Scribes

A scribe in the Old Testament was a professional writer: a state official who kept records, drafted correspondence, counted revenue and read documents aloud to those who could not. Ahijah and Elihoreph served as secretaries to Solomon (1 Kings 4:3). Shebna held the office under Hezekiah (2 Kings 18:18). Shaphan the scribe was the man who read the newly found Book of the Law to King Josiah, and the reading set the reform in motion (2 Kings 22:8-10). Jeiel the scribe mustered Uzziah's army (2 Chronicles 26:11), and Baruch son of Neriah wrote at Jeremiah's dictation, then read the scroll in the temple and wrote it again after the king burned it (Jeremiah 36:4; Jeremiah 36:27-32).

Ezra marks the change in what the word carried. He is called a scribe skilled in the Law of Moses, and he had set his heart to study it, to do it, and to teach its statutes in Israel (Ezra 7:6; Ezra 7:10). After the exile the scribe was less a clerk than a scholar of Scripture, and by the Gospels the scribes appear as a recognised class of teachers, usually named alongside the chief priests and Pharisees. Their judgement is not uniformly negative in the text: one scribe answered Jesus wisely about the greatest commandment and was told he was not far from the kingdom of God (Mark 12:28-34).

The New Testament also keeps the plain professional sense. Tertius identifies himself as the man who wrote the letter to the Romans down (Romans 16:22), and Shimshai was the Persian provincial secretary who drafted the complaint that halted the rebuilding of Jerusalem (Ezra 4:8-9).