is a theory (in other words, an opinion) that originates in the academic categories derived from
a priori greek philosophical thought - which is contemporaneous with but often predated by jewish religious thought. i'm just trying to give a perspective that will allow people to appreciate how this text is used by the people it was given to and continue to attempt to live by it to this day. and, if you'll pardon me, taking the approach of jumping straight into a translation like this and extrapolating without reference to context is rather like making assumptions about the family of an engine designer from reading a manual about an engine he designed. this just isn't how the text is designed to be read. it's not linear, it's not european and you're looking at *a translation of the lecture notes*, not hearing the lecture. now, it is entirely possible that you could use the cliff notes to speculate about the family life of charles dickens, but better to actually know the family and read, say, 'bleak house' in its socio-political (or, in this case, religious) context.
anyway, the problematic verses you are talking about are naturally not unknown to the traditional commentators - but it is axiomatic to us that G!D Is One and that where you see references to 'bene elohim' it cannot possibly mean "sons of G!D"! biblical hebrew of whatever period simply *cannot* be read in the way you suggest without doing violence to both its context and its grammar - let alone its intent. the language itself contains many ways of referring to the Divine, both direct and indirect. i was thinking about this particular argument during morning prayers today and came across the following phrase from psalm 82:
"ANI AMaRTI ELoHIM ATeM: UBNeI 'ELYON CuLCheM:
ACHeN KeADaM TeMoTOuN: U'Cha'AKhaD HaSaRIM TiPoLOu:"
usually translated something along the lines of:
"I Said that you are like the celestial beings and like all higher beings, but you shall die like adam and fall like one of the princes".
but what you are failing to understand is a set of three categories, where G!D Is at the top, humanity is at the bottom and there is an *intermediate* category inbetween of enlightened or 'higher' beings. this parallels the demarcation of mt. sinai in exodus ch.19 (and, if you agree with mary douglas, the subsequent threefold division in the sacrificial animals, but that's another argument) but the important thing about it is that the second category is one which humans can ascend to (as moses and aaron both do at sinai) but cannot be maintained without the appropriate level of spiritual development - which even the "princes" (ie those who find themselves by default in this elevated category) cannot always maintain. for example, adam was in this category by default, but he became mortal, with all its implications of work and suffering and pleasure.
now *angels*, in jewish thought, are an *entirely separate category*, of which Ha-SaTaN, the "adversary", is one. they are not some kind of higher being, but a restricted, limited being, almost like a machine. they have no free will (or knees, or thumbs, or nadgers, incidentally) and can only carry out the job that they were assigned, which, in the case of ha-satan, is essentially to be the D.A.'s office, or DPP if you're a brit. you cannot be accused of anything you haven't actually done and you cannot be tricked - all that ha-satan can do is report upon the revelation of your inner nature through your behaviour.
So, one of the words is translated into English as yhvh and another one is hyvm, and from this, we're supposed to draw the conclusion that the author actually had credible information about a conversation God had with the Adversary
well, if you know anything about biblical hebrew, yes, of course! "yhvh" is a transliterated Divine Name using the letters Yod, Hei, Vav and Hei (also known as the 'Tetragrammaton') which is a Name that nobody is permitted to pronounce. "hyvm" is the word "HaYOM" - capital letters representing letters and small letters representing the vowels in this case which means "that day". job is a *prophetic* book, meaning that it was the result of writing down a prophetic revelation - traditional opinion is divided as to who actually was the prophet concerned and when it was written down, in fact, like many of the books in NaCh (the term signifying the parts of the TeNaCH, or hebrew bible, apart from the "pentateuch" or Torah). the thing is, you're not supposed to "draw a conclusion that the author actually had credible information" - the starting point is this very assumption, that this text was revealed by G!D to a prophet. it's a
mytho-poetic text and you're treating it forensically, like an autopsy protocol or something. it's a bit like using a musical instrument for firewood, if you see what i mean.
actually, the truest thing you've said so far is this:
My hunch, suspicion, off the cuff guess, is that there was a series of stories about YHWH and The Adversary, so that the people who read Job already knew who the characters were. And we only get a chapter from the middle.
the book of job is the main attempt our tradition makes to approach the problem of theodicy (why horrid stuff happens to nice people) and, in the end all it does is give a worked-through illustrative (but not exhaustive) example. the characters are in fact rather incidental - traditional commentators even question whether there was an actual job (as opposed to, say, jacob or solomon) - the theological issue being raised is the important thing. it's not a prescriptive answer; it never tells you why nor, more importantly, does it refute job's right to question Divine justice. the "adversary" is a completely incidental construct. it's just not something we are obsessed by.
now, of course, if you want to ignore traditional opinions and construct a straw man, you are free to do so, but don't try to make out that it's somehow more authoritative for being modern or academic, totally ripped out of its context or the fact that you know nothing about biblical hebrew. i'm sure a CD doesn't make a great deal of sense if you haven't got a CD player and will end up being used as a coaster.
b'shalom
bananabrain
