Genesis: A Parsha Companion, Exodus: A Parsha Companion, and Leviticus: A Parsha Companion, by David Fohrman; Asking Better Questions of the Bible, by Marty Solomon

Review by Jon C. Olson

 

The books under review adopt a common approach to Torah study. Marty Solomon was a student of Rabbi Fohrman.

Rabbi David Fohrman

Rabbi Fohrman presents an approach to learning Torah based upon close reading of Scripture in concert with Midrash. I find him fresh and engaging. Genesis,1 Exodus,2 and Leviticus3 are three of projected five Parsha Companion books presenting some of the lessons that can be found on the website of Aleph Beta (alephbeta.org),which he founded and where he is principal educator, or in others of his books. Many of Rabbi Fohrman’s essays developed out of Shabbat table conversation with his family.

Fohrman was ordained at Ner Israel yeshiva, has taught at Johns Hopkins University, was an editor in Artscroll’s Talmud translation project, and a scholar at the Hoffberger Foundation for Torah Study.

The Parsha Companion books are physically beautiful, with layout and colors that facilitate communication. Forhman’s intended Jewish audience reads Hebrew (though he translates), and cares about traditional Jewish sources, but is uncomfortable with what they say in places. Fohrman welcomes difficulties in the biblical text since they require the serious reader to search for treasures hidden by the divinely-inspired author. Asking what, how, and why brings one to the heart of Torah, which is God’s heart. The Torah has a way of allowing for multiple perspectives.4 Rabbi Fohrman fell in love with Torah and wants you to also. While making points, he shares what narratives mean to him. All this is presented in a conversational way. For example,

I want to grapple with something that is perhaps just a tad controversial, what would seem to be a decidedly un-egalitarian aspect of traditional Jewish marriage. The issue stands out pretty clearly in the opening words of the first Mishnah of tractate Kiddushin: A woman is acquired in three ways.5

The answer to the vexing question of whether “acquiring”6 is the Torah’s concept of marriage can be found, writes Fohrman, where the Torah describes the first marriage. Immediately, he invites us to notice a problem.

Now, imagine that you’re God. You’ve just created man, and you’ve decided that he shouldn’t be alone. He needs some kind of companion. What would you do next? This would be a good time to create Eve, wouldn’t it? But that’s not what God does. Instead, the world’s first romance takes a decidedly unromantic turn. God decides to create some animals.7

Fohrman unearths more internal textual problems before resolving them in a fundamentally moral way. If you enjoy this, as I do, it will help you fall in love with Torah.

It is fascinating to see diverse connections between scriptural passages fleshed out, and bizarre midrashim explicated. Midrash deals not with what happened, but with the meaning of what happened.8 When a Hebrew phrase occurs rarely in the Bible, this is an invitation to search for connections between the settings and to ask why the phrase was used.

In a chiasm — a passage whose end is a mirror image of its beginning — the central element is emphasized. This is a tool for finding the meaning intended.9 Fohrman presents each analysis by building slowly, with repetition to assist the process of discovery.

Showing how one text comments upon another provides stereo vision, two slightly different perspectives,10 and reveals the unity of the Torah. Our laws respond to our history.11

Why did the Sages turn to the Mishkan (Tabernacle) to delineate types of work prohibited on the Sabbath? Rabbi Fohrman addresses this together with more questions: what is the point of life according to Judaism; how do I motivate myself to keep laws whose rationale I do not understand; and what is the “plot” of Torah?12

God created the universe in love, for humanity to live in. This “womb” is not needed by God: it is for us. Creative work (melachah) is our way of imitating God. The people of Israel erected the Mishkan as a place for God to dwell among them (Exod 25:8).

God also ceased from creating on the seventh day. His people imitate him by resting, avoiding melachah on the Sabbath. Mishkan and Shabbat are sanctuaries in space and time, ways of bringing God close. A Jewish mission statement is to actualize our destiny as the image of God, to invite God into our very selves. The way to walk before God and be whole (Gen 17:1) relates to how we build spaces and share them, all of which require us to make room for others, to make sure the space is comfortable and welcoming, not just for us, but for those we share it with.13

The Midrash and classical Jewish commentators noticed many relationships that Fohrman brings to light, and he cites precedents. Thus, grappling with the problems and word artistry in Scripture promises to clarify the Torah, Midrash, Talmud, and commentaries.

