Story of Scripture,

by Daniel Jeremy Silver

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• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 046508205X
• ISBN13: 9780465082056
• Release Date: July 1990
• Publisher: Basic Books
• Length: 302 Pages
• Weight: 1.45 lbs.

Customer Reviews

The Story of Scripture:From Oral Tradition to the Written Word

I have found this book to be clearly composed, easy to read, meaningful in content and "academic" or professional in thrust. The quality of supply/service by the provider is that of excellence.

How did the stories get written down? And so what"?

Recounts in detail how the spread of literacy among the upper classes, more than any religious imperative, prompted the writing down of the oral traditions. The emergence of a scripture helped define a faith's teachings with greater precision, but at the same time it hampered the faith's freedom to adapt to changing circumstances. A second scipture inevitably arose: the Talmud for Jews. It was less more systematic and pedantic, less evocative and poetic than the original and intended to justify the ideas of those in power. The history of scripture depended on who controlled the apparatus of interpretation and what readings they authorized. THE AUTHOR'S ARGUMENT PROVIDES A THOUGHTFUL CORRECTIVE TO THE DANGEROUS PRONOUNCEMENTS THAT HAVE MARKED THE RECENT GLOBAL EXPLOSION OF RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALISM. The author was the Rabbi at the Temple in Cleveland until his death in 1989.