Alastair's Adversaria - On Not Hearing the Bible as 'History'

Episode Date: August 15, 2026

This reflection was first published on the Anchored Argosy: https://argosy.substack.com/i/105250558/what-were-reading-on-not-hearing-the-bible-as-history Follow my Substack, the Anchored Argosy at https://argosy.substack.com/. See my latest podcasts at https://adversariapodcast.com/. If you have enjoyed my videos and podcasts, please tell your friends. If you are interested in supporting my videos and podcasts and my research more generally, please consider supporting my work on Patreon (www.patreon.com/zugzwanged), using my PayPal account (https://www.paypal.com/donate/?business=4WX77P4F8S7WL), or by buying books for my research on Amazon (www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/3…3O?ref_=wl_share). You can also listen to the audio of these episodes on iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/alastairs-adversaria/id1416351035.

The following reflection was first published on the anchored argosy, entitled On Not Hearing the Bible as History. A while back I enjoyed dipping my toes into some of Joshua Berman's work, more specifically parts of his created equal, how the Bible broke with ancient political thought, his Animamin, Biblical Criticism, Historical Truth and the Thirteen Principles of Faith, and his narrative analogy in the Hebrew Bible battle stories and their equivalent non-battle narratives. Berman is an observant reader of scripture, with perceptive insights on many passages, for instance on something such as the unsettling story of the Levite and his concubine in Judges Chapter 19, a passage to which he devotes a chapter in narrative analogy in the Hebrew Bible. In her groundbreaking work on the book, ETA Davidson has observed the way in which the narratives of judges

routinely function as glosses or commentary upon each other and upon other scriptural narratives. Without an appreciation of this, much of the richness of the book will pass us by. For instance, Delilah's attempts to get Samson to reveal the secret of his strength are designed to recall Samson's earlier feats, while the 1,100 pieces of silver in the story of Micah in Chapter 17 should remind us of the same sum in the story of Samson in the preceding chapter. Paying close attention to shared vocabulary and symmetrical events. Berman comments upon the way that the story of judges chapters 20 and 21 and the war with

the Benjaminites replays the themes of the story of the Levites concubine. Both the concubine and the Benjaminites are the victims of some evil or disaster. Compare chapter 19 verse 23 and 20 verse 12 with chapter 20 verse 41. They're encircled, chapter 19 verse 22 and chapter 20 verse 43. They're hunted to exhaustion. Chapter 19, verses 24 and 25, and then chapter 20, verse 43. They're abused. Chapter 19, verse 25 and 20 verse 45. They fall, chapter 19, verse 26 and 27.

And then chapter 20 versus 44 and 46. And are cast. Chapter 19, verse 25, and chapter 20 verse 48. Both meet their demise in connection with the sun's rising. chapter 19 verses 25 to 27 and chapter 20 verse 43, they're destroyed on the threshold of their former shelter, the concubine outside the house, and the Benjaminites just outside of Gibia. Israel reflects upon both events similarly,

Chapter 20 verse 12 and chapter 21 verse 3. Look more closely and further parallels emerge, such as the fact that both the concubine and the Benjaminites flee to a place where they remain for four months, Chapter 19 verse 2 and 20 verse 47. Recognising such parallels, the attentive hero will be led to ponder upon what they might mean. Perhaps one of the areas where Berman is most helpful is in his criticism of higher criticism. My first exposure to Berman was likely his introduction to Umberto Cusuto's,

the documentary hypothesis and the composition of the Pentateuch. While there are aspects of Berman's approach with which most conservative Christian readers would take issue, His defence of Scripture against the charges of higher critics is powerful, and he puts his finger on some crucial issues with which all thoughtful readers of Scripture, Christian or Jewish, liberal or conservative, should engage. In the past, I've observed that modern conservative and liberal Christians largely share assumptions concerning history that seem to be foreign to the scriptural text. Even though the text intends faithfully to bear witness concerning concrete events

that occurred in time and space, the way the authors of Scripture and its original readers seem to approach this is strange to moderns, violating many of our basic conceptions of the sort of thing that history is. It is this that Berman most highlights. Berman reminds us that concepts and categories have origins and developments, and that many of those we take for granted in the modern world

may be without straightforward precedent or clear analogy in the scripture or the world of its authors. He gives the examples of belief, law, history, author, fact, fiction, story, religion and politics. While not altogether without parallel within it, none of these concepts as they function in the modern world can simply be mapped onto concepts that were operative in the world of the scriptures. Without appreciation of this, it's easy to impose anachronistic demands and expectations upon the scriptures, demands and expectations that whether in the conservative cause of salvaging them from criticism or the liberal cause of savaging them with criticism may lead us to distort or discount scriptures that could fruitfully be understood on their own pre-modern terms.

