Baruch Ben Neraiah: From Biblical Scribe to Apocalyptic Seer (review)

Hebrew Studies 45 (2004) 333 Reviews It is, of course, the wide extrapolations drawn from narrow studies that become the easiest targets for criticism. From the beginning, Shead is aware of the limitations of his approach: “What follows is no more than a preliminary sounding of the problem,” he says of his study (p. 7, see also p. 256). For the larger questions of the compositional history of the scroll, Shead has provided an interesting analysis of a very small piece of the puzzle, but there are so may other pieces to consider, and so many other text-critical questions to be asked that his work is indeed only a “preliminary sounding.” While some of Shead’s analysis is quite objective in nature, the conclusions drawn from it (by Shead or any others), even in regard to the compositional nature of chapter 32, still seem open to crucial literary arguments. It is unfortunate that for his analysis of markers of direct speech that he did not engage the linguistic and textual analysis of C. Miller’s standard work on the topic (The Representation of Speech in Biblical Hebrew Narrative: A Linguistic Analysis [HSM 55; Atlanta, Ga.: Scholars Press, 1996). Finally, H. M. Orlinsky (“Prolegomenon: The Masoretic Text, A Critical Evaluation” in Introduction to the Massoretico-Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible, ed. C. D. Ginsburg [New York: Ktav, 1966], pp. xxiii–xxiv) stressed the point years ago that “there never was, and there never can be, ‘the masoretic text’” [emphasis his]. (More recently, see E. Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible [2d rev. ed.; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001], pp. 21ff). But Shead’s study, which is to be commended for its detailed reading of a small segment of text and its compilation of data from many versions, does not consider the issue of variants in the Masoretic tradition. Even so, for those who are interested in detailed word-by-word text critical arguments regarding Jeremiah 32 (and some considerations for the larger scroll), I recommend his study. James E. Bowley Millsaps College Jackson MS 39210 bowleje@millsaps.edu BARUCH BEN NERAIAH: FROM BIBLICAL SCRIBE TO APOCALYPTIC SEER. By J. Edward Wright. Pp. xvi + 186. Columbia, S.C.: University of South Carolina, 2003. Cloth, $34.95. This book is a model of the sort of work that virtually all sensible scholars aspire to produce: it is well informed regarding the state of scholarship, its innovations are consequential, and it effectively engages readers from a wide range of backgrounds. Not only that, because Wright interprets the series’ charge to treat a personality of the Old Testament as an invitation to consider the varying roles Baruch plays in early Jewish and Christian literature, the Hebrew Studies 45 (2004) 334 Reviews volume covers an impressive number of primary texts and corresponding socio-historical contexts. Thus Wright claims with justification at the outset that the book “combines a literary history of a biblical character with a socioreligious study of several models of early Jewish and Christian religious leadership” (p. xi). Chapter 1, “The Scribe,” deals with the Baruch of the Book of Jeremiah. After describing the socio-historical context of Jeremiah’s ministry, Wright provides a general discussion of scribes and scribalism in the ancient near east. Against this backdrop, Wright discusses in succession key passages for understanding Baruch as Jeremiah’s scribe (Jeremiah 32; 36; 43; 45), arguing that Baruch was no mere secretary, but a full partner with Jeremiah in his ministry (e.g., Jeremiah 43 is an instance of Baruch inciting Jeremiah to his task). Indeed, Wright suggests that Jeremiah’s oracle for Baruch in chapter 45 points to the possibility that the scribe was “expected to take Jeremiah’s place as a community leader and recipient of divine revelation” (p. 34). Further, Wright argues that some tradents’ placement of the oracles against the nations (MT Jer 46:1–51:58) following 25:13 in LXX Jeremiah—thus pushing the Baruch material to the end of the book—perhaps reflected those tradents’ opinion that Baruch was indeed the successor to Jeremiah. In any case, the heightening of Baruch’s significance in some circles—and the prophecy’s later transition to a...