A couple of weeks ago I received a copy of Nehemia Gordon and Keith Johnson’s new book, A Prayer To Our Father for review. The book is a joint Jewish/Christian study of the Avinue (lit. “Our Father”), the Lord’s Prayer. Nehemia plays the part of the Jewish theology geek from Israel, and Keith plays the part of the Christian pastor-jock from Minneapolis, an odd couple that struck up a friendship when Nehemia met Keith while giving tour guides in Israel. Nehemia’s tutorship in ancient Hebrew eventually turned to his suggestion that they launch into a deep study of the Hebrew version of the Gospel of Matthew
The Gospel of Matthew as we read it today in English is based on Greek manuscripts, often hundreds of years removed from original authorship. The Gospel texts were passed around under various names for several hundred years, in varying formats, until they settled into standardized texts under the currently assumed names we read today. By the time we have fully standardized Greek manuscripts of a Gospel, it has been redacted unknowable numbers of times and is at the very least changed by translation. Any linguist will attest that translating is always tinged by agenda, even if unknowingly, and no translation will perfectly match it’s original source in meaning. Because of this confusion (as well as the early Church references to Matthew originally being written in Hebrew, not Greek or Aramaic), Keith and Nehemia sought the oldest manuscripts of the Hebrew Matthew, and produced this book specifically on the Avinue prayer from Matthew chapter 5.
This is the Avinue, the Lord’s Prayer, as they translate it to English from Hebrew Matthew. Notice the differences with the standard English versions translated from Greek:
Our Father in Heaven
May your name be sanctified
May your kingdom be blessed
Your will shall be done in heaven and on earth
Give us our bread continually/daily
Forigive us the debt of our sins as we forgive the debt of those who sin against us
Do not bring us into the hands of a test
And protect us from all evil
Amen
Pros
They consistently took pop-shots at common Chrisitan myths, such as the idea that it was revolutionary for a Jew to refer to God as “Abba/Father.” That was an eye opener for me. It was embarrassing, really, to see how many places the Scriptures reffered to God as “Avi,” the Hebrew equivalent of the Aramaic abba. Even Genesis, a book put together five hundred years before Christ, names the forth person of all time as Avi’el (lit. “Father, god” or Abel in English).
The Hebrew refresher was much appriated throughout, as I have not studied Hebrew in a year. It was good to feel the linguistic geek in me resurface.
Oh, and they decide on the age old debate of how the name of God, YHWY, is supposed to be pronounced (in case you ask, they settle on “Yehovah”), although I’m not sure if such a debatable claim being settled with such immediate certainty is a good thing or not for credibility.
But seriously, the book could serve as a great introduction to basic Biblical linguistics and criticism. And Biblical criticism is something that I think more Christians ought to be exposed to, with all the usurping questions that scholarship can create to question, twist, do violence to, and recreate a faith.
Cons
Even while only coming to a grand total of 172 pages, the book felt stretched. The duo’s search for the place where Christ most likely gave the sermon on the mount took up nearly a third of the book. And they came to a conclusion all right (at the expected last of 8 failed treks described in detail, I might add), but when you are on detailed-trek 3 of 8 and you know which one they will decide is the right one, do you really want to keep reading? There was lots of this stretching of the material, and I’m pretty sure I could have gotten half the book’s content with Google search (although the Jew-sight was appreciated).
The duo also consistently refer to a gospel that a disciple named Matthew wrote, and that irritated me in a way. There was not even a hint of doubt cast on Matthew’s authorship, the fact that a semi-stable and consistent version of Matthew didn’t exist for a couple hundred years after supposed authorship, or the fact that we cannot verify original authorship’s language anyways aside from a few references from 3rd century church fathers who could be notoriously sloppy with their side references to history. For a book on the Hebrew Matthew, I was expecting at least a little scholarship on the authorship of Matthew, a solid reasoning to believe the original source was Hebrew, or even a defense of the idea that a disciple named “Matthew” wrote the piece. Alas, given the surprising lack of scholarly evidence that Jesus himself existed, maybe we can let Matthew slide. Still, if you are going to write a biblical examination, at least prove to me that what you are writing on is legit if you claim the establishment has it wrong on the source.
Suspending disbelief is great for a church service, but if you are writing a book on ancient Hebrew manuscripts, of which we have no originals, I would prefer you acknowledge the whole thing could easily be a fraud and give defense, if only for the sake of being intellectually honest.
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A quick warning: if you believe the Bible as we have it today is exactly the same as some original manuscript actually written by a guy the book is named after, be forewarned that Nehemia and Keith will make light work of this view in a mere side note in the opening pages. You should probably stay away from this book (or any Jewish thought on Scripture… or scholarship in general for that matter)
In the end, it’s a quick and easy read. You pick up lots of Hebrew and the authors bring a skimmed scholarship to the highschool level. Though I would suggest this book to anyone familiar with the history of Jewish belief on the Bible, if you haven’t read any Jewish perspective, scholarship, language, or philosophy before, this could be a great place to start.
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