Tanach Thoughts

Sometimes I'll start a post, and for several days/weeks/months will not be able to finish it. By the time I do get around to it, new info will have come to my attention and a re-write will be needed (sometimes that's the cause of the laziness of not finishing the post). That's the case with this post. Original beginning: Spoiler warning: There will not be a satisfying chiddush at the end of this post. Just some head-scratchers, at best. New beginning:  Please partially disregard the previous beginning. Yeshurun! So majestic, so inspiring, so...actually, this one isn't so bizarrely-named . Yeshurun is one of the names of the People of Yisrael. Surprisingly, this is one of the few points that just about every commentator, both Jewish and otherwise, agree on. Take that, whoever invented "two Jews, three opinions"! *ahem* Anyway, "Yeshurun" appears a total of four times in Tanach: "So Jeshurun grew fat and kicked—You grew fat and gross and coarse. ...

 "Pride Rock! So majestic, so mysterious, so...bizarrely named. Pumbaa, how can a rock be proud?" "Well, actually, I think it's a metaphor--" These words come to mind with the twin names Reuel and Deuel. Reuel is actually a name that belongs to multiple people in Tanach: There's of course Yitro, AKA Reuel, and then there's Esav's son Reuel, and Reuel ben Yevanyah of the Tribe of Binyamin, and of course, Reuel, father of Elyasaf, the Nasi of Gad in the desert. That's quite a quartet: Two Israelites, a Midianite and an Edomite. All descendants of Avraham, of course. Then there's Deuel, father of Elyasaf, the Nasi of Gad in the desert. Wait, what? Yup. Elyasaf's father is at time called Reuel and at time Deuel. What's going on? Well, people with double names aren't that rare in Tanach. In fact, I think that a great many mysteries in Tanach could be solved with properly identifying certain people with other people. But that's of c...

I thought I would do something a bit different this time, and perhaps I'll do this again from time to time, which is give my thoughts on a Tanach-related book I've read. Earlier this week, I finished chipping my way through Shaul and Binyamin by Ben Tzion Luria. I thought it was an interesting book, however, it's got one major downside that I'll address shortly. First of all, the upsides: Luria had a fascinating way of breaking down Tanach verses and reading between the lines. He has many fantastic chiddushim in the book and I think it's well-worth reading, even if one - such as myself - doesn't agree 100% with all of his ideas. One of the things I liked best is right in the first chapter: He explains why logically researchers should accept Chazalic traditions about Tanachic events and uses for evidence the Talmudic traditions of the genealogies of certain famous figures from the time. This was an issue that had bothered me since I read Malchut Beit David by Yaa...