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Writing on the Tablet of the Heart: Origins of Scripture and Literature, by David M Carr
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This book explores a new model for the production, revision, and reception of Biblical texts as Scripture. Building on recent studies of the oralwritten interface in medieval, Greco-Roman and ancient Near Eastern contexts, David Carr argues that in ancient Israel Biblical texts and other texts emerged as a support for an educational process in which written and oral dimensions were integrally intertwined. The point was not incising and reading texts on parchment or papyrus. The point was to enculturate ancient Israelites -- particularly Israelite elites -- by training them to memorize and recite a wide range of traditional literature that was seen as the cultural bedrock of the people: narrative, prophecy, prayer, and wisdom. Generally, mastery was exercised through remarkably exact recall and reproduction of the tradition -- whether through oral performance or through production of written "performances." Crises like exile, however, could prompt the creation of radically new versions of the classic tradition, incorporating verbal recall of ancient tradition with various extensions, recontextualizations and supplements. This educational process took place on a one-to-one basis and focused on the cultivation of an educated elite. A major change took place with the arrival of the Hellenistic empires in the fourth and following centuries. This, says Carr, led to the emergence of a democratized Jewish "school" as well as the marking off of the standard Israelite texts as an "anti-canon" to the Hellenistic canon of educational texts that were used in the Greek schools of the Eastern Mediterranean.
- Sales Rank: #1112692 in Books
- Brand: Brand: Oxford University Press, USA
- Published on: 2008-08-29
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 6.10" h x 1.00" w x 9.20" l, 1.07 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 348 pages
- Used Book in Good Condition
Review
In Writing on the Tablet of the Heart David Carr draws on a vast range of evidence to explore writing and the socialization of elites in the ancient Near East and the Hellenistic world. This impressive work contributes vitally to breaking down the distinction between literacy and orality which has often clouded discussions of cultural and administrative institutions in the ancient world, and reaches significant conclusions that will have an impact far beyond its core area of Biblical Studies. John Baines, Professor of Egyptology, University of Oxford David Carr's Writing on the Tablet of the Heart provides a fresh and highly readable account of the contexts and conditions which progressively shaped ancient Israel's textual heritage as scripture. Carr adroitly employs an impressively broad range of comparative and theoretical perspectives to argue for the centrality of an oral-written textual practice in the educational process of cultural formation and socialization in elite Israelite circles. While this book is must reading for students and scholars of the Hebrew Bible, both in its literary formation and social reception, Carr's reach extends to other cultural fields in which orality and textuality are performatively bound. Steven D. Fraade, Mark Taper Professor of the History of Judaism, Yale University David Carr has given us an extremely thorough study of the modes of textual transmission that has far-reaching implications for our study of the Pentateuch and the composition of biblical literature. Using a comparative and anthropological approach, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart breaks new ground in understanding the implications of orality and literacy in the formation of Scripture. This well-written and carefully researched book deserves to be a standard work for anyone interested in the Bible. William Schniedewind, author of How the Bible Became a Book [Carr] integrates so many good ideas together into a coherent synthesis that this will become a classic text worth quoting. His arguments are compelling. The author has brought old insights into a comprehensive synthesis and given us new perspectives, or "handles," by which to focus our attention on the greater picture of writing, literacy, scribes, and literary texts in the ancient world. Catholic Biblical Quarterly Exceptionally erudite and readable. Biblical scholars will need to seriously consider this well laid out challenge to the generally accepted theories of documentary sources. Review of Biblical Literature
About the Author
David M. Carr is Professor of Old Testament at Union Theological Seminary in New York. He is the author of The Erotic Word: Sexuality, Spirituality, and the Bible (OUP, 2003) and several other books.
Most helpful customer reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
Fascinating exploration of oral traditions in ancient Israel
By Jeri
One of the most difficult areas of ancient life for scholars to understand is the period when oral traditions still held as much importance as the written word. At one point "written texts served as a crucial media to facilitate oral learning" (p 27), so important were the oral traditions to ancient cultures. Yet all we have left to decipher the older oral cultures is the scanty echoes we find for it left in writing.
Much of what survives, from the Illiad to the Atrahasis epic, clearly show evidence of having been performed orally first. But how accurately were things passed on? From the evidence, enormous care was given to accurate memorization.
For Second Temple Jews, oral tradition was considered the equal of the written scriptures, and as binding (Josephus-Antiquities 10.2.1 XIII,297 and Philo -10.2.2 The Special Laws IV 143-150) so, surely, great care was taken in passing on oral traditions.
In ancient Israel there is plenty of evidence to suggest a vigorous educational system. Abecedaries have been found, and, "Over the recent decades, archaeologists have uncovered a significant number of ancient Israelite educational texts, correspondence, tax receipts, and graffiti" (p 112) indicating a similar situation to education throughout Mesopotamia, especially in Summaria and Greece.
The evidence suggests young boys were taught within their own family, if the father was a scribe, or in a very small house school. Education was based on memorization of the culture's important epics or texts.
Ben Sira refers to at least one formal school and the Qumran texts provide lots of examples of educational exercises. "Jubilees provides similar pictures of priest-centered small-scaled, family-oriented forms of textuality and education" (p 204).