Marty Solomon

Fohrman’s teaching is a source for Solomon’s Asking Better Questions of the Bible and his Bema podcasts (martysolomon.com).14 Solomon is a Jewish believer in Yeshua. He has been a pastor and leads tours to Israel. He founded and directs Impact Campus Ministries in the United States.

The intended audience for Solomon’s book and podcasts are evangelical Christians who have been told that it is a sin to question the Bible, that there is a single right answer to be gained from any text, and are therefore, as Better Questions’ subtitle says, “wounded, wary, and longing for more.”

Solomon argues that the Bible reflects a relational Eastern way of thinking that contrasts with propositional Western thought. But Eastern and Western approaches can work harmoniously together.15 He loves the Bible and wants readers to fall in love with its divine author. Asking questions of the Bible is intended by God and leads to deeper understanding of the message Scripture encodes.

Solomon covers many of the same topics as Fohrman, such as chiasm. Solomon considers midrash one of the best commentaries for interpreting the Torah, but not inspired or having the same weight as written Scripture.16

Asking Better Questions describes the various genres in the Jewish and Protestant Bibles and teaches how to interpret them. For example, it is a mistake to read the prophets or Revelation as blueprints of the future.17 Instead, their focus is on the spiritual formation of God’s people. Isaiah was not talking to his original audience about Jesus as the suffering servant, but “once we get to Jesus,” Isaiah 53 will burst forth in color.18

Solomon provides background and insight for the Bible and today. Hellenism’s pillars were education, health care, theater (media) and athletics. Western culture today builds on the same pillars. These are not evil, but Yeshua’s Jewish world was bothered by “the overarching narrative of human self-centeredness”19 If you recognize biblical narrative with parallels in surrounding cultures, don’t insist that the Bible is earliest, but instead note how it differs from the cultural norm.20 Each chapter of Asking Better Questions includes sources referenced and scholarship for further study.

Scripture tells you how to think, not or not only, what to think.21 Paul’s letters all apply the gospel, but their unique contexts, voices, and applications change. Solomon briefly notes the New Perspective on Paul and Paul within Judaism interpretive approaches.

The chapter “Throwing Dogma to the Dogs” emphasizes that theological filters influence our interpretation. Solomon is critical of dogma when it gives us an illusion of mastering the text, because instead the text masters us.

[T]he Western mind uses the Bible to promote our theologies rather than allowing our theology to be formed by the Text that should shape it. None of this is to say that our theologies are wrong, but remember — getting our weighted priorities out of alignment led to centuries of bad readings of the Bible and a whole generation trying to deconstruct how we got here.22

An example of correct priorities, the priorities of Yeshua and Paul and so also what we should adopt, is that the Torah carries the primary authority in the Hebrew Scriptures.23

Assessing the Books

Unsurprisingly, Fohrman and Solomon sometimes give interpretations that conflict with widespread Christian theology, such as Augustine’s belief that human depravity makes obedience impossible. This is not simply a contrast between Judaism and Christianity. Paul was influenced by Enochic Judaism, which emphasized a cosmic power of sin.24 Rabbinic Judaism did not follow this path, though it knows of evil inclination in every heart. Nor did all Christians follow Augustine. The notion that it is possible in principle if not always in fact to act in ways that please God is common to Jews, Anabaptists, and Methodists.25

Solomon and Fohrman invite their audiences to trust the biblical story. While each passage has a local context, the whole of Scripture is a single story with God as its source.26 Many of us want this to be true. It is traditional Jewish and Christian belief, 27 and scholars acknowledge that the Bible is a conversation across generations with high intertextuality. Having doubts about whether and how the Bible hangs together should not prevent readers from being repeatedly surprised, delighted, and strengthened in faith.

Still, does defense of Scripture make us complacent about wrong attitudes that it seems to promote or condone?28 Let’s pursue this in connection with whether, in the Bible, marriage means that man acquires woman.

When God brings the animals to the man, no companion is found for him among them. God puts the man to sleep and fashions a rib into woman. The man awakens and says “This is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh.” Then the story is interrupted to say that this is why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and they become one flesh (Gen 2:24).

How does the man’s declaration about the woman explain the purpose of marriage? Says Rabbi Fohrman, a man was originally one with his parents and he only leaves them to become one with his wife. Acquiring a wife is like acquiring the Torah. Does one who learns Torah control it? Rather, the Torah demands a certain lifestyle. Acquisition in marriage, like acquiring Torah (Pirkei Avot 6:6), is more about responsibility than about ownership. And as woman was a previous part of man (his “feminine” side, based on midrash), she completes him.29 By close reading of Scripture, Fohrman has found and resolved several textual problems, tied the Bible to other traditional Jewish sources, and reached a conclusion that will gratify some and infuriate others.

