Jewish Invention Myths: The Seven Day Week

In conducting the research on the claim that jews invented the concept of the modern weekend that I have recently debunked. (1) I discovered that jews claim to have invented the seven day week with Israeli sociologist Eviatar Zerubavel arguing that the seven-day week is a jewish invention. (2)

The problem with this is actually contained in Zerubavel’s own argument in that he is forced to concede that the concept of the week itself first began with the ancient Egyptians who completely abandoned the lunar calendar and used twelve thirty-day months divided into three weeks of ten days. (3)

Yet the seven day week was actually first derived by the Assyrians and Babylonians which the jews simply copied and adopted which was likely transmitted via cultural and/or economic contact between the early jews and the nearby civilizations of Mesopotamia plus quite probably the military defeats of the jews (plus occupation of jewish territory) by both the Assyrians and Babylonians as well as their ‘Babylonian Captivity’, (4) which Zerubavel tries to obscure by claiming that what the Assyrians and Babylonians used were ‘quasi-weeks’ when in fact they must be interpreted as ‘true weeks’ (for lack of a better term) as predictably Zerubavel offers no actual reason for his differentiation beyond:

‘Such intervals, which I shall call quasi-weeks, undoubtedly bear a striking resemblance to the week and are often mistaken for it. Nevertheless, they are an essentially different phenomenon.’ (5)

Using this dismissive hand-waving without producing actual evidence in support of his position Zerubavel blithely claims that the seven-day week was – and is - a ‘significant jewish contribution to civilization’. (6)

Evidence against Zerubavel’s position is not hard to find since the basis of the seven-day week – Shabbos (i.e., the Sabbath) – is actually Babylonian in origin, (7) which further supports a Mesopotamian origin (probably from either or both the Assyrians and the Babylonians) of the seven-day week.

While other modern scholars – such as David Brown - dismiss Zerubavel’s position and assert on the basis of their archaeological and linguistic research that the basis for the jewish calendar system(s) – of which the seven-day week is part – is certainly derived from the Babylonians (8) whose research and work on different calendars probably dates back to at least 3,000 B.C. (9)

So, no: the jews didn’t invent the seven-day week.

The civilizations of Mesopotamia did!

References

(1) See my article: https://karlradl14.substack.com/p/jewish-invention-myths-the-weekend

(2) Eviatar Zerubavel, 1989, ‘The Seven Day Circle: The History and Meaning of the Week’, 1st Edition, University of Chicago Press: Chicago, p. 11

(3) Ibid., pp. 10-11

(4) Implied by Ibid., pp. 7-9; 14 although he dismisses the point he doesn’t offer actual evidence as to why this isn’t likely the case.

(5) Ibid., p. 9

(6) Ibid., p. 11

(7) T. G. Pinches, 1920, ‘Sabbath (Babylonian)’, pp. 889-891 in James Hastings (Ed.), 2003, (1920), ‘Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics’, Vol. 10, 1st Edition, Kessinger: Whitefish also Leland Copeland, 1939, ‘Sources of the Seven-Day Week’, Popular Astronomy, Vol. 47, No. 4, p. 176

(8) David Brown, 2007, ‘Mesopotamian Astral Science’, p. 465 in Gwendolyn Leick (Ed.), 2007, ‘The Babylonian World’, 1st Edition, Routledge: New York

(9) Stefan Maul, 2007, ‘Divination Culture and the Handling of the Future’, p. 365 in Leick, Op. Cit.