Book Review: Introduction To The Holy Scriptures, by Shmuel Shrira

Note: I started writing this review shortly after the end of the third lockdown, but never got around to finishing it (translating the section below), so the result is that this is being published over a month after I first started writing this. 

Yes! After five weeks (the duration of the third lockdown here in Israel) of chipping away at the book named in the title, I've finished it and can now share with the world all of my very important thoughts on a book that I'm not sure very many people in the world are even aware exists...but I take what I can find (and yes, I found it next to the neighborhood's genizah can)...

Introduction To The Holy Scriptures is my translation of the title which is מבוא לכתבי הקודש - Mevo Lekitvei Hakodesh. It was originally written by Shmuel Shrira in Russian, according to Zalman Shazar, who wrote the introduction to the Hebrew edition. Apparently the two were among a group of scholars funded by Baron Günzburg, which is how they met.

My thoughts:

Well, it's an okay book. I won't say that that I learned a lot of new things from it. But it has some positives. Shrira included at the end a fascinating comparison of the Torah laws with several ancient lawbooks discovered around Mesopotamia. The most famous of these is of course the Laws of Hammurabi. Shrira explained why the Torah's take on the same subjects is superior to these other codes.

The best part of the book, though, was a fascinating paragraph which I've translated to the best of my ability:

With reference to books mentioned in Tanach, but ultimately left out of it (such as the books of Shma'ayah the prophet, Natan the prophet, the Book of the Wars of Hashem, etc), he wrote:

"There are those who voice indignation at the writers of the history of  the Tanach, that they dared to sift through the masses of historical material that was in their hands and only chose those pieces that fit their aim, and the rest they left out, and these were lost to us. This indignation is unjustified. These authors never concealed anything from the reader. To he who had an interest in the historical aspect of the events, they left notes referring to the texts from which they drew their inspiration. How were they to know that those books would be lost to the community? And on our part, we can speculate differently: If the sole aim of these authors of the Tanach would have been for the purpose of recording history and not for holy purposes, then likely the fate of these books would have been like the fate of the other books - they, too, would have been lost to us, during the turmoil brought upon from the fall of the kingdoms of Judea and Israel. That same moralistic and holy idea that hovered before the eyes of these authors, wrapped itself around the whole of the Nation of Israel: The holiness of these books is what protected them from being lost; Am Yisrael saved their holy books from the fire and the destruction at all cost. Entire books the nation took with themselves to the diaspora, even if it came at the expense of loss of personal wealth. Which was not the case with secular books. (pg. 49-50)

And that is an excellent perspective on the books that were lost to us over the millennia (still a sad fact, though).

What I didn't like about the book is that he buys a lot into the Biblical Criticism of his era. The result is naturally greatly mangling various books, which is too bad, really. Not much more to be said about the book. It was really really worth it for the fantastic paragraph about the lost books, and the section at the end about other codes of laws may be useful in the future, but other than that, not much of anything stood out.

4/10