Before my daughter began her history degree, I had always viewed history as a search for objective truth. As per Mr Gradgrind in Hard Times: facts, facts, facts.
But I have learnt from her degree that, with apologies to Mr Gradgrind, history is never merely about facts. Facts are the raw material. History is the interpretation. Take Churchill’s famous remark, “History will be kind to me, because I shall write it.” Or Napoleon’s, “What is history, but a fable agreed upon?”
Take, for example, the war known in Israel as the Yom Kippur War. Whilst a time of great fear and suffering in Israel, it is ultimately looked upon as a resounding victory. That same war, in Egypt, is referred to as the October War. There too, it is seen as a resounding victory and the restoration of national pride. Two sides, each convinced that it won the same war!
The Alamo is viewed by Americans as a heroic stand against overwhelming odds. To Mexico, it is a suppression of a rebellion against a legitimate government.
I recall attending a lecture in London by an American historian near the end of Obama’s presidency. He was asked what he thought Obama’s legacy would be. His response was that it depended entirely on whether the next president was Trump or Clinton, because they would be the ones to shape the Obama narrative in one direction or the other.
In this portion, the story of the spies is retold. And, shockingly, it is told differently. Whilst there are many similarities, there are also stark differences. Of course, Bible critics, assuming a lack of depth, attribute this to different authors. But depth is the Bible’s middle name. I believe what lies behind the differences in the spies narratives is a sophisticated understanding of what history is really about.
History is not simply facts. It can never be, because those facts are always filtered through human minds. No historians, no history. He or she who believes history – any history – to be a completely ‘true’ version of events is blindly accepting that ‘truth’ from fallible and often self-interested human beings.
The value of history, rather, is that it shines a light on the human experience. And this is precisely how the Bible uses it.
Did God tell Moses to send the spies, or did the Children of Israel request that they be sent? There is truth in the idea that God wanted them sent. And there is truth in the idea that the Children of Israel wanted them too. The Torah is not trying to satisfy our interest in every historical detail. Rather, it is pointing to something deeper about the relationship between God, human choice and responsibility.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that history – the Bible included – is made up to teach us lessons. By no means. The past is what happened. History is our attempt to describe and understand it. The hubris of post ’67 Israel led to initial crushing defeats at an underdefended border. But they were able to turn that ultimately into a resounding victory. For Egypt, the humiliation of ’67 was entirely wiped out by the initial successes. National pride was restored and what came after was irrelevant. No one is delusional. It’s just the same facts filtering through different lenses. But there is much to learn about Israel and Egypt and human beings in general from the way each sees the story.
As I have learnt from my UCL history degree (that I’m vicariously taking via my daughter 🙂 ), history is there not merely to inform us of dry facts. Facts alone have little to offer. Rather, it encourages us to enquire, question, reflect and consider, so that we can better understand ourselves, our lives, those around us and our world.
