Ancient Judaism

513 Pages·1967·34.415 MB·English

by  Max Weber

ANCIENT
JUDAISM

MAX WEBER
ANCIENT
JUDAISM
TRANSLATED AND EDITED BY
HANs H. GERTH AND DoN MARTINDALE
THE FREE PRESS
A Division of Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.
~
NEW YORK
Collier Macmillan Publishers
LONDON
Copyright 1952 by The Free Press, a Corporation
Printed in the United States of America
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in
any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without per
mission in writing from the Publisher.
Collier Macmillan Canada, Ltd.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 52-8156
FIRST FREE PRESS PAPERBACK EDITION 1967
printing number
5 6 7 8 9 10
CONTENTS
Preface
PART I-THE NATURAL AND CULTURAL BACKGROUND
OF ANCIENT JUDAISM
I. The Social Structure and its Setting s
1. Prefatory Note: the Sociological Problem of Judaic
Religious History S
2. General Historical and Climatic Conditions 5
3. The Bedouins 10
4. The Cities and the Gibborim 13
5. The Israelite Peasant 28
II. The Gerim and the Ethic of the Patriarchs 28
1. The Plebeian Strata 28
2. The Pre-Exilic Metic 32
3. Herdsman and Peasant 36
4. The Ethic in the Time of the Patriarchs 49
PART ll-THE COVENANT AND CONFEDERACY
III. The Social Laws of the Israelite Legal Collections 61
1. The Laws as an Index to Social Development 61
2. Social Law of the Israelite Collections 70
3. The Berith 75
4. The Yahwe Confederacy and its Organs 77
IV. Warfare and War Prophecy 90
1. Holy War, Circumcision, Nazarites 90
2. The Nebiim 96
3. Nabi Ecstasy and Prophecy 102
4. Changing Forms of Prophecy 105
:. 0 c
»vi « CONTENTS
v. Social Significance of the War God of the
Confederacy 118
1. Uniqueness of the Relation of Israel to its God 118
2. The Nature of the War God 124
3. Social Reception of the War God 130
4. Non-Yahwistic Cults 139
PART m-PRIESTHOOD, CULT, AND ETHICS
VI. Cultic Peculiarities of Yahwism 149
1. The Sabbath 149
2. Baal and Yahwe: The Idols and the Ark 154
3. Sacrifice and Expiation 162
VII. Priests and the Cult Monopoly of Jerusalem 169
1. The Levites and the Torah 169
2. The Develofment of the Priesthoc,d and the Cult
Monopo~ o Jerusalem 174
3. The Fig t of Yahwism against Orgiasticism 187
VIII. Forms of Israelite Intellectuality in the Pre-
Prophetic Era 194
1. The Israelite Intellectuals and the Neighboring
Cultures 194
2. Mesopotamian Culture Relations 201
3. The Yahwistic and Elohistic Intellectual Traditions 205
IX. Ethics and Eschatology of Y ahwism 219
1. Magic and Ethics 219
2. Mythologies and Eschatologies 225
X. Intercultural Relations in Pre-Exilic Ethics 235
1. Substantive Content of Jewish Ethics 235
2. The Ethic of the Decalogues and the Book of the Dead 250
3. Economic Ethic 252
4. Charity 255
PART IV-THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE JEWISH
PARIAH PEOPLE
XI. Social Psychology of the Prophets 267
1. Political Orientations of Pre-Exilic Prophecy 267
2. Hellenic and Judaic Prophecy 270
CONTENTS » vii «
S. Established Authority versus the ~ 271
4. Status Orientations and Inner-Politi Attitudes 271
5. Social Context of the Prophetic Messafe 278
6. Psychological Peculiarities of the Prop ets 286
XII. The Ethic and Theodicy of the Prophets 2fJT
1. The Profohetic Ethic 297
2. Eschato ogy and Prophets 321
XIII. The Pariah Community 336
1. The Development of Ritualistic Segregation 336
2. The Dualism of In-Group and Out-Group Morality 343
XIV. The Exile 356
1. B~onian and Egyptian Exiles 356
2. E 'eland Deutero-Isaiah 364
S. The Priests and the Confessional Restoration after the
Exile S80
PAl\T V-8UPPLEMENT: THE .PILUUSEES
XV. Sects and Cults of the Post-Exile Period 385
1. Pharisaism as Sect Religiosity 885
2. The Rabbis 391
3. Teaching and Ethic of Pharisaical Judaism 400
XVI. Judaism and Early Christianity 405
1. Essenism in Relation to the Teachings of Jesus 405
2. Increasing Ritualistic Segregation of the Jews 417
S. Proselytisln in the Diaspora 418
4. Propaganda of the Christian Apostles 421
Notes 425
Map, Location of Historic Places 462
Glossary and Index 463
1. Subjects 463
2. Persons 478
3. Places and Countries 483

I
PREFACE
The essays on Ancient Judaism appeared originally in the 1917-
1919 issues of the Archi1) fur Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialforschung.
They represent decades of study of Mediterranean antiquity and the
great world religions.
Max Weber's untimely death in 1920 prevented him from rounding
out his studies with an analysis of the Psalms, the Book of Job, Tal
mudic Jewry, early Christianity, and Islamism. Marianne Weber, his
widow, published Das Antike Judentum as volume three of Weber's
Gesammelte Aufsiitze zur Religions-soziologie (Tiibingen, 1921). In
presenting the essays ..a lmost unchanged in their original form," she
observed: "A sovereign and resigned calmness toward his personal
fate characterized Max Weber. Perhaps he would say now as often
before: What I do not achieve others will.'"
According to Weber, the world historical importance of Judaism is
not exhausted by the fact that it fathered Christianity and Islamism.
It compares in historical significance to Hellenic intellectual culture,
Roman law, the Roman Catholic church resting on the Roman con
cept of office, the medieval estates, and Protestantism.1
Considering himself a relative amateur compared to historical spe
cialists, archeologists, Egyptologists, and Old Testament scholars,
Weber does not claim to have unearthed new facts. "It would require
more than a lifetime to acquire a true mastery of the literature con
cerning the religion of Israel and Jewry. ... We entertain but modest
hopes of contributing anything essentially new to the discussion,
apart from the fact that, here and there, some source data may be
grouped in a manner to emphasize some things differently than
usual." 1 This emphasis, a genuine theoretical contribution, is socio
logical. New relations are perceived between old facts when Weber
brings the varied talents of jurist, economist, historian, linguist and
philosopher to the task of integration.
1 See below, p. 5.
I Footnote 1, p. 425 below.