The Parsha Companion series is an invitation to further study. We can learn elsewhere that by naming his complement “woman” the man considered her a mere extension of himself. Only after sinning and becoming aware of his own mortality does the man name his wife “Eve” as the mother of all living (Gen 3:20). Eve is a personal rather than a generic name. And the Torah now refers to the man (ha-adam) by the personal name Adam.

What is the connection between mortality and naming Eve? Adam probably perceived that he could only approach immortality through having children, which Adam and Eve achieve together. Naming Eve signifies that Adam recognized her as a person in her own right. The Torah also moves from naming God as Elohim (Gen 1) to Hashem-Elohim (Gen 2-3), to the personal name Hashem alone (Gen 4). Only after becoming aware of his wife as a person is a man capable of understanding God as a person.30

The second creation story reverses the sequence of elements in the first and plays off it.31 Genesis 1 shows God as judge, creating in six days, and the two sexes as instrumental to reproduction. Genesis 2 shows God as relational, male and female as companions, and time as non-linear. Perceiving that these stories complement each other will help us to see that men and women are both equal and complementary.32 I am reminded of the wave and particle theories of light. Our puny minds need two seemingly incompatible theories to capture the truth that light behaves like both waves and particles.

Does defense of Scripture and tradition exclude scientific thought? Not for Rabbi Fohrman. He accepts that there was an agricultural revolution,33 and that Homo Sapiens once competed with the Neanderthals,34 and tries to correlate Torah to these data.

God appeared to the patriarchs as El Shaddai (Exod 6:3), which the Sages interpret as an acronym for Ani Hu she’amarti le’olam dai, “I am He who said to the world ‘Enough!’” (Chagigah 12a).35 Fohrman uses this as a springboard to present a history of the Universe in scientific language, to show that God not only created, but also set limits.

Cosmologists speak of a “Goldilocks” world in which physical laws and properties would have to be almost exactly what we find them to be to produce the universe as we know it, with stars, planets, and ultimately life. How narrow was the margin of error? For the expansion rate of the universe, one part in 10 to the 55th power. And so on for other values and ratios.

I welcome how Rabbi Fohrman presents this scientific consensus. He admits to not knowing what the Sages meant when they spoke of God saying “Enough,” “but this is what their language inspires in me.”36 Like Fohrman, I find it awesome.

The reader may sometimes be impressed by an argument, only to later discover that another commentator disagrees. For example, Miriam is called prophetess and sister of Aaron, but not of Moses, because she received her prophecy before Moses was born.37 More prosaically, however, it is not uncommon for the Torah to identify a woman by her oldest brother.38

I have few criticisms of Fohrman and Solomon. Jacob takes the blessing and birthright from his brother, wrestles with an angel, is renamed Israel, reconciles with Esau, and returns the stolen blessing after he understands his true identity and destiny.39 Although I applaud this interpretation, Forhman’s argument that the deception of Isaac was accidental (93–113), while psychologically rich, is implausible and detracts from Jacob’s overall story. Also, I found Solomon’s expressions sometimes off-putting. Can’t a “perfect Instagram photo” be simply a “perfect photo”?

Application

The Parsha Companion series and Asking Better Questions of the Bible will make you more comfortable with traditional Jewish approaches to Scripture. Kesher readers may also profitably sample both Bema and Aleph Beta websites. These resources can enhance individual or group Torah study within and beyond Messianic Judaism.

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1. 1 David Fohrman, Genesis: A Parsha Companion (New Milford CT: Maggid, 2019).

2. 2 David Fohrman, Exodus: A Parsha Companion (New Milford CT: Maggid, 2020).

3. 3 David Fohrman, Leviticus: A Parsha Companion (New Milford CT: Maggid, 2024).

4. 4 Fohrman, Genesis, 6.

5. 5 Fohrman, Genesis, 9.

6. 6 The Y-K-H “acquires” verb in Deuteronomy 24:1 is variously translated or omitted alongside the verb for “marries.”

7. 7 Fohrman, Genesis, 10.

