Droit et Cultures (May 2016)
De Sumer au livre de Job : entre vérité, violence et contrat, ou comment vivre au Proche-Orient ancien
Abstract
A state of questions regarding law in Mesopotamia is necessary for a proper effort at reconstituting the unusual adventure of a small people deprived of acknowledged marks of a political legitimacy in Ancient Near East (land, temple, king). It is in the completing of a literary composition, understood as « law », and largely in debt of Mesopotamian juridical tradition, that it claims the territory of its upheld rediscovered identity. Serving a more or less exclusive monotheism from the Vth c. B.c.e on, this writing is corseted by a system of mainly priestly stipulations on the « licit vs illicit » which closes off this threatened identity within diaspora or multiethenic Yehud, under Persian rule. Inside this mighty story itself which locates, carries along, proclaims and contradicts this identitary « law », contra-history, debate or revolt are also expressed until a figure like Job, who has met Egyptian Wisdom, puts on trial the very God meant to sanction this retributive apparatus.
