Scripture as Logos: Rabbi Ishmael and the Origins of Midrash

Abstract

Scripture as Logos: Rabbi Ishmael and the Origins of Midrash, by Azzan Yadin. Divinations. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004. Pp. xiii + 231. $55.00 (hardcover). ISBN: 0812237919. The central thesis of Scripture as Logos is that the Tannai m (second-third centuries C.E. rabbis) who composed the Ishmaelian midrashic collections (basically the Mekhilta of Rabbi Ishtnael and Sifre Numbers) instituted a relatively restrained approach to the interpretation of Scripture. The notion of a fully polysemous Torah was not shared bv these rabbis. Their motto might summarized as Be until the text speaks, a motto that contrasts with that which they ascribe to their opponents, who say to the text, Be until I expound. The reader of Scripture is to engage in moderately passive hermeneutics; the meaning of Scripture is not entirely open, as some literary theorists might propose, but rather semi-closed. The reader must accept interpretive cues from Scripture itself and not impart them from without. Scripture speaks to its interpreter and acts as its interpreter's teacher in a system where ultimately authority and control belong to the text itself. The classification of the midrashic schools into those of R. Ishmael and those of R. Aqiva upon which Yadin's work rests is worthy of note. Over one hundred years ago, David Zvi Huffman demonstrated that the halakic/tannaitic midrashim can separated into these two schools. This classification was reinforced by the research of Jacob Nahum Epstein and Menahem Kahana, among others. Recently the classification was challenged by Gary Porton and Jay Harris. Yadin's book is a welcome response to their challenge. While we can no longer certain that these midrashic collections reflect the opinions of their eponymous fathers, we can certain of the basic differences between them. Overwhelming textual evidence for such a classification has been documented, and neither Porton nor Harris directly addresses this evidence. Yadin refutes Harris's implication that nineteenth-century' polemical scholars/rabbis constructed the idea of the Ishmaelian school and its simpler, less fanciful approach to biblical interpretation. Yadin convincingly demonstrates that such an approach did exist and is not a scholarly fantasy. Yadin begins by analyzing the different uses of two terms which frequently appear in Ishmaelian midrashim: Torah and ha-katuv (the verse). As a term, Torah stands for the voice of revelation and is usually used to introduce Scripture itself. It is a voice of authority, but it speaks in the past and is not active. In contrast, ha-katuv is the midrashic voice, a teacher of Scripture, and it steins from Scripture itself. The personification of ha-katuv as Scripture teaching the hermeneutics of Scripture serves as a basis for the remainder of the book. In ch. 2, Yadin examines the restraint demanded of the Scriptural reader in Ishmaelian midrashim. He elucidates a fascinating exchange between R. Eliezer and R. Ishmael, in which the latter rebukes the former for replacing the proper submission to the verse with aggressive hyper-interpretation. While R. Ishmael listens to the verse and then interprets, R. Eliezer tells the verse to be silent until he is done interpreting. As part of their hermeneutical strategy, Ishmaelian midrashim claim that certain words in Scripture are marked and therefore available for interpretation. The reader is to search for and locate such marks (superfluity, anomalous spellings, and other such phenomena) and then and only then interpret them. Even this search for markers is restrained. Not all verses are marked and some markers merely lead toward understanding the simple, noninterpreted meaning of the verse. Without evidence of marking, the Scriptural interpreter has no right to engage in creative exegesis. In contrast, the Sifra, the pinnacle of Aqivan midrashic creation, perceives all words as potentially marked and hence makes the category of marked meaningless since it has no contrast. …

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