(DOWNLOAD) "Further on the Expiatory Sacrifices (Critical NOTES)" by Journal of Biblical Literature # Book PDF Kindle ePub Free
eBook details
- Title: Further on the Expiatory Sacrifices (Critical NOTES)
- Author : Journal of Biblical Literature
- Release Date : January 22, 1996
- Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines,Books,Professional & Technical,Education,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 168 KB
Description
Congratulations are in order to Adrian Schenker for his intensive study of ancient Israel's expiatory sacrifices and, particularly, for discerning that in the priestly texts they comprise a coherent system. I heartily welcome the fruitful Auseinandersetzung that surely lies before us. We agree on major issues, but I differ with him on a number of his theses, which I find beset with logical difficulties and exegetical errors. My analysis is based on three of his seminal articles and will focus, in the main, on his exegesis of the enigmatic, marginal cases of Lev 5:1-4 and 5:17-19. Schenker argues that the verb [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] always means "be liable, responsible" and that the expression limb [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (Lev 5:17) cannot be a tautology, as I claim, (1) because a person must first be held liable ([TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]) before he is sentenced ([TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]). (2) But how can a person be liable if neither he nor anyone else is aware of what he has done? The text states explicitly, not once but twice, [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], "and (he) did not know" (Lev 5:17, 18). To be sure, Schenker parries this objection by claiming "er wusste es nicht sogleich, sondern es wurde ihm spater bewusst." (3) However, that he subsequently becomes aware of his act is pure hypothesis; it is nowhere mentioned in the text. Indeed, if this were so, one would have expected the text to add [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], "or (someone) informs him of his wrong" (as in Lev 4:23-28), namely, either he himself becomes aware of his act or he is informed of it by someone else. If, however, he never comes to know what he has done, why must he bring a reparation offering? The answer, I aver, is that he suspects he has done wrong, and his troubled conscience, expressed by the verb [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], is absolved by the [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], the reparation offering (see further below). Thus, there is no need, with Schenker, to speculate that the case of Lev 5:17-19 should require a [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], "a purification offering," rather than an [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], but the latter is prescribed because the sin was undisclosed for a purported long period. (4) The [TEXT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] expiates for sacrilege, not for prolonged, undisclosed sins (see below).