A History of Ancient Near Eastern Law

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1.1.2.5 Motive Clauses

Fifty percent of biblical laws have a clause attached that may underline

the origin of the law, make a promise for keeping it, explain the

reason for it, hold out threats, and give purpose for the laws. These

clauses seek to persuade and thus indicate that the law collections

are being read and proclaimed to the people, rather than confined

to the reading of the literate. The need to persuade also hints that the

laws do not carry the legislative weight of being backed by officially

mandated violent acts. The law educates the public about what to

do and encourages it to follow by both promises and threats and by

explanations.^16

1.1.3 Legal Storyettes

The Pentateuch contains a set of little stories that record the breaking

of a norm, the detention of the miscreant while Moses went for a

decision, and a decision. These might be considered case law fleshed

out into stories that served as precedent or, indeed, stories that actu-

ally established the precedent. The stories declare the laws ancient

and provide divine authority. Two stories, “the man who cursed with

God’s name during a fight” (Lev. 24:10–23), and “the man who

gathered wood on the Sabbath” (Num. 15:32–36), describe a case

of what we would call a “religious” infraction and impose the death

penalty for it. Three stories, “the daughters of Zelophehad” (Num.

27:1–11) and “the clan response to the daughters” (Num. 36) and

“those impure at Passover” (Num. 9:6–12), involve pleas from par-

ties to remedy their situation and establish social institutions: the

epiklarate and its contours and the second Passover. The “man who

cursed God’s name” ends with a whole set of provisions about penal-

ties for homicide and injury—an indication that the recitation of

these stories is part of the retelling and proclamation of law collec-

tions. The Book of Samuel includes one legal storyette, “the divi-

sion of spoils,” in which David’s men who went with him in battle

petition to keep all the spoils, and David declares that the spoils

must be divided equally. As in the “man who cursed,” the story

ends with a declaration of law, but here the authority is David’s and

he does not consult God (1 Sam. 30:22–25).^17

(^16) See Greenberg, “Biblical Law.. .”; Welch, “Reflections on Postulates...”;
Sonsino, Motive Clauses...
(^17) The Pentateuch also contains such a regulation, in Num. 31:25–28, which is
given by God to Moses without a storyette and without a general regulation attached.
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