Wisdom Discourse and Torah in Second Temple Judaism: Challenging the Integration Paradigm

While many scholars assume that wisdom texts eventually merged with or were shaped by Torah traditions, JiSeong James Kwon employs a discourse-critical approach to analyze Proverbs, Ben Sira, the Wisdom of Solomon, Baruch, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and Deuteronomy, demonstrating how wisdom literature maintained an independent identity and theological orientation distinct from the legal traditions of the Torah. Kwon demonstrates that Jewish intellectual production remained pluralistic in form, genre, and theological orientation throughout the Persian and Hellenistic periods.