RBL 10/2007

Walton, John

Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old

Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World
of the Hebrew Bible

Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2006. Pp.

368, Paperback, $24.99, ISBN 0801027500.

Alan Lenzi
University of the Pacific
Stockton, CA 95211

Comparative studies abound in our field. Discussions of the “Bible and,” focusing on a
particular theme or text from the ancient Near Eastern or Mediterranean world, are
commonplace. What is unusual is a one-volume, comprehensive treatment of how the
Hebrew Bible participates in and differs from the cultures of the ancient Near East.
Drawing from a wide array of scholarship on the textual remains of the ancient Near East
(archaeology rarely factors into his discussions), John Walton’s new volume offers just
such a rare synthesis. His analysis demonstrates many conceptual similarities between the
Hebrew Bible and its ancient Near Eastern neighbors and locates the Bible’s uniqueness in
covenantal theology and its portrayal of Yahweh’s divine nature. Ultimately, Walton
believes, Yahweh, unlike all other ancient Near Eastern deities, desired a relationship with
his people and revealed to them—in the Hebrew Bible—not just his will but also his
character.

Walton is very well informed in both primary and secondary literature, writes clearly, and
offers several interesting comparative suggestions throughout the book. As a work of
synthetic presentation, the book is primarily geared toward students and the interested
public. But given its narrow theological orientation and problematic methodology, this

This review was published by RBL 2007 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a
subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp.
book, unfortunately, cannot be recommended for the university classroom or for library
purchase.

Walton divides his work into five thematically oriented parts: comparative studies
(chapters 1–2), literature of the ancient Near East (chapter 3), religion (chapters 4–6),
cosmos (chapters 7–8), and people (chapters 9–14).

Part 1 contains the methodologically foundational chapters “History and Method” and
“Comparative Studies, Scholarship, and Theology.” Because these chapters orient the
entire volume and are seriously flawed, they will receive more substantial comment below.

Part 2 offers thumbnail summaries of a generous selection of texts (arranged according to

genre) from Egypt, Mesopotamia, Anatolia, and the Levant, and provides references to
accessible translations. Alongside the works usually included in such lists, Walton includes
lesser known texts like Shurpu as well as some notes about various ancient Near Eastern
archives (e.g., Emar, Mari, and Ebla).

Parts 3, 4, and 5 form the heart of the book (chapters 4–14). In each of the constituent
chapters Walton provides descriptions of various aspects of the ancient Near Eastern
“cognitive environment” (Walton’s term for “worldview,” used to refer to concepts or
beliefs shared by all or some of the ancient Near Eastern cultures as well as those that are
distinctive to each). His treatment shows sensitivity to the differences in the individual
cultures, often treating Egypt separately from Mesopotamia and/or the Hittites.1 Part
three (87–161) presents ancient Near Eastern concepts of ontology and deity, the role of
temples and rituals, and the ideas of state and family religion. Part 4 covers cosmic
geography and cosmology/cosmogony (165–99). Part 5, the longest in the book (203–
329), treats human origins and the role of humanity in the universe, historiography,
divination and omens, the ideology of cities and kingship, the concepts of law and
wisdom, and finally death and the afterlife. Walton commendably roots his syntheses and
generalizations in frequent references to and quotations from primary documents.

Throughout these chapters Walton uses gray-shaded text boxes called “Comparative
Explorations” to take up a point from the main text and compare it with the Hebrew
Bible. These occur about every three or four pages and vary in length from less than one
to several pages. In chapter one, for example, there is a comparative discussion of
“ontology and theogony in Israel,” (91) “Yahweh’s council” (94–95), and a particularly

1
One suspects Jan Assmann’s The Mind of Egypt: History and Meaning in the Time of the Pharaohs (trans.
Andrew Jenkins; Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003) has influenced the title of Walton’s book and
its “cognitive environment” theme. (See http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/2004/2004-06-51.html for a review
of Assmann in Bryn Mawr Classical Review.)

