The Story of Scripture : From Oral Tradition to Written Word

Challenges the conviction that scripture is a sacred text with which one should not tamper, and argues that the most creative eras of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam occurred before written scriptures were developed

Silver, author of several works on the history of Judaism, has here written a controversial but interesting and lucid analysis of the development of scripture in Judaism. Pointing out that the truly creative period in each of the major Western religions was in its pre-written scripture period, he argues that "some scriptural material is neither high minded nor significant." Silver analyzes the emergence of scripture in relation to the spread of literate society and describes the importance of the development of the alphabet to this phenomenon. Using archaeology and the history of culture and civilization to buttress his views, he examines the differences between the first scripture, the Bible, and the second, the Talmud--also showing how the scriptures of both Christianity and Islam developed similarly. Recommended to libraries with an interest in Jewish studies and comparative religion.
- Maurice S. Tuchman, Hebrew Coll . Lib . , Brookline, Mass.
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