Damascus Document: When is a Cigar just a Cigar?

 The Damascus Document (as Fraade points out) is unusual in that it combines both law and narrative together, where the laws go hand-in-hand with its narrative and eschatological framework.  Moreover, it explicitly cites scripture as an independent source; and provides interpretations of it to support a legal and moral worldview.  Prefiguring rabbinic midrash, it seems to derive lessons from the text as such that allows for “new modalities of continuing revelation”.  The word “derive”, of course, is a loaded term alluding to metaphors that see interpretation as a key to unlock secrets both hidden and revealed in the text; a type of mechanistic action that leads to a determinative answer.  The exact nature of the relationship between text, narrative, law and philosophy – and the extent interpretation that mediates between them – is precisely at stake and it is high stakes. 

For in the view of the Qumran sect the “seekers after smooth things” (dorshei) is a derogatory term for the Pharisees that lead to falsehoods: “For they sought easy interpretations, chose illusions, scrutinised loopholes, chose the handsome neck, acquitted the guilty and sentenced the just, violated the covenant”.  This stands in contrast to the more authoritative interpretation taught by the “Teacher of Righteousness” who “taught the community the proper observance of the Law and the true eschatological meaning of the words of the prophets” (Angel).  Interpretation in this view is necessarily but strictly limited to “the men of renown, who stand (to serve) at the end of days.”  It may be inferred there is a “right answer” to legal question, to whom the Sons of Zadok are custodians.

One can see there are opposing legal outputs (e.g. on the laws of polygamy, incest and witnesses) and to which one side believes the other has erred.  However, the gap that opens between text and interpretation, and the combining of law and narrative into a single text, naturally opens up questions about the nature and philosophy of the law.  What were they up to when they came to these different determinations of the law?  Does it underlie a different thought process or worldview?  Are they different opinions within one ‘language game’, ‘form of life’ or exegetical activity; or are they playing different games?

Daniel Schwartz would like to take the latter view – the enterprises are different with the Qumran view of law being “Realist” and the Rabbinic being “Nominalist”.  Loosely, the former have laws based on reality (as understood through the text) based on objective principles, while the latter are more based on the determination of the law as a speech (or procedural) act (i.e. what the text, judge or court says).   If there are not two witnesses to a single crime, does the ‘guilty’ man walk free, even if there were three independent witnesses to the man committing the crime on separate occasions?  Must one act according to the judicial procedure and let them off (Rabbinic); or ensure that the judicial process gets the right result and convicts them (Qumranic)?

Jeffrey Rubinstein, on the other hand, takes the former view described above where they are both engaged in the same exercise; albeit his article fluctuates between two forms of this.  On the one hand: “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar”.  Arguments such as the one above are purely a matter of exegesis from an interpretive point of view.  On the other hand: he seems to conclude that there is a common Realist philosophy underlying both; where there is a debate on the nature of things, such as the nature of impurity.  The Rabbis equally base their notions on ‘reality’ such as in considering the spatial properties of liquid in determining impurity; whilst the Qumran give weight to legal process (e.g. in not accepting testimony of a nineteen year old).  In the latter variant of Rubinstein’s interpretation, the Rabbinic positions are “more nominalist” purely as a result of an historical process where the law remains static but ideas about reality change.  Thus, the laws become more ‘taboo’ or nominalist, because of this severed connection.

Without being able to go into too much detail here, the above analyses seem to conflate three separate issues: i) the authority of the law (or its interpretation); ii) the determination of the content of the law; and iii) the telos or purpose of the law.  Questions of realism and nominalism can be applied to each and in different combinations.  Questions about the authority of the law in relation to reality are a variant of the Euthyphro dilemma (do the gods love good action because it is good, or is good action good because it is loved by the gods?), albeit as applied to a legal system and its interpreters.  Whether the determination of the law is realistic relates to the extent one can “derive an ought from an is”.   The Telos of the law could be exhausted by ‘revealing reality’ or the ‘exercise of authority’; but equally could be something else entirely outside of that dichotomy.