This review was published by RBL 2007 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a
subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp.
interesting box on “How is Yahweh different from the gods of the ancient Near East?”
(110), among others. Walton offers many useful comparative interpretations and several
provocative suggestions. Concerning the latter, for example, Walton reads Jer 31:33 in
light of Mesopotamian divinatory notions of the gods writing their will on the exta of an
animal (257–58); the notion of divine writing from this perspective, Walton suggests,
changes the human heart in Jeremiah into a medium of revelation that can inform others
about Yahweh. He also presents a celestial divinatory background for understanding the
stopping of the sun and moon in Josh 10:12–15, which he interprets not as an account of
an astronomical miracle but as a report of the manifestation of an unfavorable omen
(262–63)—if only Galileo had known Enuma Anu Enlil!

But Walton’s comparisons are sometimes controversial or even entirely unacceptable. For
example, according to Walton, Mesopotamia had exteriorized ethics (actions) while the
Hebrew Bible developed interiorized morality (right and wrong) (152–54 [main text]); the
gods of the ancient Near East acted on whim at times but Yahweh never did so (despite
appearances, 141); the ancient Near Eastern gods existed in the cosmos, Yahweh above it
(98 and 195, n. 2); ancient Near Eastern ritual was the result of common sense and
experimentation, the Hebrew Bible’s came from revelation (142, 137 [main text]);
ancient Near Eastern law and wisdom attempted social control whereas the Hebrew Bible
instilled a value system (singular; 299). There are indeed many distinctive ideas in the
Hebrew Bible and these should provoke interpretation and explanation. But Walton’s
attempts often seem overly influenced by his theological predisposition to distinguish the
Hebrew Bible from its historical matrix. In the following treatment of Walton’s opening
two chapters, one will see that this evaluation also applies to the methodological
foundations of the book.

Walton’s first chapter (15–28) looks at the history and method of comparing biblical
materials to the ancient Near East. His brief overview of the history of comparative studies
(15–18) highlights the well-known fact that critical polemics and confessional apologetics
have steered the intellectual enterprise of comparison from the very beginning. Although
apparently wanting to offer an alternative to this impasse, Walton explicitly returns to
this intellectual dichotomy throughout the remainder of the book, very clearly takes a side
(see below), and thereby perpetuates the dichotomy that he wants to bridge. This is the
book’s most problematic aspect.

The rest of the chapter (18–28) treats “methodology,” but most of its text is devoted to
justifying comparative study and only alludes to principles of comparison inter alia.
Walton effectively demonstrates that biblical authors were fully ensconced in the ancient
Near Eastern “cognitive environment” and must be read in light of that environment if
one wants to appreciate their significance in ancient times and avoid imposing one’s own

This review was published by RBL 2007 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a
subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp.
modern worldview on them. (The latter idea comes up several times and will require
further comment.) But given the fact that the section’s concern is establishing a
methodology for comparison, one wonders why he concludes with only a very brief
enumeration of ten general principles of comparison (e.g., “both similarities and
differences must be considered”; “careful background study must precede comparative
study”; “similar functions may be performed by different genres in different cultures”)
without further explanation. These implicitly inform Walton’s comparative practice in
chapters four to fourteen—and thus give the reader a view of his principles in practice, but
a more explicit and sophisticated methodological discussion is needed.

Chapter 2, “Comparative Studies, Scholarship, and Theology,” is the most revealing

chapter methodologically. Walton begins with an elaboration upon the critical vs.
confessional dichotomy introduced in the opening pages. The author shows how
comparative studies have posed challenges to both critical and confessional scholars, have
met resistance from each, and have been employed by both for polemical purposes. He
then presents what seems to be a mediating position, what he calls the “integrated role” of
comparative studies, to which he assigns three aspects: 1) critical analysis, which “serves to
provide a wide range of information by which we can understand in more advanced ways
the history and literature of the biblical world”; 2) defense of the biblical text, which even
non-confessional scholars can contribute to; and 3) exegesis, about which Walton warns,
“if we do not bring the information from the ancient cognitive environment to bear on
the text, we will automatically impose the parameters of our modern worldview, thus
risking serious distortion of meaning.”

