Chapter 3. The Theological Potential in the Abraham Narrative
3.1 The Method
I come to Genesis with Pauline interests in mind. This has at least three implications. First, it directs my attention to elements in the narrative that relate to Paul's interests in Galatians in order to facilitate a robust and in-depth intertextual reading of Gal 4:21-5:1 in ch. 6. Accordingly, my analysis of the Abraham narrative is centred on the births of Abraham's two sons (section 3.3) – a feature that proves to be coherent with the
narrative. I also analyse the theme of the promise of blessing to all the nations (3.4), and the issue about circumcision and the identity of the people of God (3.5) in relation to Ishmael and Isaac. My aim, however, is not to exercise a flat Pauline reading of the text of Genesis, but to respect its integrity in order to discern how Paul utilises the potential of the text, i.e. does Paul go with or against the grain of the text?
Secondly, although I recognise that there were many ways in which Jews were reading the Abraham narrative before and around Paul’s time, I do not engage in either a comparative study between Paul and other Second Temple Jewish texts (except in a limited way with Philo’s allegorical practice in 5.1.3), or an exploration of other aspects of the narrative with regard to other Jewish interests. I only mention here two points where Paul’s interests appear to be distinctive. First, Paul focuses on Abraham’s faith as the grounds for his righteousness, and distinguishes it from Law observance (Gal 3:1- 18; cf. Rom 4), whereas some other Jewish interpreters were interested to present Abraham as an example of a Torah observant Jew. Thus, e.g. both the writer of Jubilees and Philo attempt to explain the chronological discrepancy in the claim that Abraham followed the Law of Moses before the time of Moses in their own distinctive ways. The book of Jubilees presents the Law in “heavenly” terms (transcending Mosaic confines) to argue that it was accessible to Abraham before it was given to Moses at Sinai.253 Philo
uses Abraham’s conformity to the Law as evidence that the Mosaic Law conforms to the 253 The Law is released from Mosaic confines with the repeated emphasis on it existing in the heavenly tablets, e.g. law of circumcision (Jubilees 15:25), and being mediated by angelic beings (e.g.
Jubilees 1:27-2:33 to Moses [Sabbath laws]; 4:18 to Enoch). In Jubilees 12:25-27 Abraham is enabled to
understand and speak Hebrew, the language of creation, to read the books of his fathers. Thus, in Jubilees 21:10 Abraham accredits his knowledge of the laws to the reading of the words of Enoch and Noah.
Jubilees 4:17-18 describes how Enoch received revelation concerning calendrical observances. Chapters
6–7 describe the laws that were made known to Noah. Thus, the Law predated Moses, at least in regards to the aspects that Jubilees highlights (calendrical observances, circumcision, food laws).
unwritten law of nature that was already available to Abraham (Abr. 3–6; 60–61; Opif. 3). Second example of Paul’s distinctive interest is his emphasis on the Abrahamic promise of blessing to all the nations, whereas, as Popović argues, there is no reception history of Gen 12:3 in the Dead Sea scrolls, which is most likely not due to silence of evidence but due to a conscious outlook that excluded the Gentiles from the covenantal blessings (this outlook is also shared in other Jewish texts, e.g. Jubilees).254
The third implication of approaching the Abraham narrative with Pauline interests in mind is the assumption that Paul was not aware of questions about different compositional strands of the Pentateuch.255 Thus, my analysis operates on the “final
form” of the text that is witnessed primarily in the LXX, but also in the MT.256 Paul
quotes Gen 21:10 in Gal 4:30 from the LXX (with his own modifications), but the possibility must be entertained that Paul can also operate with Hebrew (cf. Acts 21:37- 22:1 that portrays Paul as being bilingual),257 and occasionally demonstrates, possibly
his own, Hebraic revisions of the Greek text.258 I think that it is a plausible historical
reality that Paul, as a self-confessed Pharisee, was trained with the Hebrew scriptures (Gal 1:13-14; Phil 3:5-6; cf. Acts 22:3; 23:6; 26:4-5),259 and thus, although my analysis
254 Mladen Popović, “Abraham and the Nations in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Exclusivism and Inclusivism in the Texts from Qumran and the Absence of a Reception History for Gen 12:3,” in
Abraham, the Nations, and the Hagarites: Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Perspectives on Kinship with Abraham, ed. Martin Goodman et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 102–103.