One can say that the Damascus document reflects on the authoritative nature of law as being based in the principles of creation, whilst doing further research on how the Qumranic community determined the law from that reality.  Equally, one could say that for the rabbis the determination of the law is more nominalist than that espoused in the Damascus document, whilst leaving the question of how much the final determination reflects reality open.  Furthermore, the articles only briefly touch on the telos of the law.  One can agree with Rubinstein that certain laws and interpretations were based on an understanding of reality, without thinking that its severance from the reality leaves it relying on nominalist authority alone.  As argued by Rabbi Soloveitchik in Halakhic Mind, this can reflect a “genetic fallacy”; and that the purpose of the law is quite other than the expression of reality or authority.

One can avoid over-interpreting or straightjacketing a view into one interpretation (nominalist vs. realist) but still see relevant philosophical differences between. Them. Sometimes a “cigar is just a cigar” but where one can ask what one smokes.

 

The Halakhic Document: An Amicable Divorce?

 4QMMT is a short work of around 150 lines, that presents the halachic opinions of its author on roughly twenty matters such as ritual purity, the beginning of the Omer, the holiness of fruit in its fourth year and the suitability of various people to engage in temple ritual.  The selection is relevant as they are all matters that the later Rabbis would label as “Sadducean” without heed to any particular sociological or historical nuance between various groups.  The community in question that adhered rigorously to these precepts, accepted views that were more stringent than those evidently in practice in the time, and which limit participation the temple rite.  For example, they require sunset (and not merely ritual immersion) in order to participate in ritual of the Red Heifer; and which limit the participation of the blind and deaf in terms of coming into contact with ritual purity.  Where the pharisees trust the masses with regards to sacred food and offerings (and are considered haverim), the opinions presented here would restrict participation.

Whilst the selection is clearly demarcating boundaries, the style of presentation in this section of the laws themselves is not self-consciously polemical.   These are listed in a summary fashion (and in a style reminiscent of later halachic compendia); detailing their decisions and opinion on these Torah precepts succinctly and without the need for further argumentation.  This may indicate that the opinions are not novel in and of themselves, would be recognised by the addressee and thus, not in need of learned support.  Such statements are not concocted in order to oppose a particular group on theological, identity or other grounds, nor addressed to any ‘sons of darkness’.  Rather they are statements of long held views from tradition, and which may have been implemented in times past, and (moderately uncontroversially at this point?) acknowledged as one such strand of thought.

The polemics come in the following exhortatory section, where the contention is not necessarily in arguments on the content of the halacha per se but on the social effects of their ‘correct’ view, not being the one currently practiced in contemporary Jerusalem.  The polemics themselves – putting halachic misadventure in the context of Jewish history and G-d’s blessing and curses, and the worry that misstep would cause abominable practices – does not seem overly unusual or stronger than others who care about correct practices.  However, the authors of 4QMMT see this as a reason that “we have separated ourselves from the multitude of the people [and from all their impurity] and from being involved with these matters and from participating with [them] in these things”.  Unlike Bet Shammai who despite taking stringent opinions managed to coexist with the more liberal positions of Bet Hillel (marrying each other, and relying on each other’s ritual food preparation); the authors of 4QMMT cannot abide the contradictory practices. 

Styled as a letter, ink has been spilled on who the relevant addressee may be.  One opinion would be that it is a pharisaic high priest in the Maccabean period – a “you” separated from the “us” of the author.  Possibly it is a sympathetic ear (a “you, unlike them”) that has remained part of the establishment.  In Fraade’s reading, it is possibly a neophyte or initiate into the community itself, where the text is intramural and educational on the key halachic pointers of the community.  Given the popularity within the community, and the vernacular language used, its intramural use is well taken.  Nevertheless, it is a stretch without further support to suggest as Fraade does, that it is not at least in the style of an address to an external party in a leadership position given that it is for the “welfare of your people”.