Berman lists some of the under-examined assumptions with which we are accustomed to approach a supposed work of history, the assumptions that we hold concerning the content of such a work, the author of such a work, and ourselves as readers of such a work. Regarding the first, the content of such a work, Berman points out the way that rhetorical flourishes, symbolism, embellishment, and preaching or moralising, are all deemed inappropriate in works of history by moderns. On the second, the authors of works of history, Berman observes the way that we expect historians to be masters of the academic discipline of history

and its critical methodology, but do not believe that they are, thereby warranted to command or demand anything of us as their readers. Finally, readers of history approach their reading material as consumers and judges, who read voluntarily as those who reserve to themselves the right to be the arbiters of the meaning of the events recorded. He writes, In our world, the historian or journalist provides the facts. The reader determines the meaning.

Berman argues that this approach to the writing and reading of history is more peculiar to the modern age. Pre-modern history, within scripture and in other ancient histories, was chiefly exhortation, he writes. These writers never wrote with the disinterested aim of chronicling the past for its own sake. Rather, the deeds of the past were harnessed for rhetorical effect to persuade readers to take action in the present, to believe in the powers of a deity to deliver salvation,

to exhibit bravery or other civic virtues. A person was qualified to recount the deeds of the past, not chiefly on account of their mastery of historiography, but on account of their standing in the community as office holders, military heroes, esteemed men of letters, etc. Unlike contemporary historians, they weren't expected to provide a full account of their sources, or to prove in detail the accuracy of their claims. Berman notes, In our world, the primary encounter is between the reader and the facts he or she reads. In the pre-modern world, the primary encounter is between the reader and the authority of the exorter.

Their accounts were not expected to be clear and unembellished presentations of carefully sourced and substantiated facts with minimal rhetorical flourish, symbolism and literary artistry, their interpretations of events being submitted to the judgment of their readers. No, as texts written chiefly to exhort by figures withstanding in their communities, they address their heroes or readers with authority, giving their accounts of events in ways designed to persuade and to move their audiences in the present. This approach might in certain respects be closer to a modern historical movie than a modern academic work of history.

Such a movie, even while it may seek to be very faithful to the reality and require extensive research, won't provide detailed sources, allows a degree of embellishment, reordering, and dramatizing of its material, is artistically designed to move and inspire its audiences, rather than merely to inform them, and doesn't approach those audiences primarily as judges of the history that it portrays. Historians watching such movies may applaud the faithfulness of their portrayals, while recognizing that the faithfulness of such works will be assessed by rather different,

even if not entirely foreign criteria from those applied to their own. Of course, in other respects, scripture is a very different thing from such modern artistic portrayals of past events, so in avoiding the limitations of one modern analogue, we should beware of thoughtlessly adopting the limitations of another. Any attentive reader of scripture should not take long to recognise that even though it is very concerned faithfully to communicate past events

and is also often written by eyewitnesses of some of those events, and or by persons who knew several such eyewitnesses. It is very different from the kinds of historical writing to which we are accustomed, and much more akin to the historical writings of its own time. The accounts of Scripture do not, as contemporary histories, humbly present their account of the facts before the bar of the discipline of history, their reliability and meaning to be judged by their heroes according to the principles of sound method. No, they speak as authoritative and trustworthy witnesses that call for faith from their hearers. Those accustomed to trying to get behind various historical accounts to discover the underlying facts

and adjudicate competing interpretations will frequently be dismayed by the degree to which scripture obstructs their way, leaving us little choice but to submit to or disregard its authoritative testimony. while harmonization of accounts may be possible and we should not presume embellishment, scripture routinely portrays events in ways that seem more concerned to communicate their theological import than the simple facts of the history. What was the nature of Judas' death? Matthew and Acts give us very different accounts, and while they can be harmonized, the difficulty and awkwardness of such harmonization suggests that Matthew and Luke were rather

less interested in the supposedly pure historical details of Judas' death, what actually happened, than in portraying the event so as to accent aspects of its theological and typological import. Of course, the theology and typology must be grounded in real events, but textual mediation is in inescapable, while assuring us of the grounding of our faith in concrete historical realities, scripture portrays events in ways that neither invite nor really facilitate reconstruction of what actually happened, as moderns can tend to think of this, as discrete and unadorned facts detached from frameworks of meaning and authority.

Its account of the past is not a recounting of historical facts, but an authoritative portrayal designed to summon people to faithfulness in the present and to equip them to perceive the meaning of events. In reading the scriptures as history, in the modern sense of that term, both liberals and conservatives can fail to treat them on their own terms. Conservatives, for instance, in reading biblical narratives as history, frequently miss their theological, typological, symbolic, literary, and hortatory character. The authority of such narratives can get thin down to their reliability as historical sources in the modern sense. On the other hand, those who appreciate the

literary artistry and symbolism of the biblical narratives, can lurch towards dismissing them as faithful accounts of the past. While Berman's approach to these issues differs from mine, he identifies the crux of so many of the problems with modern readings of scripture, whether conservative or liberal. If you'd like to read more of my reflections, keep up with my work, and see pictures of what my wife and I have been doing of late, you can do so on the anchored argosy. My work there, here and in many, other places is provided free of charge, designed to be accessible to as many people as possible. That is made possible by generous donations of various people. If you would like to donate,

you can do so using my Patreon or my PayPal accounts. The links to those are below. God bless and thank you for listening.