Standard 3

Grade: 6–8 9–12

Students will appreciate Tanakh as a multivocal text with a complex history of development.

PREAMBLE

For modern Jews, the understanding that the Tanakh is not monolithic and has a complex history cannot be ignored. Whatever one's relationship is to the critical study of Tanakh, one must, at the very least, engage with the existence of these approaches. The methodology of this standard is to root this engagement in the earliest experiences of children, so that when presented in later years with the critical approach in more detail, they are able to integrate it into their understanding of limmud Torah.

This standard raises complex and spiritually challenging issues such as, "If we teach students to view the Tanakh critically, will they want to live their lives by it?"; "If students don't believe that the Torah is written by God, why should they value it more than Shakespeare, Homer, or any other kind of literature?"

We believe that critical approaches to the study of Tanakh can be taught in ways that provide spiritual nourishment and compelling connections to Judaism for children. We also believe that this standard gives students more than a new way of reading texts. It gives them a new view of Jewish history, a new understanding of the development of Jewish ideas, and, in essence, an appreciation of our tradition's enduring truths.

GO TO
STANDARD
GRADE LEVEL 6–8
STANDARD 3 BENCHMARKS
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3.1 Explains how biblical stories respond to issues of ultimate concern.

Suggested Examples: the nature of humankind, God's relationship to humanity, the importance of law

Suggested Resource: Michael Rosenak, Commandments and Concerns

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Raise questions and discuss issues of ultimate concern.
  • Reflect on personal understandings of the text.

3.2 Explores how messages of the Tanakh are timeless and enduring.

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Adduce the significance of a biblical narrative and its relevancy.
  • Explain how "truth" extends beyond "did it happen."

3.3 Recognizes the various genres of writing in the Tanakh.

Suggested Examples: narrative, legal, poetic, prophetic

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Identify characteristics of various genres from the biblical text.
  • Compare tone, use of language, and styles of genre.

3.4 Examines "twice-told" or "thrice-told" narratives in the Tanakh.

Suggested Examples: creation, Genesis 1:1-2:3 and Genesis 2:4b-25; flood story, Genesis 6:17-22 and 7:1-5; wife/sister, Genesis 12:10-20, Genesis 20:1-18, and Genesis 26:6-14; Hagar and Ishmael, Genesis 21:8-19; manna and quail in the wilderness, Exodus 16:2-3, 6-35a and Numbers 11:4-34; appointment of Joshua, Numbers 27:12-23 and Deuteronomy 31:14-15, 23

Suggested Resources: Richard Elliott Friedman, The Bible: With Sources Revealed, pp. 27-30; Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative, pp. 47-62

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Compare similarities and differences in events, sequence, and/or facts of narratives.
  • Note the use of language, names, and descriptions of biblical figures and the names of God.
  • Analyze various interpretations, traditional and modern, for recurring themes and/or for differences.

3.5 Compares and contrasts Torah texts that present divergent ideas about the same issue.

Suggested Examples: The Decalogue—Exodus 20:1-17 and Deuteronomy 5:6-18; Slavery—Exodus 21, Leviticus 25, Deuteronomy 15; Holidays—Leviticus 23, Numbers 28-29, and Deuteronomy 16:1-17

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Examine details of texts and note differences.
  • Explore reasons for repetitions.
  • Show how aspects of the Torah were formulated at different time periods.

3.6 Recognizes change in "voice" in certain biblical texts.

Suggested Examples: Genesis 11:9," that is why it was called Babel . . . ."; Genesis 12.6 and 13.7, "the Canaanites were then in the land"; Genesis 26:33, "that is why the children of Israel to this day do not eat the thigh muscle"; Genesis 36.3, "before any king reigned over the Israelite"; Deuteronomy 34.6, "until this day"; II Samuel 1:18, "It is recorded in the book of Jasher."

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Note a change in style and voice when reading biblical texts.
  • Use examples to examine and research how Tanakh was compiled.

GO TO
STANDARD
GRADE LEVEL 9–12
STANDARD 3 BENCHMARKS
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3.7 Knows that some biblical scholars have identified different sources in the Tanakh as a method for analyzing the composition of the Tanakh.

