"Seems"? Perhaps seems. But if we wish to be objective readers and not be swayed by any sort of agenda then I think we should take seriously Eric Cline's own explanation for what he was "primarily" about in that chapter:andrewcriddle wrote: ↑Tue Oct 11, 2022 7:47 amThe chapter is The Nehemiah Memoir Clines seems to accept that large parts of the book of Nehemiah were written by the historical Nehemiah. What he is primarily questioning is Nehemiah's honesty and objectivity in recounting his experiences.neilgodfrey wrote: ↑Fri Oct 07, 2022 2:35 amI was surprised at Grabbe's naivety in appearing to assume that typical novelistic features in the story of Nehemiah are evidence of an imaginary diary as a source.rgprice wrote: ↑Wed Oct 05, 2022 8:37 am This is from Lester Grabbe's highly respected work:
Two biblical books claim to describe the Jews of Palestine in the Persian period; these are Ezra and Nehemiah. One of the most accepted conclusions of today is that much of the book of Nehemiah is based on Nehemiah's personal account (the so-called `Nehemiah Memorial/Memoir'). Thus, we have some indication not only of Nehemiah's deeds but even of his attitudes and (private?) thoughts. This is valuable material; on the other hand, we must recognize that it is very one-sided and reflects the entrenched opinions and biases of a strong-willed willed man. We can hardly use it as a dispassionate chronicle of events. Nehemiah's own firmly held views shape the entire narrative. The material in Ezra is quite different. In it are a number of alleged documents of the Persian administration. Although these have been widely accepted as authentic in recent English-language language commentaries, their genuineness has been strongly questioned in Continental scholarship.
-Lester L. Grabbe. An Introduction to Second Temple Judaism: History and Religion of the Jews in the Time of Nehemiah, the Maccabees, Hillel, and Jesus (Kindle Locations 448-452). Kindle Edition.
Of course, Nehemiah makes references to the Torah. Nehemiah 8 in particular describes a presentation of the "Book of the Laws of Moses".
Eric Clines, to my way of thinking, patiently demonstrated the novelistic genre of our book of Nehemiah in a chapter in his book What Does Eve Do to Help? (link is to my series of 5 posts on that chapter)
Andrew Criddle
. . . . It has been the intention of the present study to show that a strict regard to the literariness of the document and to the role of the reader in the processing of the document is inevitably profitable for the historian.
If it were merely a simple matter of questioning the objectivity of a narrative, of seeing reasons to suspect an author might not be fully transparent about his motives, and so forth, then it would have been a very bland chapter indeed insofar as it would be telling us nothing new or discussion-worthy about how historians as a rule are found to approach their sources.
But that is not what Clines seems to be addressing at all. He is addressing the all-too-common failure of historians -- especially in biblical studies -- to first grapple with questions of literary tropes, literary functions, and then to follow up those studies by rigorously applying the results to how a document is read.
Clines includes a footnote there. Following up that reference we read:
One of the guilty names that Clines points to is Siefgfried Hermann. Here are some selections from from the relevant pages (310-311):
The tale is well told, and may be tailored to Nehemiah’s later achievements, but it is not lacking in contemporary colouring, and cannot be dismissed entirely as fiction. . . .
Sure, it's easy for historians to say they are sceptical and have reservations about an author's objectivity and honesty but the historian needs to undertake some groundwork before reaching such a position. He or she needs to understand the nature of the text itself.
The literary tropes Clines identifies in the book of Nehemiah are, I would suggest, consonant with "historical fiction". Historical fiction can be written by a real person writing his "memoirs" and by an author speaking through a created literary figure.
How does a reader begin to sift the history from the fiction?
The answer to that question involves resort to external or independent references. If they don't exist then where can we possibly start?
Or maybe there are independent sources and the Elephantine papyri do point to a Judaism of the day in which everyone understood the sabbath was a market day and god should be worshiped alongside his wife.