Monday, December 13, 2021

Notes taken from Crispin H.T. Fletcher-Louis, “The High Priest as Divine Mediator in the Hebrew Bible: Dan 7:13 as a Test Case" (1997)

Notes taken from: Crispin H.T. Fletcher-Louis, “The High Priest as Divine Mediator in the Hebrew Bible: Dan 7:13 as a Test Case,” SBL 1997 Seminar Papers, pp. 161-93

 

Glancing at the Curricula Vitae of the candidates for the post described in Dan 7:13-4 the high priest is the front runner. In the first place, since the high priest is a representative character some of the other figures are included in his candidature: the high priest wears on his breastplate and shoulder pieces the names of the twelve tribes and so represents Israel. To the extant that the arrival of the “one like a son of man” before the Ancient of Days is interpreted in 7:18, 22, 27 as the giving of the kingdom to Israel, the former must either represent, or be symbolic of, the people of God. The high priest is, at the very least, a representative of Israel, is not her concrete embodiment within the cultic drama.

 

As a number of scholars have recently demonstrated, the high priestly garments also associate him with Adam, which is only natural given the strongly Edenic symbolism of the Temple. In Dan 7:2 the “four winds stirring up the great sea” reminds us of Gen 1:2 and the Chaoskampf mythology is firmly embedded in ancient Near Eastern creation accounts so the vision quite naturally climaxes with the coming of a “one like a human being” just as does Gen 1:1-31. (p. 167)

 

In Daniel 7 verse 14 has bee just cause for those who would see in v. 13 a messianic king, since there he is given “dominion, and glory and kingship.” However, in Israel’s pre-exilic period sacral kingship involved the king in a position tantamount to that of high priest and there was good scriptural warrant, upon which the Hasmoneans would capitalise, for a high priest with royal powers (esp. Psalm 110). . . . Not only does the high priest have a strong candidacy since he is wedded so closely to other angelomorphic figures, he does so in that context (the Temple cult) which was evidently the most significant for the development of the human angelomorphic tradition. Time and again there are telling signs that it is the temple cult, its drama and costume, its holiness and the experience of worship in a time and space qualitatively other, which have contributed to a given literary angelomorphic characterisation. (p. 168)

 

(Under the heading of “The High Priest, Baal, and the Chaoskampf”):

 

Because of the importance of the Baal allusion it is incumbent upon us to say something about the high priest and the Chaoskampf. That subject would merit extensive treatment in its own right. Given the confines of this study I can only flag up work in progress and give five reasons why I believe that prior to Daniel 7 the high priest had already taken on an identity mimicking that of Baal:

 

(1) First, while Mosca is right to draw attention to the way in which, for example in Ps 89, Baal motifs are transferred to the pre-exilic king, in the post-exilic period the prerogatives of kingship are transferred to priesthood. A priori, then, there is the possibility that the role of the king in the cult with respect to his authority over the mythical forces of chaos should be transferred to the role of the high priest within the same sphere.

 

(2) Secondly, P.J. Kearney has argued that in Exod 25-31 the sevenfold division in the instructions for the building of the Tabernacle corresponds to the seven days of creation in the P account of Genesis 1 (“Creation and Liturgy: The P Redaction of Exodus 24-40,” ZAW 89 [1977] 375-87. Each section begins “And the LORD spoke to Moses saying . . .” {Exod 25:1; 30:11; 30:17; 30:22; 30:34; 31:1; 31:12]). This correspondence is a transparent for the third and seventh sections where the building of the bronze laver (30:17-21: the “sea” of 1 Kgs 7:23) and the injunction to keep the Sabbath (31:12-17) correspond perfectly to the third and seventh days of creation in Gen 1:9-10; 2:2-3. . . .For our purposes Kearney’s suggestion is significant because it places the description of Aaron’s garments and his ordination (Exod 28-29) in parallelism with the first day of creation (Gen 1:1-5) where, however muted, there are echoes of God’s victory over the forces of creation in ancient Near Eastern cosmogonies. Kearney himself saw a parallelism between God creating light (Gen 1:3-4) and Aaron tending the Tabernacle menorah, to which reference is made in Exod 27:20-21 and 30:7-8 – an inclusion around Exodus 28-9 (“Creation and Liturgy,” 375. This relationship between Aaron, God and the creation of light can be correlated with Zech 2:8; 3:9; 4:14). That, here, Aron plays the role within the cult that God plays within creation Is important because, as John Day has noted with specific reference to Gen 1:3-5, in the ancient Near East the defeat of the forces of chaos is commonly associated with the dawn, light in general and the sun god or goddess (Day’s God’s Conflict, 102, 121-2. See e.g. Ps 46:6; Isa 14:12f; 17:14; Job 26:12-13; Hab 3:11 and esp. Psa 110:7 of the priest-king).

 

Similar conclusions are reached if we examine the details of Exodus 28-9 in their ancient Near Eastern history-of-religions context:

 

(3) The ephod (Exod 28:4f) has puzzled commentators. There is now general agreement that originally and in other contexts the biblical ephod was a garment that covered a statue of a god (See esp Judg 17:5; 18:14-20; Hos 3:4; cf. 2 Kgs 23:7: ABD 2:550 “Ephod”; HALAT 1:77). As such it was a biblical example of a widespread interest in the precious garments of the gods. This symbolism is then assumed to have been lost when in P Aaron is given an ephod.

