Jon D. Levenson, the Albert A. List Professor of Jewish Studies at Harvard Divinity School, specializes in the “Jewish Bible” (2), the history of its interpretation in rabbinic Judaism and early Christianity, and the theological implications of that history for modern Jewish-Christian dialogue. His commitment to comparative methods and diachronic analysis is unmistakable. This publication indicates that his methods and wide-ranging expertise are enriched by Islamic Studies. Although the Jewish Bible is granted privileged, perhaps even normative status in his arguments and the discussion of Jewish and Christian texts predominates in this book, premodern Islamic perspectives are displayed judiciously. The integration of Islamic perspectives with critical historical scholarship models a strategy worthy of emulation by participants in Jewish-Christian dialogue: it helps avoid slippage into parochial triumphalism and intellectual barbarity.
In the title of this monograph, Abraham refers to Avram/Avraham, not necessarily an archaeological or historical personage, but certainly the Israelite literary character depicted in the multiple documentary sources collated in Genesis 11:26–25:18. Patriarch, in the subtitle, signifies the results of an evolutionary process that transformed the Israelite literary character into three distinctive figures: (1) the Hebraic Avraham, as articulated in late ancient and medieval rabbinic traditions, as well as his equally Jewish counterpart found in the Hellenistic writings of Philo and Josephus; (2) the Greek 'Abraam of Pauline Christianity, as articulated in both the New Testament and slightly later Apostolic texts; and, (3) the Arabic Ibrāhīm of Islam, described as a primal and archetypal monotheist in the Qurān (e.g., Sura 3:67) and venerated by Muslims throughout history.
Regarding the continuities and discontinuities between the Israelite Avram/Avraham and his transformations in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, there are two options: one weak, the other strong. The weak, historically naïve, or traditional claim rests on the assumption that the rabbinic Hebrew, Christian Greek, and Islamic Arabic names are passive terms that merely transliterate the biblical Hebrew. They are exact synonyms, conveying precisely the same content. The strong, or historically enlightened, claim asserts that rabbinic Avraham, Christian 'Abraam, and Islamic Ibrāhīm creatively translate one culture into another. The various names hermeneutically transubstantiate the biblical character into figures who the eponymic protagonist would not recognize as himself if he were to encounter any one of them face-to-face. Levenson demolishes the weak claim and champions the strong. He perceives the diverse Abrahams as synechdoches for the several ways that Judaism, Christianity, and Islam generically differ from one another. More notably, he also asserts that the Jewish Avraham, the Christian 'Abraam, and the Islamic Ibrāhīm not only diverge from one another but deviate radically from the Israelite character depicted in Genesis. The systematic differentiation of the ancient near eastern namesake from his diverse successors is the major thesis thoroughly and persuasively defended throughout the monograph. The argument is nuanced; the differentiation varies from tradition to tradition. In the unique case of rabbinic Judaism, according to Levenson, continuities between Avram/Avraham and Avraham prevail; in his judgment, the differentiation in rabbinic Judaism is less radical than in Islam (e.g., p. 137) and far less radical (e.g., p. 70) than in Pauline Christianity. Levenson describes Paul's christocentric theology as “catastrophic” (153) for the Jewish people.
