Where Can Wisdom Be Found? The Sage's Language in the Bible and in Ancient Egyptian Literature.

• Author: Bleiberg, Edward

Interest in possible interconnections between the Hebrew Bible's wisdom literature and the ancient Egyptian literary genre of "teachings" (sb y.t) began with Adolph Erman. He observed similar statements found both in The Teachings of Amenemope, a late Ramesside text, and the biblical book of Proverbs, traditionally attributed to King Solomon. He published his findings as "Eine agyptische Quelle der 'Spruche Salomos'," Sitzungsberichte der preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften 15 (1924): 86-93. Subsequent studies by numerous authors identified similarities between statements in other texts made in each tradition, dissected the possibilities for influence in one direction or the other, and/or posed a hypothetical Urtext from which both derived. Nili Shupak takes an entirely new approach to the relationship between the two traditions in this new book, one that is very successful in elucidating real and chimerical connections. The study has three primary objectives: to compile a glossary of Egyptian wisdom terms, to elucidate the semantics of these terms, and to clarify the biblical wisdom terms in relation to their Egyptian parallels. In eight chapters organized along similar lines, Shupak examines a group of Egyptian terms, follows it with an analysis of related Hebrew terms, and compares them.

This systematic approach depends on Shupak's profound knowledge of both ancient Egyptian and Biblical Hebrew. This knowledge allows her to go beyond superficial similarities between the two languages...