255 Although source critical questions do not guide my investigation, I appreciate the observations of the approach. Source critical analysis points to features of the text (similarities between accounts, tensions in the text etc.) that are important to recognise even when the focus is on the final form of the text.
256 I recognise that the LXX is not a simple entity or a stable text. I use it here as a shorthand for the fluid tradition of the Greek translations (Old Greek) of the Hebrew Bible, a work that began in the mid 300 BCE. To have the best available access to the Old Greek text that Paul possibly used, I use the critical LXX Göttingen edition. The MT is the most comprehensive witness to the possible Hebrew text that was available to Paul, but I recognise that the MT might both reflect a different Vorlage to that of the LXX translator, and a different Hebrew text to what Paul used. I have not included in my analysis the relevant Qumran texts or Targums, but occasionally note their contribution to the discussion.
257 Cf. Matthew S. Harmon, She Must and Shall Go Free: Paul's Isaianic Gospel in Galatians, BZNW (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2010), 25.
258 For discussion, see Christopher D. Stanley, Paul and the Language of Scripture: Citation
Technique in the Pauline Epistles and Contemporary Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1992), who maintains that Paul used existing Hebraic revisions. Also, Dietrich-Alex Koch undertakes an analysis of the textual development of the LXX and argues that, since Paul's Hebrew- oriented renderings of the Greek text resemble at points an already available textual revision of the LXX, it is more likely that Paul had such a version at his disposal rather than making his own renditions (“The Quotations of Isaiah 8,14 and 28,16 in Romans 9,33 and 1Peter 2,6.8 as Test Case for Old Testament Quotations in the New Testament,” ZNW 101 [2010]: 223–40, especially pages 238-240). Martin Hengel suggests that Paul made himself the revised text he worked from (The Septuagint as Christian Scripture:
Its Prehistory and the Problem of Its Canon [Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2001], 83, 89). Whether Paul used
an already revised Greek text, or made his own revisions is beyond the scope of this research.
Nevertheless, it is important to recognise that Paul mainly operates with the Greek, but also potentially had the resource to read Hebrew.
259 Cf. W. D. Davies, Paul and Rabbinic Judaism: Some Rabbinic Elements in Pauline Theology (London: SPCK, 1948), 1–16. Paul's reading of Scripture in Hebrew is a debated question, which is left
is focused on the Greek text that Paul uses in Galatians, I also consult the Hebrew. My aim is to follow the lines in Paul's thought to the matrix of Scripture that he has reflected with (Greek and Hebrew), and not only to the text that he is using (Greek) in his communication in the Gentile mission. Thus, I note the relevant differences between the LXX and the MT, as I analyse the semantic potential in the Abraham narrative.260
Since my focus is on the final form of the text of Genesis 11-22, I approach it with insights gained from narrative criticism. I present here some features of the narrative approach that are important for my analysis. Berlin compares narrative to art and to the task of representation, in which relationships rather than absolutes matter: “[t]here is no correct size for painting a house or a flower. It depends on what else is in the picture, and where in the picture it is.”261 Thus, relationships are the clues for
interpretation.262 Berlin supplies several insights for how biblical narratives set up the
relationships that should guide its interpretation:
a) narrative analogy: the reading of one story in terms of another.263 A prevalent
feature in my analysis of the Abraham narrative is to establish relationships between accounts that elucidate one another (e.g. chs. 12 // 22; 16 // 21). I also note analogies that extend beyond the Abraham narrative.
b) character contrasts: “[c]haracters, especially main characters, in the Bible tend not to be absolutes. Our perception and evaluation of them comes through contrasts with other characters, with their earlier selves, or with the reader's expectation.”264 This is crucial for analysing the significance of Ishmael in
relationship to Isaac. Also, the development of Abraham's character, and the contrast with the people of Babel is important in order to capture the narrative point about Abraham's relationship to God and his significance for humanity. c) repetition, and variations on it: “it calls attention to the similarity of two things
open by many scholars (see discussions in Friedrich Wilhelm Horn, ed., Paulus Handbuch [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013], 66–75, 479-482).