Suggested Resources: Richard Elliott Friedman, Who Wrote the Bible? and The Bible: With Sources Revealed; Nachum Sarna, Understanding Genesis (Introduction); Joel Rosenberg, "Biblical Narrative" in Back to the Sources, Barry Holtz, editor; Back to the Sources; Israel Knohl, Sanctuary of Silence (first and last chapters); Benjamin Edidin Scolnic, "Modern Methods of Bible Study" in Etz Hayim Torah Commentary; Ilana Pardes, Biography of Ancient Israel

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Read a secondary source on the documentary hypothesis and/or source criticism. Articulate the theory and provide evidence used to support J, E, P, D as distinct sources in the Tanakh.
  • Examine characteristics, literary style, vocabulary, and history of selected sources.
    • Compare biblical texts from different sections of the Tanakh considered to be from the same source, e.g., (D) Deuteronomy 31:24-29 to 2 Kings 22:8, the Scroll of Instruction in Deuteronomy to the discovery of the Scroll during King Joash's reign, (D) Jeremiah and Deuteronomy, (P) Ezekiel and Leviticus.

3.8 Understands that the Tanakh is a product of different writers.

Suggested Examples: Passover—Exodus 12:9; Deuteronomy 16.7, 2; Chronicles 35:11-13; Slavery—Exodus 21:2-6, 7-11; Leviticus 25:39-46; Deuteronomy 15:12-18; Collective and individual reward and punishment—Exodus 34:6-7; Psalm 99:8; Deuteronomy 7:9-10; Psalm 103:8-10; Ezekiel 18

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Trace changes in a given theme.
  • Compare differing views of a topic.
  • Explain how a response to an issue and/or event can be described differently.
  • Explain why all views were included in the Tanakh.

3.9 Understands that historical, authorial, and literary claims made by biblical texts should not always be taken at face value.

Suggested Examples: Biblical texts were not necessarily written in the time period of the events they are describing. Some biblical texts were ascribed to particular authors by later biblical writers or editors, e.g., Psalms to King David, Song of Songs to Solomon, second and third Isaiah to Isaiah, and later chapters of Amos to Amos. Some biblical texts reflect layers from earlier and later writers/editors, e.g., Amos, Isaiah 1-39 and 34-35, and Leviticus 16:1-28 versus 16:29-34.

Suggested Resource: introductions to the individual books of Prophets and Ketuvim in The Jewish Study Bible, Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler, editors

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Determine tone, style, and time frames in comparing Isaiah 6 to Isaiah 44.
  • Analyze a psalm without superscription for content, ideas, themes, etc. When presented with superscription, comment on the psalm for the suitability of subscription.
  • Examine texts for change in tone, style, and themes.

3.10 Recognizes that there are various methodologies for biblical text study.

Suggested Examples: Parshanut Hamiqrah/medieval commentaries, source criticisms, literary approaches

Suggested Resources: Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler, "The Modern Study of the Bible" and Barry D. Wallfish, "Medieval Jewish Interpretation" in The Jewish Study Bible, edited by Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler; Robert Alter, The Art of Biblical Narrative

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Research various interpretations of selected texts using different methodologies.
  • Analyze a selection from three points of view.
  • Posit a personal interpretation of selection and critique other views.

3.11 Knows there are various theories and unanswered questions regarding canonization of the Tanakh.

Suggested Examples: Tanakh was developed in stages. Canonization was a reaction to the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E. A book was chosen for canonization as a result of the community's views on sacredness and authority and inspiration. Tanakh includes a wide variety of genres as well as differing and contradictory traditions.

Suggested Resources: Marc Zvi Brettler, "The Canonization of the Bible" in The Jewish Study Bible, edited by Adele Berlin and Marc Zvi Brettler

3.12 Raises theological and philosophical questions through the study of Tanakh.

Suggested Examples: What can we learn from Abraham's dispute with God over Sodom and Gemorrah? What does it mean to have a covenant? What does it mean to be a chosen people? How can revelation be understood? What are the moral and ethical teachings of the Torah?

Sample Learning Activity:

  • Keep a journal reacting to the material being studied.

3.13 Engages with Jewish scholarly writing that attempts to grapple with critical scholarship and complex theological and philosophical ideas.

Suggested Examples: Neil Gillman, Sacred Fragments; Jonathan Wittenberg, The Three Pillars of Judaism; Elliot Dorff, Conservative Judaism: From Our Ancestors to Our Descendants; Ellen Frankel, The Five Books of Miriam: A Women's Commentary on the Torah

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Write a journal entry or book review responding to a theologian's position on critical scholarship.
  • Recognize that the discussion of these issues is a central component of Jewish identity for the modern Jew.

3.14 Articulates strategies for interpreting the text in the light of both its historical development and its final redacted form.

Suggested Examples: Genesis 1 and 2-3, Genesis 37, Numbers 16

Sample Learning Activity:

  • Interpret a self-chosen text from both source-critical and canonical perspectives.
    • Write an essay, teach a class, make a creative presentation.

3.15 Appreciates that traditional and modern critical methodologies are valid forms of interpretation.

Sample Learning Activities:

  • Reflect on purposes of specific interpretation and approach.
  • Journal a personal view of the understanding of Tanakh.