8. 8 Fohrman, Exodus, 16. By contrast, for a fundamentalist, the purpose of the Bible is to convey facts (Jonathan Sacks, “Fundamentalism Reconsidered,” Jewish Action, Summer 1991: 24, citing James Barr, Fundamentalism [London: SCM, 1997], 49–50.

9. 9 In “Rabbi Fohrman on the Documentary Hypothesis” at alephbeta.org, large chiasms and intertextuality rebut the notion that Scripture is fragmented. Fohrman thinks a “super smart” redactor is not far from revelation as traditionally understood.

10. 10 Fohrman, Leviticus, 4.

11. 11 Fohrman, Leviticus, 165.

12. 12 Fohrman, Exodus, 213–17.

13. 13 Fohrman, Exodus, 228-30

14. 14 Marty Solomon, Asking Better Questions of the Bible: A Guide for the Wary, Wounded, and Longing for More (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2023). “Bema” is the synagogue platform from which Torah is read.

15. 15 Solomon, 22, compares Eastern thinking to the melody played by the right hand in piano music; Western thinking is the harmonies in the left hand. With Western thinking only, you won’t even recognize the song. Fohrman also uses a piano music metaphor, but says the plain sense is the right hand melody, while midrash is the left hand harmony, which in isolation sounds almost like nonsense (Exodus, 17).

16. 16 Solomon, 55.

17. 17 Solomon, 97, 174.

18. 18 Solomon, 105.

19. 19 Solomon, 129

20. 20 Solomon, 45.

21. 21 Solomon, 157, 161.

22. 22 Solomon, 137.

23. 23 Solomon, 40.

24. 24 Gabriele Boccaccini, “Paul’s Non-Supersessionist Theology,” Covenant and the People of God, eds. Jonathan Kaplan, Jennifer Rosner, and David J. Rudolph (Eugene: Pickwick, 2023), 1–8.

25. 25 John Howard Yoder, The Jewish-Christian Schism Revisited, eds. Michael G. Cartwright and Peter Ochs (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), 121–31.

26. 26 Fohrman and Solomon examine questions that the Bible is asking. Readers who want secular scholarship juxtaposed with traditional biblical interpretation should see James L. Kugel, How to Read the Bible: A Guide to Scripture, Then and Now (New York: The Free Press, 2007).

27. 27 For example, “Nine Theses on the Interpretation of Scripture,” The Art of Reading Scripture, eds. Ellen F. Davis and Richard B. Hays (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), 1.

28. 28 Is there a point at which we have to give up the struggle and admit that edification is not possible; a biblical text must be repudiated? Davis, in Davis and Hays, Art of Reading Scripture, 164, says no, but agrees that the biblical text is not to be simply equated with divine revelation. Sacks, “Fundamentalism Reconsidered,” 22–23, thinks Christianity can take a critical view of Scripture because it sees the highest revelation of God in human form, but Judaism takes revelation as the word of God. Daniel Weiss Halivni proposes that the earliest Torah was revelation. Torah was corrupted during centuries in which “Israel sinned” and as restored by Ezra includes applied meaning as a remedy for the insufficiency of scribal emendation, the whole endorsed by prophetic authority; Daniel Weiss Halivni, Peshat & Derash: Plain and Applied Meaning in Rabbinic Exegesis (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991).

29. 29 Fohrman, Genesis, 12. In the corresponding video, https://www.alephbeta.org/playlist/jewish-marriage-do-men-acquire-women, acquiring the Torah completes man.

30. 30 Jonathan Sacks, “Garments of Light,” Covenant & Conversation. Genesis: The Book of Beginnings (New Milford, CT: Maggid, 2009), 33–40.

31. 31 See “A Tale of Two Names: Elokim and YHVH\;” https://members.alephbeta.org/playlist/elokim-and-ykvk.

32. 32 Russ Resnik, “The Two Shall Become One Flesh: The Beginning and End of Marriage,” Kesher 29 (2015): 3–25.

33. 33 Fohrman, Leviticus, 161.

34. 34 https://www.alephbeta.org/video/elokim-and-ykvk/elokim-and-ykvk-week-11.

35. 35 Fohrman, Exodus, 27. Solomon discusses the God who said “Enough” in Bema podcast #2.

36. 36 Fohrman, Exodus, 28.

37. 37 Fohrman, Exodus, 64.

38. 38 Adin Steinsaltz, The Steinsaltz Humash, 2nd ed., Hebrew and English (Jerusalem: Koren, 2019), commentary to Exodus 15:20.

39. 39 Fohrman, Genesis, 91–141.