enth month. He read from it facing the square before the Water Gate
from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the
women and those who could understand; and the ears of all the people
were attentive to the book of the Law. The scribe Ezra stood on a
wooden platform that had been made for the purpose....AndEzra
opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was standing above
all the people; and when he opened it, all the people stood up. Then Ezra
blessed the Lord, the great God, and all the people answered, “Amen,
Amen,” lifting up their hands. Then they bowed their heads and wor-
shiped the Lord with their faces to the ground. Also Jeshua, Bani,
Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita,
Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites,helped the people to under-
stand the law,while the people remained in their places. So they read
from the book, from the Law of God,with interpretation.They gave the
sense, so that the people understood the reading. (Neh. 7:73b–8:8)A few things stand out in this account. It is not at Ezra’s initiative, but that
of the people, that this great public reading is said to have taken place. Ap-
parently, “all the people” knew that this great book of law (presumably our
Pentateuch) existed, but they were still somewhat fuzzy about its contents.
So they willingly stood for hours, “from early morning until midday,” in
order to hear its words firsthand. It is remarkable that this assembly in-
cluded “both men and women and all who could hear with understand-
ing,” that is, children above a certain age: the Torah’s words were, according
to this passage, not reserved for some elite, or even for the adult males of
the population, but were intended for the whole people to learn and apply.
But — most significantly for our subject — this public reading is accom-
panied by a publicexplanationof the text. The Levites “helped the people
to understand the Law, while the people remained in their places”; thus,
“they read from the book, from the Law of God,with interpretation.”
Why should Scripture have needed interpreters? No doubt the need
began with very down-to-earth matters. After all, every language changes
over time, and by the Second Temple period some of the words and ex-
pressions used in preexilic texts were no longer understood. Even such
basic concepts asget, take, need, want, time,andmuchwere expressed
with new terms by the end of the biblical period; the old words had either
shifted their meaning or dropped out of the language entirely. Under such
circumstances, some sort of interpreter would be necessary to make the
meaning of the ancient text comprehensible. The same was true with re-158james l. kugelEERDMANS -- Early Judaism (Collins and Harlow) final text
Tuesday, October 09, 2012 12:03:59 PM