ABSTRACT
Our final topic concerns the history of how the sacred languages and sacred texts we have been considering were received, interpreted and transmitted. The process of interpreting and explaining the meaning of a text begins as soon as it exists. Indeed, in the case of an oral utterance by a prophet or a teacher, the process begins even before then when it is first heard and remembered, and only later, sometimes, as in the case of the words of Zoroaster, many centuries later, written down. Very little is known of those early preliterary stages in the process, mainly because we are almost entirely dependent on written records, mostly of uncertain date. The scientific quest for the original words of Jesus or Isaiah or Zoroaster has given way in recent years to a renewed critical study of the texts as we have them, and as they have been used and interpreted by the communities who believe them to be sacred. The reception, interpretation and transmission of written texts in their final sacred or canonical form will be the main subject of this chapter, but first we shall look at some preliterary stages in the process.