The chapter concludes with a flow chart illustrating “Roles for Comparative Study” (40).
According to this chart, general cultural studies inform comparative studies. Comparative
studies flow into critical analysis, where one engages in historical reconstruction and
literary comparison. Positive assessment of the biblical text leads to exegesis or may
contribute to apologetic purposes. Negative assessment in the critical analysis stage shunts
the information to apologetics, which goes on the offensive to prove the Bible true or on
the defensive to deflect criticism. In other words, critical analysis in Walton’s “integrated
role” of comparative studies never offers a “negative” assessment of the Bible (“Negative”
is defined, one surmises, as anything that may detract from the fundamental truth[s] of
the Bible.) If one compares this chart to the conclusion of the earlier section called
“Challenges to Confessional Scholarship,”2 one will see that Walton’s mediating position
is really nothing but a slightly disguised confessional one. Thus, there are two reasons to

2
“Scholars engaged in this work use their research to challenge the conclusions of critical scholarship and
in the process to authenticate the biblical text. Such studies intend to exonerate the Old Testament and
defend against spurious attacks on its integrity” (36).

This review was published by RBL 2007 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a
subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp.
do comparative analysis according to Walton: to understand the “positive” things about
the Bible and to defend it against those who would point out its purported “negative”
features. For anyone engaged in teaching students to think critically and independently,
this view of comparative study and caricature of critical analysis is unacceptable.

It is hard to avoid the conclusion that Walton’s integrated comparative method violates
his own principle of not imposing one’s modern cognitive environment onto the Bible, a
warning he intones throughout the book. But modern imposition on the data is of course
unavoidable not only in one’s descriptions but in one’s very approach to the comparative
task—everyone commits a theoretical imposition. Analysis requires a circumscription of a
body of data, a delimitation of context, the formulation of questions from interaction
with the data, and the construction of categories through which to analyze the data. All of
these come from the interpreter. Walton realizes this tacitly, for example, when talking
about the analytical difficulty of distinguishing “religion” from “life” in the ancient Near
East (87) and explicitly in his treatment of historiography (217–37, esp. 220). But his
resistance to embrace self-consciously and address in a methodologically explicit manner
the role of the investigator leaves the reader with a rather naïve impression of the
comparative process: one takes the “givens” and sifts the data through the ancient context
with a few general rules as guides, all the while trying not to think too much like a
modern, in order to gain information about the truth of the Bible. A look at other
comparative enterprises in the humanities will show that this is a woefully inadequate
approach.

Two representative ideas in the book, myth and historiography, will demonstrate how the
critical/confessional dichotomy and the resistance to embrace a self-consciously
constructive analytical approach to comparison creates problems in the text.

Walton defines “myth” as “stories in which the gods are the main characters” that many
people consider “fanciful and fictional” since they do not believe in the reality of the
deities (43). However, given the fact that some people still believe in the god of the
Hebrew Bible, “myth,” Walton observes, can present problems. But, as he notes, “it is
irrelevant whether the modern reader believes the gods of the Babylonians or the God(sic)
of Israel exist. The significance and nature of the literature are not dependent on our
assessment of their reality. These accounts serve as important sources for coming to
understand the worldviews of the ancients” (44, emphasis original). This is a
commendable, middle-path distinction to help ease the problems some readers will have
with “myth.” Moreover, this kind of reflection demonstrates how one’s analytical
categories can identify with or undermine certain ideological positions. This is all
methodologically and pedagogically solid. There is a problem, unfortunately, because
Walton causally uses the words “myth” or “mythological” throughout the remainder of

This review was published by RBL 2007 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a
subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp.
the book only in relation to non-Israelite materials. Therefore, despite the fact that he
actually introduces a well-established comparative analytical category in the study of
religion 3 and reflects upon it, he deploys it elsewhere in such a way as to underline a
confessional theological agenda and undermine his own statement about the irrelevancy
of modern ideas about the gods (essentially, if only briefly, espousing methodological
atheism). Walton neither upholds a mediating position nor avoids imposing his own
modern assumptions.

