Help me find an article re Ancient Hebrews and memorization pls

[Chris in VA]

I read an article that explained how important accurate memorization was to the ancient peoples--particularly Hebrews/Jews. It spoke to the "Telephone Game" critique of the Torah and/or Old Testament, which says stories were radically changed and embellished over time.

Thanks.

[alpidarkomama]

I don't quite understand what you mean by "the 'Telephone Game' critique of the Torah." Stories were changed? What stories? And by whom?? :) I'm sure I can get you information if I understand a little more. Thanks!

[Ester Maria]

... but the only thing I found which makes a reference to the "telephone game" is a part of some blog post, which actually concerns itself with the so-called Kuzari argument for the truth of Judaism, not memorization per se:

Concern 6: How can one guarantee that the transmission process from generation to generation of the Torah was not compromised, like in the famous "Telephone Game"?

 

Response to 6: The "Telephone Game" is a game which is often used to demonstrate how information can easily become corrupted by indirect communication. In this game, people organize themselves in a line, and a player at the beginning of the line whispers a message as quietly as possible to his or her neighbor. The neighbor then passes on the message to the next player in line to the best of his or her ability. The passing continues in this fashion until it reaches the player at the end of the line, who calls out the message that he or she received. If the game is "successful", the message that the person at the end of the line calls out is different than the original message.

 

The difference between the "Telephone Game" and the Torah transmission process is the fact that in the telephone game there is only one person at each stage of the message-passing process; in the Torah transmission process, there are at least one hundred thousand people in each generation. Because whispering from one person to another person is not the most reliable method of communication, there is a significant chance that at least one of the people in the line will not relay the message properly to his or her neighbor. And this is enough to alter the message called out by the person at the end of the line.

 

Now let us consider a modification of the "Telephone Game" in which there are one hundred lines of people instead of only one line of people. The one hundred players at the beginning of each line each pass on the same message to the next player in each of the one hundred lines. Each neighbor in each line then passes on the message to the next player in each line to the best of his or her ability. The passing continues until the message gets to the end of each line. Now let us suppose that the messages called out by the people at the end of each line are not all exactly the same but they still all resemble each other very closely. And let us also suppose that there are parts of the message called out by each person at the end of each line which are all identical. Then would it not be reasonable to assume that these parts of the message were transmitted flawlessly through each of the lines of people? Most people would think so. Of course, there is a chance that these parts of the message were transmitted incorrectly in each of the lines and by coincidence the people in each of the lines made the exact same errors. But the chance of this occurring is so astronomically small that it is reasonable to believe that these parts of the message are identical to the same parts of the original message.

 

Such a modification of the "Telephone Game" is similar to the Torah transmission process. Everywhere in the world, Torah-observant Jews have received the Torah and the history of the transmission process of the Torah from previous generations. Yes, there are parts of the Torah and the history of the transmission process of the Torah which have varied slightly for different sects of Torah-observant Jews; however, the claims A, B, C, and D have been universally accepted by all sects of Torah-observant Jews. Hence, just as in the modification of the "Telephone Game", it is reasonable to assume that identical messages at the end of each of the one hundred lines implies a perfect transmission of the message, the fact that claims A, B, C, and D are universally held to be true by all sects of Torah-observant Jewry implies a perfect transmission of claims A, B, C, and D, which implies that claims A, B, C, and D are true.

You'd need to be a lot more specific about what was in that article, or about specific wording of things - what epochs, memorization of what (text or oral law?), etc.