Am ha-Aretz / עם הארץ

All of the Torah was written down at the time of Moses [ Critique ]

Question: How do we know that all of the Torah was written down at the time of Moses or shortly thereafter? When and under which circumstances was it written down?

Response: The word Torah has at least two meanings. In the first meaning, it is the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, also called the Five Books of Moses or the Pentateuch. There is an Orthodox belief that all (or almost all) of the Pentateuch was written down by Moses, to the letter in accordance with Divine will. However, the text of the Pentateuch itself never claims that Moses wrote all of it.

As used in the Pentateuch, the word Torah means the commandments of God. As such, it is often called Law or Teaching.

My position is that all of the commandments that God communicated to Moses, that is, the commandments that constitute God's Teaching, were written down during Moses's lifetime and / or shortly thereafter. This view contradicts the position of the Oral Torah, which also claims that it originated with Moses, but claims that it was never completely written down (large portions of it were written down, but centuries after Moses).

1. The following two passages prove that all of the Teaching was written down, and, consequently, none was transmitted in a purely oral form.

Moses and the elders of Israel charged the people, saying: Observe all the Instruction / mitzvot that I enjoin upon you this day. As soon as you have crossed the Jordan into the land that YHWH your God is giving you, you shall set up large stones. Coat them with plaster and inscribe upon them all the words of this Teaching / Torah. When you cross over to enter the land that YHWH your God is giving you, a land flowing with milk and honey, as YHWH, the God of your fathers, promised you -- upon crossing the Jordan, you shall set up these stones, about which I charge you this day, on Mount Ebal, and coat them with plaster. There, too, you shall build an altar to YHWH your God, an altar of stones. Do not wield an iron tool over them; you must build the altar of YHWH your God of unhewn stones. You shall offer on it burnt offerings to YHWH your God, and you shall sacrifice there offerings of well-being and eat them, rejoicing before YHWH your God. And on those stones you shall inscribe every word of this Teaching / Torah most distinctly. (Deuteronomy 27:1-8)

Moses dies before entering the Land. Before his death, he issues an instruction to the people. As soon as the people enter the Land, they are, among other things, to "inscribe ... all the words of this Torah" on large stones. Just based on this passage, the way I see it, there are three possibilities:

1. The people obeyed this instruction, and wrote down all of the Torah. The Torah has been exclusively in written form ever since.
2. The people disobeyed the instruction. At least some of the Torah from Moses was transmitted orally. This is the "Oral Torah".
3. Same as (1), except that, at a later time, some of the written Torah was destroyed, and was instead transmitted orally. This is the "Oral Torah".
   

While it's possible that some of the written Teaching has been lost from the text, there are a couple of major problems with point 3. First, the point contradicts the account given in the Oral Torah itself. That is, if the Oral Torah is true, then 3 didn't happen. Also, if the Oral Torah was just the lost portions of the Written Torah, then the Oral Torah would not be as vast as it is, since the text was written down in a certain limited amount of space.

Once we reject point 3, can we decide between 1 and 2? Consider the following:

Then Joshua built an altar to YHWH, the God of Israel, in Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of YHWH commanded the children of Israel, as it is written in the book of the law / Torah of Moses, an altar of uncut stones, on which no man had lifted up any iron. They offered burnt offerings on it to YHWH, and sacrificed peace offerings. He wrote there on the stones a copy of the law / Torah of Moses, which he wrote in the presence of the children of Israel. All Israel, and their elders and officers, and their judges, stood on this side of the ark and on that side before the priests the Levites, who carried the ark of YHWH’s covenant, the foreigner as well as the native; half of them in front of Mount Gerizim, and half of them in front of Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of YHWH had commanded at the first, that they should bless the people of Israel. Afterward he read all the words of the law / Torah, the blessing and the curse, according to all that is written in the book of the law / Torah. There was not a word of all that Moses commanded, which Joshua didn’t read before all the assembly of Israel, with the women, the little ones, and the foreigners who were among them. (Joshua 8:30-35)

The passage describes what the people, under the leadership of Joshua, did when they entered the Land. According to the description, they followed Moses's instruction above to the letter. Joshua wrote "on the stones a copy of the Torah of Moses". "The book of the Torah of Moses" is mentioned a couple of times. Lest we think that, aside from the book, there might have been some other, unwritten, teaching, the passage clearly states: "There was not a word of all that Moses commanded, which Joshua didn’t read". Absolutely everything that Moses commanded was read. And since it was read, it must have been written down. And since all of it was written, "not a word of all that Moses commanded" was transmitted in an exclusively oral form, contrary to the claim of the Oral Torah.

2. The above two passages provide conclusive proof that Moses did not transmit any Oral Torah -- all that he transmitted was written down. There are several other passages throughout the Tanakh that point to the same thing. Here are some of them.

Moses wrote down this Teaching / Torah and gave it to the priests, sons of Levi, who carried the Ark of YHWH's Covenant, and to all the elders of Israel.

And Moses instructed them as follows: Every seventh year, the year set for remission, at the Feast of Booths, when all Israel comes to appear before YHWH your God in the place that He will choose, you shall read this Teaching / Torah aloud in the presence of all Israel. Gather the people -- men, women, children, and the strangers in your communities -- that they may hear and so learn to revere YHWH your God and to observe faithfully every word of this Teaching / Torah. Their children, too, who have not had the experience, shall hear and learn to revere YHWH your God as long as they live in the land that you are about to cross the Jordan to possess. (Deut. 31:9-13)

When Moses had put down in writing the words of this Teaching / Torah to the very end... (Deut 31:24)

According to the above passage from Joshua, it's possible that by the time the people entered the Land, the "book of the Torah of Moses" already existed. These Deuteronomy passages say that, in fact, Moses did write down "this Torah". One might claim that "this Torah" refers only to the Written Torah, and allows for the existence of an Oral Torah. This is unlikely. First, Moses calls upon the people "to observe faithfully every word of this Torah", without mentioning any Oral Torah. What's more, in Deut. 27 (the very first passage I cite), Moses also uses "this Torah"; as Joshua shows, it refers to the written -- there is nothing else.

Now it happened after the death of Moses the servant of YHWH, that YHWH spoke to Joshua the son of Nun, Moses’ servant, saying, ... Only be strong and very courageous, to observe to do according to all the law / Torah, which Moses my servant commanded you. Don’t turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go. This book of the law / Torah shall not depart out of your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then you shall make your way prosperous, and then you shall have good success. (Joshua 1:1-8)

God tells Joshua that "all the Torah" that Moses commanded is contained within the "book of the Torah", and that the Torah should be followed "according to all that is written therein". No "fences", no Rabbinic "interpretations", and certainly no new laws. As an extra bonus, God says not to depart from the book of the Torah "to the right hand or to the left". This means, in part, not diminishing or increasing the commandments contained within the book of the Torah. Certainly, the Oral Torah contains multitudes of commandments not found in the Written Torah.

And YHWH said to Moses: Write down these commandments [words / devarim], for in accordance with these commandments I make a covenant with you and with Israel. And he was there with YHWH forty days and forty nights; he ate no bread and drank no water; and he wrote down on the tablets the terms of the covenant, the Ten Commandments. (Exodus 34:27-28)

This particular passage does not say that Moses wrote down all of the Law. It does say that he wrote down a central part of the Law, which is all "the terms of the covenant" between God and the Jewish people.
Posted by Ami at October 23, 2004 11:57 AM | TrackBack