The Shema in the Second Temple Period

The precise historical moment when Deut 6 (Shema Israel) was transformed into a prayer ritual is uncertain and a matter of scholarly debate. It is generally assumed that by the time of the Mishnah’s redaction (ca. 200 C. E.), the recitation of the Shema was already a standardized ritual
because the Mishnah refers to it as a well-known practice. Indeed, the Mishnah takes for granted that its audience is so familiar with the prayer that it does not define it at all, but rather delves immediately into detailed discussions of its timing and exceptions that might arise in everyday life. Other sources from the Second Temple period, however, challenge the idea of the antiquity and ubiquity of such a standard prayer ritual composed of biblical verses from Deuteronomy and Numbers. This paper examines a number of key texts from the Second Temple period that seemingly refer to the recitation of the Shema prayer and that have been used by scholars to reconstruct the origins of this liturgical ritual. Through a close reading of four of these sources (the Letter of Aristeas, Philo, the Community Rule, and Josephus), I argue that they might not refer to the practice of the Shema recitation that we know from later rabbinic literature. Rather, they provide us with a lens into the diversity of ways that Deut 6:6–7 – “take to heart these instructions… impress them on your children… recite them when you stay at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you get up” – was understood and fulfilled in the Second Temple period. The Letter of Aristeas describes an act of meditating on God’s works of creation; the Community Rule prescribes daily recitation of laws; Philo emphasizes the instruction of justice; and Josephus frames the obligation as a commandment to commemorate the deliverance out of Egypt twice daily. The particular framing of the Shema ritual that we come to know in the Mishnah might have appropriated and extended the practice of reciting the Shema in the temple (some evidence suggests that the Shema was recited in the temple), but this was only one of the ways in which Deut 6:7 was enacted and fulfilled in the pre-destruction period.