Historical, Cultural and Religious Context of the Prescribed Texts
Texts in a world
The prescribed texts are artefacts of the ancient Near East, and the examiner rewards specific context rather than general colour.
Covenant and law
Deuteronomy and parts of Exodus follow the shape of first-millennium vassal treaties: preamble, historical prologue, stipulations, witnesses, blessings and curses. Compare the Code of Hammurabi (c. 1750 BCE) for casuistic law ('if a man ... then'), and note that apodictic law ('you shall not') is proportionally more prominent in Israelite collections.
Religion and cult
Ugaritic texts from Ras Shamra illuminate Canaanite religion: El as high god, Baal as storm god, Asherah, and the divine-council imagery used by Hebrew poets. Priestly material in Leviticus concerns holiness, purity and sacrifice, with distinct offerings (burnt, grain, peace, purification, reparation) and a calendar of festivals - Passover, Weeks, Booths, and the Day of Atonement.
Society and politics
Understand the tribal confederation, the monarchy of Saul, David and Solomon, the temple as political and economic centre, prophecy as a social institution, and the Babylonian exile of 586 BCE as the crisis that reshaped the texts.
Traps
- Anachronism: reading modern individualism, democracy or 'religion versus state' into the text.
- Assuming one uniform 'Israelite religion' across a thousand years.
- Using Ugaritic parallels to claim direct borrowing rather than shared cultural idiom.
- Treating sacrifice as primitive magic rather than a system of communication and status.
- Citing a custom without explaining its function.
Worked example
The 'eye for eye' law of Exodus 21:24 is not a licence for vengeance but a limit on retaliation, and it has cuneiform parallels. Rule of thumb: for every custom, ask what it rules out as well as what it commands.