Text and transmission : an empirical model for the literary development of Old Testament narratives

The immense religious importance of the Old Testament imposes a great responsibility on the exegete. Since his results are inseparably bound to his presuppositions, a thorough and continuous examination of the latter is essential. The need for a discussion of appropriate methodology is illustrated by the variety of results provided by source-critical studies of the same narratives. The present work, a slightly revised version of the Ph.D. thesis submitted to the University of Liverpool March 1991, aims to contribute to this discussion by suggesting a possible analogy to the transmission of Old Testament narratives. Two basic assumptions are made: 1. analogies between the transmission of Ancient Near Eastern texts and Old Testament narratives are possible and 2. if the evidence is inconclusive, a hypothesis based on a valid empirical model is to be preferred. Since general tendencies of development have to be isolated, many passages of Ancient Near Eastern texts had to be referred to, which because of space limitations could not all be quoted verbatim. The reader is thus referred to the publications of these texts noted in the relevant passages. Preface 5 I. Methodological Considerations 9 A. The Necessity of an Analogy 9 B. The Nature of a Valid Analogy 18 C. The Investigation of Analogies 23 D. The Aims of the Present Study 26 II. Previously Proposed Analogies 28 A. Akkadian Epics 28 1. The Anzu Epic 30 2. The Atraḫasīs Epic 35 3. The Etana Epic 47 4. The Gilgameš Epic 50 B. The Biblical Books of Samuel-Kings and Chronicles 64 III. A New Analogy: Assyrian Royal Annals 75 A. The Macrostructural Development of Assyrian Royal Annals 76 1. Sennacherib’s First Campaign 79 2. Aššurbanipal’s Campaign Accounts 104 B. An Example of the Chronicler’s Editorial Methods: The Account of Sennacherib’s Siege of Jerusalem 164 C. The Microstructural Development of Assyrian Royal Annals 179 1. Omission 180 2. Contraction 186 IV. Application of Results 190 A. 1 Kgs.221–38 190 B. 1 Kgs.20 229 V. Conclusions 239 Appendix I – The Chronicler’s Vorlage 245 Table 1: Text Types 245 Table 2: References to Sources 253 Appendix II – Discourse Profiles 255 1. Aššurbanipal’s Campaign against Aḫšeri 255 2. Aššurbanipal’s Campaign against Teummān 260 Appendix III – Participant Orientation Patterns 265 1. Sennacherib’s Second Campaign 265 2. Sennacherib’s Third Campaign, Part 1 268 3. Sennacherib’s Third Campaign, Part 2 269 4. Sennacherib’s Third Campaign, Part 3 269 5. Sennacherib’s Third Campaign, Part 4 271 6. Aššurbanipal’s Campaign against Kirbit 272 7. Aššurbanipal’s Campaign against Aḫšeri 274 8. Aššurbanipal’s Campaign against Teummān 278 9. Aššurbanipal’s First Campaign against Ummanaldasi 282 10. Aššurbanipal’s Second Campaign against Ummanaldasi 284 11. Aššurbanipal’s Campaign against Dunanu 289 12. Aššurbanipal’s Campaigns against Arabs 295 Appendix IV – Ahab in 1 Kgs.22 300 Abbreviations 306 Bibliography 308

The series Beihefte zur Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft (BZAW) covers all areas of research into the Old Testament, focusing on the Hebrew Bible, its early and later forms in Ancient Judaism, as well as its branching into many neighboring cultures of the Ancient Near East and the Greco-Roman world.