 

However, there are good reasons to think the Aaronic ephod retained its divine garment symbolism. In the post-biblical period Jewish tradition continues to interpret the ephod’s symbolism in terms of divine clothing (In Gen. Rab. 38:8 the high priest wears God’s garments [cf. y. Yoma 7:3, 44b; Lev. Rab. 21:11]. In 4QShirShabb [4Q405 23 ii 5; 11QShirShabb 8-7 6] the ephodim are worn by the angelic priests of the heavenly realm. See also Josephus, Ant. 3:180 in context, Aristeas 99, Rev 1:13-16 . . .]). In the context of the cosmic symbolism of the Tabernacle it would make excellent sense to have Aaron wear such divine costume: “ . . . and not do different parts in the Temple and its objects represent the heavenly abode, but even the priest . . . represent the divine retinue, i.e. the angels” and so the high priest represents the presence of God Himself.

 

Outside the Hebrew Bible there are several instances of a word apparently cognate with the biblical אפור. In one of these the usage points to this garment being worn by the god victorious in the Choskampf. In a well-known passage from the Ugaritic Baal epic an ipd is worn by Baal when he slays Leviathan (CTA 5.I.1-5).

 

Although you [Baal] defeated Lotanu, the fleeing serpent,
destroyed the coiling serpent,
the Tyrant with the seven heads,
You were uncovered, the heaven came loose like the
girdle of your cloak (‘ipdk)! . . .

 

The first two lines of this text are remarkably close to Isa 27:1 and they are frequently cited in the discussion of Daniel 7. However, hitherto no notice has been taken to the reference in line 5 to an Ugaritic ephod and the implications this might have to Dan 7:13.

 

(4) Fourthly the stones on the high priest’s breastplate have several very specific and important symbolic functions. In the first place the parallels to Ezek 28:12ff and the Greek Addition to Esther D (15:6) clearly demonstrate that these are specifically attached to divine kingship (Compare Pseudo-Philo’s Biblical Antiquities 25:10-26:15 where the stones are related to those covering Amorite idols. Eschatologically, they will be set above the two cherubim over the ark [26:12]). . . .

 

(5) Finally, confirmation for the view that Aaron wears the garments of the God victorious in the Chaoskampf is provided by a remarkable passage in Josephus’ Antiquities Book 3. In his extended account of the tabernacle and the priestly clothing Josephus come to describe the sash with which the priests’ robe is girded to the upper body:

 

. . . they gird [the robe] at the breast, winding to a little above the armpits the sash, which is of a breadth of about four fingers and has an open texture giving it the appearance of a serpent’s skin. Therein are interwoven flowers of divers hues, of crimson and purple, blue and fine linen, but the warp is purely of fine linen. Having taken the end of the twisting across the breast and winding it around again, it is tied and then hangs at length, sweeping to the ankles, but is so long the priest has no task in hand, for so its beauty is displayed to the beholders’ advantage; but when it behoves him to attend to the sacrifices and perform his ministry, in order that the movements of the sash may not impede his actions, he throws it back over his left shoulder. Moses gave it the name of αβανηθ but we have learnt from the Babylonians to call it εμιαν, for so it is designated among them (3:154-6).

 

Why is the ash likened to a serpent (οφις) and does this have anything to do with Leviathan? The ash is referred to with the language of twisting (ελιξ), which is otherwise so characteristic of a snake’s skin. This language is also reminiscent of that used of the “twisting” serpent in Isa 27:1-2 and the parallel passage in the Baal cycle (CTA 5.I.1-3) where, as we have seen there is a reference to an ephod. A little further on Josephus says of the High Priest in particular that

 

. . . by the sash, wherewith he encompassed [the robe] he (i.e. Moses) signified the ocean, which holds the whole in its embrace.

 

Clearly this suggests that it is not a land serpent that is meant, but a sea serpent: the sash represents both Yam or Tiamat and their monster Leviathan (Lotahn) or Qingu. That this symbolic likely connection with the etymology of the name Leviathan (לויתן). It is commonly assumed that this is related to the Hebrew noun לִוְיָה, which in Prov 1:9 & 4:9 is some kind of wreath or garland, not unlike our priest’s sash (BDB 531, cf. the ליות [sing. ליה] which decorate the stands of the basin in Solomon's temple [1 Kgs 7:20, 30, 36]. Is it a mere coincidence that this basin was called "the Sea"?). In turn it is supposed that both nouns are derived from a hypothetical root HEB which would mean “to turn, twist, wind” (See most recently John Merton’s discussion: “Leviathan and Ltn: The Vocalization of the Ugaritic Word for the Dragon,” VT 32 [1982] 327-31). If some connection between this mythical beast and a sash embroidered in its image does in fact go back some way in biblical tradition this might explain the linguistic discrepancy between the biblical lwytn and the alternative spelling of the same creature’s name in CTA 5.I.1 where its consonants are ltn: by the period of biblical transmission, if not before, this monster had become associated with a cultic item of symbolic dress, and the precise form of its name affected accordingly.

 

The express purpose of the sash’s sea/chaos monster symbolism would require further examination. However, at this juncture there should be no doubt that the high priest wears a vanquished Leviathan: the sash hanging on his side evokes the image of a limp and defeated serpent in the hand of its conqueror (It is worth comparing cylinder seal images of the god victorious in the Chaoskampf, where the god holds in his hand the limp serpent. See e.g. E. Williams-Forte, “The Snake and the Tree in the Iconography and Texts of Syria during the Bronze Age,” Ancient Seals and the Bible [ed. L. Gorelick and E. Williams-Forte; Malibu, CA: Undena, 1983] 18-43, 39 [figs. 1, 2 &4] for examples).

 

With these five points there is, I submit, good evidence that, within the cult at least, the high priest takes on the some of God’s identity in the victory over the forces of chaos. Needless to say, whilst it would be over hasty to use the word “ditheism” of this material, the pattern is close to that of the relationship between the Ancient of Days and the ‘one like a son of man’ in Daniel 7. (pp. 186-91)