Anthology of Anthologies

Introduction

Robert Alter has called the book of Proverbs an “anthology of anthologies” (or a collection of collections)[1], indeed, a brief glance at Proverbs demonstrates that the book is subdivided into sections with even conservative scholars recognizing multiple authorship as the following unit headings demonstrate:

Proverbs of Solomon	1:1-9:18	A
Proverbs of Solomon	10:1-22:16	B
Words of the Wise	22:17-24:22	C
Words of the Wise	24:23-34	D
Proverbs of Solomon transcribed by Hezekiah’s scribes	25:1-29:27	E
Words of Agur	30:1-33	F
Words of Lemuel	31:1-31	G

Table 1: Proverbs by superscript or introductory heading

The headings suggest that editorial activity was still ongoing as late as Hezekiah’s era (two hundred years after Solomon). We might ask who collected the sayings and try to identify the different authors. Does a difference in style denote different authors? The first nine chapters are set in the form of instructions from a father to a son but the next section (up to chapter 22) consists of one-line aphorisms that seem to have no social context, interrupted by the “words of the wise” (reverting to instructional format), followed by the “Hezekiah collection” (similar to the one-line aphorisms) with the anthology concluding with an acrostic poem on the virtuous woman (chp.31).

Of course, some may object that such investigations add little to our understanding of the book. Does it matter who wrote the sections, or compiled/edited the book? Individual proverbs contain universal truths and “pithy” sayings (maxims) by which one can direct life – such investigations are therefore (it is objected) purely speculative academic ventures which contribute little to our everyday understanding of the sayings. However, context should never be so easily dismissed as the provenance of particular proverbs explains how they should be applied or understood. Moreover, the idea that individual proverbs have no social or historical context and are simply eclectic folk sayings (a stitch in time saves nine) or have been copied from Egypt[2] contradicts what we know about the Scriptures. Wisdom literature, such as the Psalms, is the result of the Psalmists life experiences and it is important to determine whether the psalmist is David, or Hezekiah (or someone else) and to establish (as far as is possible) the historical context. In the words of Proverbs: “It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter” (25:2).

There are a number of techniques that can help us “search out the matter”. Some of these methods were not available to bible students of a bygone era (such as stylometry)[3] and when combined with intertextual analysis this can lead to fresh insights into the text. This article hopes to be a short introduction to a more extended treatment of Proverbs which will appear later this year (DV) and therefore only preliminary findings are presented here, with more work needed to flesh out the inter relationship between Proverbs and other Wisdom Literature (Job, Psalms etc.) and with the prophetic corpus, particularly Isaiah.

Repetitions in Proverbs

Even a casual reader of Proverbs cannot help but notice the number of times that certain proverbs are repeated.[4] Scholars have proposed various reasons for the repetitions; some understand it as a remnant of poor editing (repetition is the “seam” between the original subunits),[5] others that iteration is the result of oral transmission, or that sayings were repeated in order to establish a numerical scheme.[6] However, the theory of imprecise or sloppy editing, mostly held by the older critics, is (rightly) dismissed by modern scholars.

Recently, G. Rendsburg (among others)[7] emphasise the importance of repetition and variation in poetry and prose in relation to performance response.[8] The device of repetition (often with slight variations) aided “live” performances and enhanced audience participation (minor variations assist alertness). We can readily imagine a book like Song of Songs being “performed” by allocating readers different roles and perhaps it was read on a special occasion (i.e., a wedding). Scholars believe that the nature and function of the sapiential material is made clear only when it is explored within a performance context, that is, in a particular social or dialogical situation that creates a framework through which to identify the function and significance of the discourse.[9] However, performance analysis is problematic in the book of Proverbs, as the material has been removed from its original context(s) of use and assembled into an anthology.

If the repetitions do not represent literary “seams” where units have been inexpertly joined together, but rather a literary device to enhance performance, can repetition tell us anything about the compositional development of the book?[10] It is certainly possible (as closer examination will substantiate) that repetition fulfils a dual function; enhancing performance response and providing textual coherence. If that is the case, then the use of repetition should tell us something about compositional history. Any provisional conclusions garnered on the hand of analysing repetitions can be further put to the test by subjecting the units to stylometric analysis and finally to intertextual analysis. If these three approaches reach similar conclusions we can be fairly certain that we are on the right track and we should know more about when Proverbs was written and why it was written.

Analysing Repetitions

The classic study on repetitions (mentioned earlier) is that of D. C. Snell, Twice-Told Proverbs and the Composition of the Book of Proverbs. Snell freely admits that his project has “failed” to explain repetitions; “Actually, I will fail at explaining repetition, but because repetition shows that sections of the book had in one way or another an affinity for each other, I will still be able to speculate in a more informed way than before about the way the book came together.” (p.9) Despite his admission, the work that Snell performs is important because he presents the data systematically dividing the repetitions into groups that consist of proverbs that are exactly the same except for spelling variations (6 sets), proverbs with one dissimilar word (6 sets), two dissimilar (11 sets), three dissimilar (9 sets) and four dissimilar words (10 sets).

Snell highlights the work of Israeli scholar Jehoshua Grintz[11] who, rather than looking at repetitions, uses “expressions” (proverbial clichés) in order to posit a two stage composition of the book which can be represented graphically as follows:

Grintz argues that A, B and C form the first edition with D and E (and possibly the remainder) forming the final edition in the time of Hezekiah. However, Snell disagrees with the methodology employed for identifying and selecting the “expressions” and remarks that affinity (between expressions) need not imply contemporaneity. Essentially, Grintz contends that the present order of Proverbs reflects the historical order in which it was composed but this is difficult to maintain as the Septuagint presents a different order, suggesting that the final (canonical) form was still fluid when the LXX was translated in the third century:

The consensus view is that parts of the book were composed and joined in the following order (using the original titles from table 1):

1. 10:1-22:16 (B)
2. 22:17-24:22 (C)
3. 1-9 (A)
4. order unknown; 24:23-34(D); 25-29 (E); 30(F); 31(G).

   This view understands B as the oldest collection because of its attribution to Solomon and one-line sayings which are a simpler structure. Chapters 1-9 were added later as a prologue, with some scholars believing that this occurred after the exile.

   When critiquing the work of Grintz, Snell makes the important observation (p.7) that evidence of language similarities could derive from other circumstances than the text having a single compositor. This is important because it highlights the necessity for other techniques (such as stylometry) in order to determine whether or not similarities are superficial or systematic. Stylometry uses statistical methods to determine the probability that a text is written by a certain author. Every author leaves a “fingerprint” that cannot be easily mimicked (if at all). It is relatively easy to use similar words or copy phrases, but the way a person writes is very individualistic, particularly when it comes to function words. Function words are words that have little lexical meaning but serve to express grammatical relationships with other words within a sentence (e.g., “the”, “a” or “it”…..).[12] This type of analysis has developed to such an extent that it can be employed forensically, to determine (for example) whether or not emails have been written by the same person (useful in counter terrorism).

Conclusion

The analysis of repetition in Proverbs is a useful tool, at the very least for giving a first impression into how Proverbs was “put together”. This article has deliberately refrained from presenting a specific thesis, because this will be published (DV) later in the year, giving readers time now to form their own impressions. The data from Snell has been placed in a macro enabled spreadsheet – download the spreadsheet and use the interactive buttons to view the internal and cross-unit connections. Ask yourself the following questions:

1. Which unit was written last?
2. Which units are closely connected?
3. Which units are not connected?

There is a macro enabled spreadsheet to accompany this article and it can be downloaded from this link.