Quote:
Originally Posted by Will Wiley
I picked up Richard Elliot Friedman's book, Who Wrote the Bible again the the other day, and was wondering about the different priesthoods which he thinks were important in understanding who wrote, edited or redacted the hebrew bible.
What do we know of the priesthoods that claimed to be of Moses or of Aaron, and how did they relate to priests of the tribe of Levi?
Were these different traditions still in around by the time of the Common Era?
|
The simplest way to look at this is to realize that nothing was clear during First Temple times.
The priesthood was theoretically always Aaronite. Aaron was a Levite.
There is speculation that Moses was involved in the priesthood struggle. For example the Golden Calf incident in Deuteronomy is not very complementary to Aaron.
Deuteronomy 9:20
Quote:
|
Moreover the LORD was very angry with Aaron to have destroyed him; and I prayed for Aaron also the same time.
|
On the other hand, Exodus is sort of OK with Aaron's conduct.
The Moses/Aaron conflict has always seemed sketchy to me. Anyway Moses had a dubious marriage and maybe this is a reason for the Aaronid line to have won out.
Anyway, in the second temple period,
Zadok won out.
Quote:
|
Zadok (Hebrew: Tzadok צדוק, meaning "Righteous") was a priest descended from Eleazar the son of Aaron. He aided King David during the revolt of his son Absalom, and was consequently instrumental in bringing King Solomon to the throne. After Solomon's building of The First Temple in Jerusalem, Zadok was the first High Priest to serve there.
|
A likely story.
Quote:
Zadok was a patrilineal descendant of Eleazar the son of Aaron the high priest.(2 Samuel 8:17; 1 Chronicles 24:3) The lineage of Zadok is presented in the genealogy of Ezra (his descendant) as being of ninth generation of direct patrilineal descent from Phineas the son of Eleazar; Ezra 7:1, see 1 Chronicles 5:30 where he is placed ninth in descent from Phineas.
..Zadok, The son of Ahitub, son of Amaryah, son of Azaryah, son of Mirayoth, son of Zerachyah, son of Uzzi, son of Bukki, son of Avishua, son of Phineas
—Ezra 7:1-4
|
Sons_of_Zadok has some more depth on this.
Quote:
Phineas the son of Elazar the son of Ahron the Kohen..Behold I give to him my covenant of Peace, and is/will be his and his progeny after him (a) covenant of everlasting priesthood in turn of his zealousness for of his God, and he atoned for the sons of Israel
—Numbers 25:13
. Torah commentators such as Yosef Karo and explain that the continuity of high priesthood is put forth to the descendants of Phineas from this noted verse.[1]
|
It is not clear if the Hasmoneans were Zadokites
Were the Hasmoneans Zadokites?
Schofield, Alison, Vanderkam, James C., Journal of Biblical Literature Vol. 124, No. 1, Spring 2005
Discusses this.
Quote:
A series of important changes overtook the Jewish high priesthood in the early Seleucid period. Zadokites in the family line of Joshua the son of Jehozadak had passed the office along in hereditary fashion for about 350 years before Menelaus, a person with different family connections (2 Mace 3:4), usurped the office in 172 B.C.E. At Menelaus's death in 162 B.C.E., Alcimus, whose familial connections are unknown,1 succeeded him by royal appointment (162-159 B.C.E.). After Alcimus came that sacerdotal black hole from 159-152 B.C.E. Then in 152, Jonathan, a son of Mattathias, became the first Hasmonean high priest; members from his family retained the office until 37 (and briefly again in 35) B.C.E.
In the scholarly literature one often meets the claim that the Hasmoneans were not Zadokites;2 that is, they assumed an office not belonging to their family and thus occasioned charges against their legitimacy by groups such as the Essenes and Pharisees.
|
Anyway, it is a historical fact that the second temple priesthood were members of a family that claimed descent from Zadok for a long time.
There is a theory that Zadok was a
Jebusite.
Quote:
|
Some scholars have speculated that as Zadok (also Zadoq) does not appear in the text of Samuel until after the conquest of Jerusalem, he was actually a Jebusite priest co-opted into the Israelite state religion. Harvard Divinity School Professor Frank Moore Cross refers to this theory as the "Jebusite Hypothesis," criticizes it extensively, but terms it the dominant view among contemporary scholars,[9] in Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic: Essays in the History of the Religion of Israel.[10]
|
06-17-2013, 04:54 AM
Different priesthoods.
