{"id":42000,"date":"2018-10-14T21:40:16","date_gmt":"2018-10-14T18:40:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=42000"},"modified":"2022-05-10T19:20:47","modified_gmt":"2022-05-10T16:20:47","slug":"normative-and-narrative-the-larger-context","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/normative-and-narrative-the-larger-context\/","title":{"rendered":"Normative and Narrative: The Larger Context"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"entry-content\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":50634,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[651,366,414,363],"acf":{"old_id":"42000","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":41606,"related_cahpter":"69","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"The surrounding story offers a window into the fuller purpose of the laws","content":"<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">Rashi\u2019s first comment on the Torah cites Rabbi Isaac\u2019s question: Why does the Torah begin with the Genesis narrative, instead of with the first law given to Israel? An assumption that the Torah\u2019s legal stipulations are its main point underlies the question \u2013 a fair premise, to be sure \u2013 but the enmeshedness of biblical law and narrative invites us to think harder about the point of the Torah\u2019s legal sections in the first place. After all, the first such section is not simply a discrete list of rules, as we might expect in a written body of law.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">The buildup to the theophany at Sinai in Exodus 19 acts with Exodus 24 as a detailed narrative frame for the Decalogue and additional laws in Exodus 20-23. This frame gives the intermediate laws a context, a part in a story. They are anchored in a setting: at a remote mountain, following years of slavery and a redemption exploding with displays of divine might, amid a long migration through the wilderness.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">The Code of Hammurabi from Mesopotamia famously has numerous documented affinities with biblical law. Whereas the US Constitution\u2019s \u201cWe the People\u201d frames its legal articles with a democratic expression of intent, the Code of Hammurabi\u2019s prologue and epilogue frame the laws as the accomplishments of a \u201cKing of Justice.\u201d In fact, the wealth of trial records that survived Hammurabi\u2019s time shows no evidence that his laws were consulted as a \u201claw code\u201d; these laws were not necessarily prescriptive in intent or enforceable in practice, as we might expect. But that was not, apparently, their main purpose: Their purpose was not to be legal stipulations per se, but rather to demonstrate that King Hammurabi fulfilled his divine command to establish and champion justice.<\/p>\n<p style=\"direction: ltr;\">In the case of ancient Israel, the absence of documents like trial records (a result of the perishable materials on which they were written) makes it harder to determine the extent to which the Torah\u2019s legal stipulations were enforced or used in adjudication. The narrative framing of the laws in Exodus 20-23, however, may \u2013 like the prologue and epilogue of the Code of Hammurabi \u2013 offer a window into their fuller purpose.<\/p>\n","image":{"ID":54853,"id":54853,"title":"jo24-frame story","filename":"jo24-frame-story.png","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jo24-frame-story.png","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/storytelling-and-decision-making\/jo24-frame-story\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"jo24-frame-story","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":54852,"date":"2019-05-04 20:32:46","modified":"2022-09-07 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