This Shall Be Your Wisdom (Deut. 4:6): The Wisdom of Deuteronomy Amidst Changing Paradigms For Hebrew Wisdom

Abstract

Abstract The death of ‘Wisdom Literature’ as a literary genre that has controlled understandings of wisdom in the Hebrew Bible has resulted in a need for new investigations of the concept of wisdom in biblical books outside the ‘Wisdom Literature’, which have often been considered to be ‘influenced’ by the artificial genre of ‘Wisdom Literature’. This paper will analyse the relationship between wisdom and law in the book of Deuteronomy, in order to show how freeing the concept of wisdom in Deuteronomy from the influence of ‘Wisdom Literature’ opens up perspectives to appreciate the wisdom of Deuteronomy on its own terms as a unique contribution to conceptions of Hebrew wisdom. Rather than thinking of the wisdom of Deuteronomy as being influenced by ‘Wisdom Literature’, the wisdom terminology in Deuteronomy is better accounted for by Deuteronomy’s rhetorical appropriation of the ancient Near Eastern Instruction and Law Code literary forms, each of which focuses on transmitting wisdom for successful living. The wisdom of Deuteronomy, which is cultivated throughout the book in the literary forms of Instruction and Law Code for the transmission of knowledge and intellectual skill in Torah interpretation and application, is distinct yet complementary to the wisdom found in the traditional ‘Wisdom’ books, Proverbs, Job, and Ecclesiastes.