Levenson's use of the ancient near eastern, Hebrew, biblical figure of Avram/Avraham as the foil against which to measure the divergent Abrahams of rabbinic Judaism, Christianity, and Islam is as problematic as it is informative and fascinating. He shows that all those post-Israelite Abrahams are tendentious or anachronistic constructions, that in none of them, to varying degrees, is the ancient near eastern Avram/Avraham accurately or fairly portrayed. Unexpectedly in a book so profoundly guided by the principles of descriptive, critical historiography, Levenson fiercely defends the Israelite figure as a paragon of virtue against modern critics who adduce the wife-sister episodes and the narrative of Isaac's binding in order to expose Abrahamic immorality. Nowhere in Genesis, to cite another example of Levenson's deferential treatment of scripture, is Avram/Avraham depicted in the traditionally familiar role of the enlightened monotheist who wages iconoclastic warfare against false images by smashing them physically. Neither does the Avram/Avraham of Genesis denounce idolatry verbally. This “surprising” conclusion supports a more general claim: “It is not simply that in Genesis Abraham does not teach what Moses is said to have taught; it is that he does not teach anything at all. In this, too, he distinguishes himself radically from other putative founder-figures, like the Buddha, Confucius, Jesus, and Mohammed” (4). That the rabbinic Avraham, Pauline 'Abraam, and Islamic Ibrāhīm, taught nothing at all will seem controversial, if not scandalous, to traditional Jews, Christians, Muslims, and secularists who may be presumed to believe that their respective Abraham is identical with the literary or historically genuine figure whose behavior, if not speech, was emphatically didactic.
Because Avram/Avraham taught nothing at all, according to Levenson, and because the Abrahams of rabbinic Judaism, Pauline Christianity, and Islam diverge from one another isomorphically with their respective deviations from the ancient near eastern figure, it necessarily follows that modern attempts to invent a singular, trans-confessional, and therefore unifying “Abrahamic religion” lack adequate warrant, especially if its advocates seek to legitimate their efforts with quasi-fundamentalistic appeals to scriptural authority. These advocates hope that contemporary Jews, Christians, and Muslims can overcome their sorry history of conflict, disrespect, and oppression by finding reconciliation in the common ground of veneration for the figure of Abraham, who founded the truly generic and monotheistic religion before it speciated into the contingencies of historical Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Among the advocates of ecumenical Abrahamic unity discussed are the popular author Bruce Feiler and the distinguished Islamist Louis Massignon. Chapter Six, “One Abraham or Three,” is devoted to demolishing the structures that support these well-meaning but misguided attempts to forge inter-confessional peace. Levenson argues cogently that these attempts either rehash traditional anti-Judaism or invent an altogether newly concocted theological tradition. That many of these attempts are strictly modern cannot be gainsaid. As reported by other investigators, it was as recent as 1995 that the Library of Congress introduced its official Subject Heading—“Abrahamic Religions”—which was intended to classify “works dealing collectively with Judaism, Christianity, and Islam and sometimes other monotheistic religions, that discuss an underlying, common heritage traceable to the patriarch Abraham.” [See Aaron W. Hughes, Abrahamic Religions: On the Uses and Abuses of History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 57].
As suggested by Levenson's distaste for the modern fascination with “Abrahamic Religions,” his fiercely apologetic defense of Avram/Avraham's morality, and his preferential, perhaps normative treatment of the Jewish Bible, not everything in this monograph adheres with equal and unequivocal tenacity to the austere principles of impartial, strictly descriptive, critical historiography. Supernaturalism and theologically informed homiletics are sometimes allowed the last word. How else explain the metaphysical resonance and sermonic timbre of claims that “God's willingness to allow repentance and confession to effect atonement is itself a concession for which strict justice cannot account” (58)? Or the following orthodox, orthopraxic proposition: “Jews can still reenact the profound message of the Aqedah in their self-surrender to the will of God in the form of observance of the mitzvoth, the commandments of the Torah” (112)? Or the extended attack against scientific materialism, or “scientism” (133), and the edifying lesson in apologetics that instructs readers to “be open to instruction from history and aware of the cultural embeddedness of texts about Abraham and…equally open to the transcendent and enduring religious messages these texts convey” (17)? These jarring deviations from the austere practice of secular, critical scholarship may account for why the monograph was selected for cosponsorship by the Tikvah Foundation. Its “Library of Jewish Ideas” is meant to present “engaging and authoritative treatments of core Jewish concepts…to general readers who are curious about Jewish treatments of key areas of human thought and experience” (ii). It may strike more than one reader as worrisome when Foundations leverage their influence to encourage the mingling of faith-based sermons with empirically-anchored scholarship.