Despite much that is praiseworthy in his general discussion of historiography, Walton’s

treatment is equally problematic. In his treatment of the role of deity in historiography,
he writes: “The denial of supernatural causation by many [!] of today’s historians means
that any ancient document used in reconstructing a history that conforms to present-day
standards needs to be ‘adjusted’ by the modern historian to delete its non-empirical data
and eliminate its supernaturalistic bias. Such may be considered necessary in order to
present ancient history to a modern reader, who will want to read history expressed in the
context of his or her own cognitive environment, but it represents cultural imperialism”
(220–21). Later, in assessing how proper historiographical concerns complicate both
critical and confessional uses of the biblical materials, Walton says “critical scholarship
needs to rethink its imperialistic and anachronistic imposition of modern standards and
values on ancient texts” whereas he challenges confessional scholars “to rethink precisely
what constitutes the truth of the text that they seek to defend” (235). Even allowing for
the dubious assumption that recent critical scholarship is actually guilty of not being
concerned with understanding ancient documents through indigenous historiographical
practice, this rhetorical juxtaposition virtually vilifies the critical scholar and associates
truth with confessionalists. Moreover, his whole treatment of historiography implies that
one may read ancient historiographical testimony in its ancient cognitive environment—
and I think one should—but that it is unacceptable to then translate that reading into a
modern (or post-modern [?]) historical interpretation. Invocation of the derogatory
“imperialism” ensures that no one would dare try.4 On the other hand, because Walton
defines Israelite historiography as “theological history” that reveals Yahweh’s character and
legitimates his covenant, it seems the confessional approach, though slightly scolded, finds
an implicit vindication.

3
See, e.g., William E. Paden, Religious Worlds: The Comparative Study of Religion (Boston: Beacon Press,
1988), 69–92.
4
This invocation of imperialism, in my opinion, is an example of a “faith-based” approach to scholarship
appropriating the rhetoric of post-modernism in order to fashion themselves as oppressed and thereby find
legitimacy, alongside other historically marginalized groups, in the secular, post-modern academy. See
Johannes C. Wolfhart, “Postmodernism,” in Guide to the Study of Religion (eds. Willi Braun and Russell T.
McCutcheon; New York: Cassell, 2000), 388–92.

This review was published by RBL 2007 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a
subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp.
Perhaps, instead of exploiting the critical/confessional dichotomy for rhetorical purposes
and concluding his comparative discussion with the rather weak statement that the Bible
“offers a different sort of testimony [i.e., than empiricism] that we must respect” (236),5
Walton could have enhanced his presentation by discussing how an informed
historiographical reading of the biblical testimony, that is, one that factors in all the
historiographical conventions of the ancient context, can be appropriated into our own,
no-less ideologically motivated historical concerns. Maybe he could have even offered
brief examples of Marxist, positivist, feminist, and Evangelical contemporary historical
interpretations.

There are several other issues that one might discuss in the context of a review, but there is
simply not enough space to go into them all. On a practical note, the author uses short
titles in footnotes after an item’s initial reference, but the bibliography, though not
marked as such, only lists selected works. Tracking down a full citation can be time
consuming.

In conclusion, Walton shows considerable erudition in this volume and has used it to
produce another confessional contribution to the comparative debate. Despite much that
is useful, the book is not an appropriate adoption for classrooms outside the Bible college
or conservative seminary.

5
This statement occurs right after Walton affirms that there is no empirical means to prove or disprove the
deity’s involvement in historical events or outcomes—again, he affirms methodological atheism. But,
Walton seems to believe that this inability lends historical credibility to the Israelite historiographical
tradition whereas most historians and religious studies scholars see this as reason to focus on humanistic
explanations. See Seth D. Kunin, Religion: The Modern Theories (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University
Press, 2003), 74.

This review was published by RBL 2007 by the Society of Biblical Literature. For more information on obtaining a
subscription to RBL, please visit http://www.bookreviews.org/subscribe.asp.