This brief statement intends to attack the Bible and its canon in totally Jewish terms.  We hope in this way to facilitate a realization of the extent to which the academic discussion of these issues has been conditioned by fundamentally Christian terms, definitions and issues, or by objective academic language that, while welcome, does not represent Judaism in its own light. Let’s save time and call this:  “Reclaiming the Jewish Bible”—the title of a book I should probably write.

It’s not that Bible isn’t a Jewish term; it is.  Ha-sefarim in Dan. 9:2 is translated as en tois biblois, and this is the origin of the term Bible, ta biblia.  Judaism, in all its manifestations, has accepted the notion of a set of books that...