I’m not sure that there is any evidence that can decide on the addressee based on the slender evidence from the text, at least not without bringing to the text historical views (e.g. on identification of Essenes) as a given, that are themselves in dispute.  Nevertheless, given that the addressee is considered as having “wisdom and knowledge of the Torah”, it doesn’t seem a strong offensive polemic against the addressee (regardless of group they belong to).  Rather, it is a defensive polemic that, as above, is used to justify not their opinions themselves, but their separation from the community on account of those.

Ben Sira: Where wisdom and law are uncomfortable bedfellows

In the introduction to the book of Ben Sirah, his grandson introduces the work with the purpose that “those who read the scriptures must not only themselves understand them, but also as lovers of learning be able through the spoken and written word to help the outsiders” but also that they themselves “might make even greater progress in living according to the law”.  Equally, in chapter 2, the reverse is also the case whereby “If you desire wisdom, keep the commandments”.  In this view, instruction in wisdom and the living according to the law are complementary rather than contradictory activities, and can in fact create a virtuous circle.  To the extent that wisdom and Torah are separate activities and discourses, they are not necessarily entirely independent ones. 

That one cannot entirely articulate wisdom from the law (or vice versa), a wisdom discourse that can be articulated independently to “help the outsiders” does indicate an accommodation of sorts – a notion we will come back to.  However, it does not the direction of that accommodation, nor that the accommodated discourse is really superfluous other than for rhetorical reasons.  Jack Sanders though would like to argue that the accommodation is one way – that the ancient sapiential traditions needs to accommodate to elements of the Mosaic Torah as a survival strategy, during a period in which the importance of the Pentateuch is growing for the ‘man on the street’.  The appeals to the law are not to be taken at face value and the integration occurs “only in ways that allow the integrity of the sapiential approach to life to continue”.  Where wisdom dictates that one should honour ones parents, this does need the Decalogue to justify it. 

In this sense, would the placing of its wisdom in the context of the ancestors, including Moses to whom G- d gave the commandments, and Aharon from who headed the priesthood be considered just special pleading?  Is its only point acceptance of the “sacred canopy” of ancient wisdom without genuinely placing itself in that tradition?  Wright argues, in contrast, that is precisely the rhetorical point to defend the institution of priesthood against its detractors; albeit that certain groups of priests who may sacrifice without wisdom or are corrupt in other ways.  Though not a work of law, it does take positions on legal matters, such as the use of lunar calendar for setting festivals. The wisdom noted in Ben Sirah is an important correlate to the law, rather than an opponent.  This is not to say there aren’t elements of accommodation, with Wright saying that Hellenistic philosophy is used (in a way the law itself doesn’t internally require) but where it is pressed into service of the issues of the day.  To help the ‘outsiders’ or reinforce the insiders, one may need to steps outside a particular discourse to then reinhabit it.

The law without wisdom may lead to a corrupt priesthood, but wisdom contains its own epistemological limits.  No different that Ecclesiastes and Job, and continuing through to later philosophers in the Jewish tradition like Maimonides; an important part of wisdom is knowing where it ends.  Ben Sirah states that “What is too marvellous for you, do not investigate, and what is too difficult for you, do not research… you have no business with secret things”.  Whether a caution against the wholesale adoption of philosophy, or a broadside against the Enochic tradition that make predictions based on dreams and visions that “have led many astray”, the epistemological point is the same: wisdom does not provide its own foundations.  Whatever the relative importance of law and wisdom – and there will be genuine differences in this regard – they jointly ground one in received (and down to earth) traditions.

It would seem possible to acknowledge different genres of literature, with differing priorities, and different lenses for viewing reality; without setting up ‘opposition’ between them at a global level (albeit there will be differences in particular points).  Historic, legal, narrative and mystic works can operate on different levels of meaning without negating the other.  There can be accommodation between them, where accommodation is not a survival strategy, but an interplay or dialectic of ideas.