Qumran is especially interesting because the texts show clear evidence that learning was of vast importance. There was "an ongoing community of study, where every group of ten must always have an interpreter of the Torah day and night, relieving one another in shifts, reading the scroll aloud, investigating the law, and blessing the congregation" (p 218).
This is not to say that the evidence shows that the entire culture was literate. On the contrary. The Second Temple Jews needed their priests to be literate, and they also needed a large number of scribes for taxes and correspondence. But there was little point to the average farmer knowing how to read. Although Josephus states that the Law requires all children 'to be taught letters (Ag.Ap I.60).
Acrostics in the Bible point to the early educational system in the Bible, as does Duet 6:6 reminding parents to repeat God's words to your children, to "recite them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise".
Memory was the foundation of all education in the ancient world. You most certainly did not have to be a member of the elite to be literate or well educated. Many of the upper class Romans had slaves who read to them. And teachers were widely regarded as lower class, poorly paid, and of no social consequence.
Carr argues that writing began for the Jews in the Davidic-Solomonic period "a period the Bible depicts as the time of emergence of city-state structures" (p 163). Whatever education there was during this time would have been scanty, as the epigraphic evidence suggests, "that any such early forms of textuality and education pale in comparison to the development of the later prexilic period" (p 164).
By the Second Temple period, there is clear archaeological evidence for synagogues, which became "sites for study and prayer" (p 243).
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
The Original Hebrew Text
By Sue Earl
David Carr gives an excellent presentation that helps Western readers understand the form of the original Hebrew text. His primary thesis is that the form of the text, without word dividers and markers, was needed to be well-known by the reader prior to the public reading of the text. His theory is that the purpose of the text was primarily a prompt to aid the reader remember and recite this already well-known text. This form meant that the reader could easily recognize large sections, rather than read individual words. The purpose of the recitation and memorisation of the writing was to ensure that the tradition was "written on the listeners' minds and hearts". He gives examples of writings of surrounding ancient cultures to reinforce his ideas regarding Israel's writings.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful.
What is this book about?
By Benjamin D. Steele
This is an interesting book, but I wasn't sure if it would be. I suspected others might feel the same way considering this book. I hope this review will be helpful.
There are many positive blurbs. The Catholic Inquiry said that Carr "brought old insights into a comprehensive synthesis and given us new perspectives." John Baines, an Egyptology professor, declares that the author "reaches significant conclusions that will have an impact far beyond its core area of Biblical Studies." Teresa Morgan, an Ancient History scholar, suggested that "His cross-cultural analysis will stimulate new insights into areas which readers know well, while it also offers intriguing glimpses into new territory." And William Schniedewind, an author on Bible Studies, gives praise that the Carr "breaks new ground in understanding the implications of orality and literacy in the formation of Scripture."
Sounds great. Yet going by those blurbs it isn't clear what the book is about, beyond some general relationship of orality and literacy in the ancient world. What exactly is the synthesis, new perspectives, significant conclusions, new insights, intriguing glimpses, and implications? I had to read the book to find out even what the book is about, which made it a bit difficult in my original decision about whether or not to buy the book.
Worse still, none of the reviews were overly informative and insightful. All that I could tell from the reviews was basically what the blurbs said, but no one bothered to explain the significance of this relationship between orality and literacy. When reviews are of such a low quality it makes me have doubts about reading a book. I'm glad I decided to read the book anyway.
I'm part way into the book now. I might revise my thoughts later on. But I wanted to offer a preliminary review.
The reviewer Sue Earl is correct that "[Carr's] theory is that the purpose of the text was primarily a prompt to aid the reader remember and recite this already well-known text." But it is a lot more than that. The book isn't, as reviewer Jeri states, just about a "vigorous educational system . . . of vast importance."
More importantly, it's about what all this meant for ancient societies and their development, the social and cultural significance. The author's interest isn't merely academic. He seeks to understand the implications for today of the early texts produced millennia ago, as some of those texts remain centrally important to modern society.
It really is a fascinating subject. And the book is a worthy read.
That said, I will offer one criticism. The author concludes that literacy (or rather a particular form of it) was central to the development of civilization as we know it. I'd agree with that in a general sense. But I think he misses something by maybe not taking seriously enough pre-literate societies.
I happen to be reading recently another book that specifically deals with pre-literate societies. It is Knowledge and Power in Prehistoric Societies: Orality, Memory, and the Transmission of Culture by Lynne Kelly.
Kelly offers an original theory. The details of it aren't important here, but I'll point to the relevant part.
In her doing research in relation to the Australian Aborigines, she came to realize how vast the store of knowledge oral societies maintained from generation to generation. Her book explains how this is possible. These people needed detailed knowledge of the world around them and they needed to be able to pass this on with precision and accuracy, which required highly effect mnemonic tools.
From what I can tell, this challenges Carr's own theory. I don't think it disproves his basic argument. But it might call into question certain elements. As I get further into both books, I'll have more to add.
The two books would make for useful comparison, as they offer views from either side of the transition into literacy.
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