260 I offer in the body of my text mostly quotations from the LXX, but include the MT when the Hebrew words become important in the discussion. Otherwise, I note significant differences with the Hebrew text in the footnotes. My own sense is that the LXX translator of Genesis attempted a very literal translation, but nevertheless could not retain the features that only the Hebrew language facilitates. This is supported by evidence that the LXX reading accords occasionally closely with the Hebrew text preserved in Qumran. Thus, it is possible that the LXX translator did not have the exact same Vorlage as the MT. See an example in Matthew Thiessen, “The Text of Genesis 17:14,” JBL 128 (2009): 628–629.
261 Adele Berlin, Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative (Sheffield: Almond, 1983), 135. 262 Ibid., 136.
263 Ibid. 264 Ibid.
or utterances, and may also be calling attention to their differences.”265 This
relates to capturing the narrative point of view.266 Alter elaborates on the idea of
repetition and proposes “a scale of repetitive structuring and focusing devices” that run from smaller elements to larger ones: Leitwort, motif, theme, sequence of actions and type scenes.267 The following are relevant in my analysis:
1) Leitwort: repetition that explores the semantic range and different forms of the word-root; includes word-play that involves phonetic relatives. This is important in capturing the significance of Isaac's birth that “plays” with his name.
2) theme: a leading idea that “is made evident in some recurring pattern, and that is often associated with one or more Leitwörter” or with a motif (a recurring concrete image, sensory quality, action, or object).268 This is relevant in section
3.4 that follows the theme of blessing to the nations that follows the recurring pattern in the promise of the great nation and blessing to all the nations, and is connected with the two Leitwörter blessing and seed.
3) sequence of action: a pattern of action with “some intensification or increment from one occurrence to the other, usually concluding either in climax or a reversal.”269 This is important in connecting Abraham with what precedes him
(Babel), but also within the Abraham narrative to discern the distinctions between the covenants (chs. 15 and 17+22) that have a certain pattern of action (establishing the covenant followed by ratification that includes a sacrifice). Berlin also points to the biblical narrative “technique of leaving gaps”270 and
connects it to the artistic principle where “the suggestion of a thing may be more convincing than a detailed portrayal of it.”271 This suggestive technique invites the
reader to fill in the picture.272 Besides being a technique to make the representation more
convincingly realistic, it also lends the potential of the text for the “painting” of various
265 Ibid. Alter adds emphasis on the differences: “what you have to look for more frequently is the small but revealing differences in the seeming similarities, the nodes of emergent new meanings in the pattern of regular expectations created by explicit repetition” (Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative [New York: Basic Books, 1981], 97). Thus, e.g. the differences in the repeated promise of the blessing formula are important to note (e.g. in you; in your seed).
266 Berlin, Poetics, 136. 267 Alter, The Art, 95–96. 268 Ibid., 95.
269 Ibid., 96.
270 Berlin, Poetics, 137. 271 Ibid., 136.
kinds of “pictures.” Thus, whilst recognising the potential of other kinds of pictures, I paint a picture in the following analysis that highlights the births of Abraham's two sons, Ishmael and Isaac, as the focal point for the interpretation of other important themes of the narrative. This is done to uncover the theological potential in the narrative for Paul's application in Gal 4:21-5:1. In doing this, I do not claim to give the right reading, or the historically understood original meaning of Genesis, but aim to elucidate the potential of the text that is relevant for reading Paul.